Men forget their own infirmities in their endeavour to help each
other. Before the war we had a phrase which has taken on a new meaning
now; we used to talk about "lending a hand." To-day we lend not only
hands, but arms and eyes and legs. The wonderful comradeship learnt in
the trenches has taught men to lend their bodies to each other--out of
two maimed bodies to make up one which is whole, and sound, and
shared. You saw this all the time in hospital. A man who had only one
leg would pal up with a man who had only one arm. The one-armed man
would wheel the one-legged man about the garden in a chair; at
meal-times the one-legged man would cut up the one-armed man's food
for him. They had both lost something, but by pooling what was left
they managed to own a complete body. By the time the war is ended
there'll be great hosts of helpless men who by combining will have
learnt how to become helpful. They'll establish a new standard of
very simple and cheerful socialism.
There's a point I want to make clear before I forget it. All these
men, whether they're capturing Hun dug-outs at the Front or taking
prisoner their own despair in English hospitals, are perfectly
ordinary and normal. Before the war they were shop-assistants,
cab-drivers, plumbers, lawyers, vaudeville artists. They were men of
no heroic training. Their civilian callings and their previous social
status were too various for any one to suppose that they were heroes
ready-made at birth.
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