65° - 01.07.1968, Blaðsíða 29

Guide Lines to Permanent Peace
by
Hon. W. J. LINDAL
Dwelling on truths that appear to have been
lost, Henrik Ibsen laid down what has become a
classic quotation:
Evigt ejes kun det tabte.
Freely translated:
Only the lost is eternal possession
In a realistic sense, that of the past which seems
to have been lost is not lost if it has been pre-
served in records which nothing can destroy.
Such records may prove to be priceless. They
may contain examples of human action which
could be valuable guidelines for the erection of
a structure for permanent peace on earth. The
guidelines may be found in the histories of many
lands, in records both temporal and spiritual. It
is equally inevitable that there will be overlapping,
that some are clearer and more definite than
others.
My book, The Icelanders in Canada, was writ-
ten primarily as an exposition on the thesis that
the ancient Icelandic Sagas and Eddie poems
present such guidelines with unusual force and
clarity. Following Hutchinson’s book, “Milton
and the English Mind”, I used the words “the
Icelandic mind”, and as the same mental pro-
cesses have continued to this very year, I gave
my thesis the title: The Icelandic Mind in Con-
tinuity.
The words “Norse mind” might have been used
except that the actual records are to be found in
Iceland and in the thoughts of Icelanders who
migrated to the Western Hemisphere. Another,
and perhaps a fairer way of referring to this
attitude of mind, is to say that it has existed in
the other Scandinavian countries and elsewhere
but not with such clearness nor so definitely con-
tinuous as in Iceland.
Four principles as laid down in that continuity
of thought and resulting action will be discussed.
The first, perhaps the most fundamental of
them all, is to be found in the Sagas and the
Eddas. It probably developed in the evolution of
Norse mythology and is much older than the
sagas and poems in which it is recorded. In the
original Icelandic (Norse) and the English trans-
lation it reads as follows:
Hann vill ekki vamm sitt vita.
He brooks no blemish in himself.
This is a directive, perhaps the most powerful
directive a human being can apply to himself.
His conscience would dictate what he regarded
as a blemish in himself, but the application of
that directive would, through that very process,
be character building and in course of time a
norm would evolve in the community, not dis-
similar to the Christian “Do unto others as you
would have them do unto you”.
This is clearly and consistently revealed in the
actions of the Norsemen of old when they em-
barked upon expenditions in all directions. True,
when they met resistance no quarter was given.
But after the resistance had been broken, or if
they were received in a spirit of friendship, or
occupied areas not peopled, the true spirit in which
the advances were made is revealed. The man who
declines to do that which would be a stain on his
character will not seek to become a dictator, will
never build an empire of overlordship of some
over others, a mother country over colonies, an
aristocracy over a proletariat.
The Swedes, Rurik and Askold, in their ex-
peditions to what is now the Ukraine, did not
act the part of conquerors. They joined with the
Born in Iceland in 1882, Walter J. Lindal was
brought up in Winnipeg. After receiving three
degrees from Canadian universities he was ap-
pointed judge in 1941 and served until his re-
tirement in 1962. He is author of four books, the
last of which, “The Icelanders in Canada” was
published in 1967.
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