The Icelandic Canadian - 01.09.1968, Side 20

18
THE ICELANDIC CANADIAN
Autumn 1968
The Norsemen who occupied the
Isle of Man established a Parliament
lor the island, now called The House
of Keys. Eirikr the Red (Thorvalds-
son, who settled Greenland, laid the
foundation there for an Althing to
govern the island, wholly independent
of the Althing already established in
Iceland. If Thorfinnr Karlsefni had
•been able to maintain a settlement in
Vinland (whether the locale was New-
foundland or Cape Cod is of no
moment), it would have been indepen-
dent of Greenland, Iceland, and Nor-
way. One can generalize: he who brooks
no blemish in himself will not form or
help to develop a state, an empire,
or a world power, in which there are
second-class citizens; he would not
seek to establish two levels of citizen-
ship.
The advance, however, may not be
geographic but ideological. If it is by
force and is perpetuated by force it
violates the same basic principle.
So also the advance into other coun-
tries may be economic. Here legitimate
trade, reasonable financial co-oper-
ation and assistance must be excepted.
Financial control, however, may be
abused and may endanger the econom-
ic and finally the political indepen-
dence of a country.
Brook no blemish in yourself! That
self-directive cannot be over-empha-
sized. It helped to develop positive-
ness in the feeling of fatalism which,
all the authorities agree, was deep-
rooted in the ancient Norsemen. A
man virtually said to himself: “If I
am fated then I must so direct myself
as to be worthy of that for which I
am destined.” It can be and has been
applied in all phases of modern hu-
man conduct, in commercial enter-
prises as well as in domestic affairs,
socially as well as in athletics.
The second rule of conduct is to be
found in the last two lines of the third
verse of a “Song of Praise” (Lofsong-
ur) by Rev. Matthias Jochumsson,
which is now the National Anthem of
Iceland. The following are the two
lines:
VerSi groandi JrjoSlif meS Jrvorrandi
tar,
sem Jjroskast a guSs-rxkis braut.
Give strength to our people, diminish
their tears
On their course to a kingdom of God.
This is a prayer to God but it is
not a prayer for help in building a
kingdom in a mould of man’s choosing
(where power usually becomes the
objective); it is a prayer for guidance
in building a kingdom of the kind
the conscience of a thoroughly honour-
able man tells him God would want to
have builded.
The invocation is to God and it is
not limited to the Trinity of Christian-
ity. It could equally be to Yahweh of
the Hebrews, to Allah of the Moham-
medans, to the Creator, to the Uni-
versal Mind — no matter what word
is used. The power that inspired Got-
ama, the last Buddha, or which created
the doctrine of Confucianism, and the
philosophy of Hinduism, may equally
be supplicated.
If communism is distinguished from
forms of dictatorship then it would
not be unrealistic to say that the
theory originated by Marx and Engels
is an unconscious deification of the
working classes — the proletariat. They
envisioned an ultimate classless society
of workers, which to them would be a
heaven on earth. World experience has
shown that the acceptance of that
theory is capable of creating an intens-
ity of zeal and a willingness to sacri-
fice one’s own life as if a deity were
being worshipped.