THE TABLET A WEEKLY NEWSPAPER AND REVIEW

ESTABLISHED 1840 REGISTERED AS A NEWSPAPER

VOL. 168 No. 5033

LONDON OCTOBER 24th, 1936

SIXPENCE

THE WORLD WEEK BY WEEK

PRINCIPAL

. 545

CLOSING IN ON MADRID ; SPAIN IN EUROPE : THE PRICE OK SOVIET FRIENDSHIP ; CIANO IN BERLIN ; THE ABUSE OF NATIONALISM ; NO SUMMONS FOR PARLIAMENT; “ POPULAR EDUCATION” LEADING ARTICLES 543

WHEN ENGLISHMEN JUDGE EUROPE ; SELLING THE SAINTS RELIGION IN AN AGE OF REVOLUTION,

VI ................................................................. 549 By CHRISTOPHER DAWSON ABYSSINIA RE-VISITED, I I .............................. 551

By EVELYN WAUGH TYNDALE’S NEW TESTAMENT . . 554

By HUGH POPE, O.P. CHRIST THE K I N G .......................................... 557

By RONALD KNOX ROME LETTER .......................................... 559

CONTENTS

THE CHURCH ABROAD .............................. 561 AN AUTOBIOGRAPHY, VIII .563

By G. K. CHESTERTON FRENCH PAINTING..........................................566

By J. POPE-HENNESSY THE REUNION MOVEMENT IN THE

CHURCH OF ENGLAND..............................568 BEAUMONT COLLEGE .............................. 569 BOOKS OF THE WEEK .............................. 570

MARGERY KEMPE ; FOREIGNERS AREN’T FOOLS ; ROMANTIC IDEALISM ; THE THIRD REPUBLIC ; INDIAN PHILOSOPHY ; F. F. URQUHART ; FICTION CHRONICLE CHESS AND CROSSWORD......................... 578 THE CALENDAR ..................................... 580 APOSTOLATE OF THE COUNTRYSIDE . 580 — " ■■■■• — ■ . . . i

THE WORLD WEEK BY WEEK Closing in on Madrid

The flight of President Azana to Barcelona, the dissensions between Caballero and Prieto, and the unexpected ineffectiveness of the attempts to defend Madrid, all point to the rapid collapse of the Red resistance to the national uprising in Spain. General Franco continues to move carefully, and at times slowly, and the progression of his encircling forces, involving, as it does, much careful co-ordination, is reminiscent of a good chess player developing a farreaching combination. It is possible now to look back over three months and to see with what forethought and restraint the military operations have been conducted. Trained troops had to be the nucleus of the rising, but what the army really offered was a chance for Spaniards themselves to save their country. General Mola, in a recent interview, declared that the forces under his command multiplied themselves by ten in the first two days after he raised his standard at Pamplona. The movement which today can maintain in the field the armies now closing in on Madrid and the forces investing Bilbao, also maintains law and order, and enables life to proceed more or less normally throughout the greater part of Spain. Those who would still pretend that it is not in the truest sense a great national movement must believe that its forces are somehow so numerous and powerful that they can hold down a hostile population in province after province, an admission which is itself a recognition of the huge recruitment of ordinary Spaniards to the insurgent cause. Every effort has been made, naturally enough, to stir up local disaffection in Morocco and in the centres held by the insurgents, and far from the centres of conflict. Small garrisons, surrounded by hostile populations, would inevitably have suffered had they not been able to rely upon general goodwill.

With the relief of Oviedo, the nearest that the Red forces had come to a spectacular success has ended in their defeat. Little is now heard of the investment of Saragossa, and while Catalonia remains the stronghold of both anarchists and Communists, there seems little prospect of their combining effectively when they find themselves on the defensive. Spain in Europe

The military caution shown by General Franco has been accompanied by an increasing definiteness in his political utterances. Very notable is his declaration that the new Spain will play a much larger part in the international business of Europe than did the old. The country will be more formidable and will compel more respect. This aspect is now looming large in the calculations of statesmen. This week-end there assembles at Biarritz a party conference of the French Radicals, the men who are the heart and soul of French Parliamentary democracy. When that democracy has been assailed, with only too much justification, for the gross corruption it has harboured, it has been to the heart of the Radicals that the accusing finger is commonly pointed. In their strength and their weakness the French Radicals are the typical French deputies, and they are faced with most difficult decisions today for the future, not only of their country, but of their particular regime. They can bring down M. Blum by withdrawing from the Popular Front, in which they are the most moderate element, and a counterpoise to the Communists. They have to calculate whether the resulting elections would restore one of the familiar central coalitions in which they would form the principal element, or whether it would jeopardize the whole political structure. In the elections in May the two extremes to the Right and the Left gained at the expense of the centre parties, the Socialists increased and the Radicals diminished. But they have the strongest reasons for taking a stand to prevent the Government becoming more closely involved with its Communist allies.