Lord Lansdowne—­to whom, whatever may be thought of some recent utterances, the country owes a debt of gratitude too little recognised, especially for his conduct of foreign affairs at a most difficult period during the Boer War—­stated his opinion that “in a league pronouncing a sentence of international outlawry upon any one country that broke away from its obligations you would have a material guarantee for the maintenance of peace.”  He pointed out how “the existence of such a league might perhaps have prevented the War in July of 1914, as it was impossible in that time of clamour and confusion when one suggestion after another made by those who, like Sir Edward Grey, were working for peace was rejected, to put forward a definite proposal for dealing with the dispute in a manner provided for by previous agreement.”  Lord Parker, whose authority carries the greatest weight with jurists everywhere, having the true lawyer’s instinct for putting vague proposals into definite shape, actually presented a draft of heads of agreement for the establishment of a League.[1] These heads would, to say the least, form the basis for discussion leading to practical results.  One or two of his proposed clauses may be quoted as expressing in definite language the fundamental principles which must be the basis of any such League.  The first may appear perhaps only a “pious opinion.”  It is really very much more.  Assent to it means the complete repudiation of the ideas which have guided German policy—­the ideas which made world war inevitable, and which will inevitably lead to war in the future unless they are abandoned.  Any nation which assents to the clause tells the world that it expressly rejects those ideas and agrees that its action shall be guided by principles diametrically opposed to them.  Assent to a declaration of the kind suggested would certainly affect the spirit in which international questions are approached in future, and probably the resulting action also.  It runs: 

“The League to recognise that war from whatever cause is a danger to our common civilisation, and that international disputes ought to be settled on principles of right and justice and not by force of arms.”  The last clause dealing with the admission of new members of the League is the complement of this.  There is to be power “to admit a nation as a member of the League, if satisfied in each case that the nation bona fide accepts the principle on which the League is founded, and bona fide intends that international disputes shall thereafter be settled by peaceful means.”  It is contemplated, and rightly contemplated, that there should be a possibility for the Central Empires to join the League sooner or later, but it can only be on terms of their rulers at the time saying expressly, “We abjure in the sight of the world and of our own people those principles of action which German rulers and leaders of thought have been inculcating for two generations.”  The choice for Germany would be either to stand excommunicated