Welsh Journals

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THE part played by the small nationalities in the drama of World civilization and the relationship of true national ideals to the wider conception of world co-operation, were generally the main themes studied at the Welsh School of Social Service at Llandrindod Wells this year. To give these inquiries a fitting sense of reality, Denmark, home of a small nation a little bigger than the Welsh, was studied in detail and in relation to Wales. In inviting Mr. Paul Hansen, Founder and Principal of the People's College at Esbjerg, the school made an excellent choice of an expert to put the case of Denmark. The subject was of increased interest because the experience of Welsh educationists who had visited Denmark was drawn upon, and their findings were made avail- able to the school in a memorandum prepared for the occasion.1 Attention, for the sake of clarity, was limited mainly to a consideration of the Folk High Schools and to Rural Economics in Den- mark in comparison with conditions and ideals in Wales. It is quite impossible in a short article to record, even in outline, the essentials of the ad- dresses and discussions which the programme brought into being, but the spirit of the school can be best conveyed by the following quotations from the speeches heard at the various meetings. MR. PAUL HANSEN. "A uniform world culture is undesirable, and, what is more, it is impossible." "Education touches the springs of our nature only when it is given in the mother tongue." "The different nations are the different wells which provide and merge into the stream of civilization." "The idea of democracy came to Denmark from without-from France and from England,-but to this idea Denmark added equality and co- operation." "The success of democracy as a political sys- tem is bound up with adequate education." "The sounds and straits which separated Den- mark's myriad islands also joined them together." "The small nations are easier to organise. They are less complex in their social structure than the greater ones, and this means less wide differences of station between one citizen and another." "The Folk High Schools do not last for ever. From time to time they must renew themselves 1 Memoranda for a Conference on Wales and Denmark. Spurrell and Son, Carmarthen. WALES AND DENMARK by Frederick Evans, M.A. and reorientate their activities to meet new con- ditions." "The seasonal character of the occupation of the agricultural worker in Denmark causes him to fill the vast majority of places in the Folk High Schools. "Denmark has based her agricultural system upon the production of butter, bacon and eggs. By the strict standardization of these products, the improvement of the arrangements for col- lection and transport, and a close study of the British and German markets, she has reached stability in this kind of export trade. Speculation has been cut out, and quantity, as well as quality, has been standardized." "There are nearly forty different kinds of co- operative societies in Denmark." "Co-operation, in the end, depends upon an efficient educational system." "To educate a people, their enthusiasm must first be awakened." "The Folk High Schools came into their own after the defeat of Denmark in the war of 1864, when the slogan of the Danish people became- What we have lost outwardly, we must gain inwardly.' "It is not what you know that matters, but what you are." "The tradition of co-operation in Denmark has its roots in the co-operative cultivation of the land under the old manorial svstem.' "The cultivation of land through a system of small holdings can only succeed through the organization in parallel of all forms of co-opera- tion." "We have a saying in Denmark, When the Devil wishes a certain thing not to be done he sets up a committee to do it.' "The Folk High Schools in Denmark divi le naturally into the humanitarian, the nationalist, and the religious types." "There is no wealth but life." THE REV. Gwilym DAVIES. "During the last ten years the smaller nations have shown the greatest amount of unprejudiced support of the League of Nations, and have thought most clearly about it." "The Frenchman is mathematical and logical, yet in practice is often incoherent, the German is methodical and supremely practical, the English have a confidence and an air of unconscious superiority that carry them through most difficult situations, and the Welshman is shy, nervous, and self-effacing. Yet if we quote Mr Llovd George as a representative Welshman, what a