SIR GERALD CAMPBELL

British Minister to Washing-
ton and Special Assistant
to the British Ambassador
to the U.S.A.

I know that some people like to
speak, and some toythink with all sin-

 

cerity, of freedom, justice, of “never
again” and they gain easy applause
from their audiences, but I am inclined
to think that what most of us in most
countries yearn for as much as any-
thing is stability.

By “stability” I do not mean rigidity
—not the unchanging institution, but
the shifting, supple balance of the
climbing mountaineer—in what we
have come to call the postwar world.
We do not know very exactly what it
will be like. We may have some totally
new issues to face just as, towards the
end of the last war, our thinking and
our planning was all upset by the addi-
tion to our vocabulary of a totally new
word—the word “Bolshevism.”

But, as things go at present, we should
be something like a group of partners
going into a new business without
much to hang a hat on except what
might be called “general intentions.” It
will not be much use playing about
with one another unless the chief gen-
eral intention is a chief general inten-
tion to cooperate, unless the partners
can, and want to, rely on one another’s
fairness and sense of justice, on one
another’s energy and ability, on one an-
another’s experience and connections.
That is the only way in which we can
proceed happily towards the “Journey’s
End.”

RICHARD H. WELLS
President-Elect, RI

It is time to reaffirm our belief in
the Aims and Objects of Rotary. I wish
I could bring a revival of the power
and message of Rotary in every Rotary
Club and in the heart of every Rotarian
in the world. If you are tired of the
Aims and Objects of Rotary, if they
seem trite and hackneyed to you, then
you are tired of Rotary, because therein
are the fundamentals of Rotary exist-
ence.

In Rotary, we ask each man to de-
velop himself and seek the service for
which his talents best suit him, and if
all Rotarians are serving, then Rotary
will reach its best and highest level of
achievement. There is a tremendous
power and influence which is generated
by men meeting together, a quarter of
a million of them, men of good will,
good desires, and good intentions,

<

 

meeting every week with the deter-
mination to know and to understand
one another.

As long as we adhere strictly to the
Aims and Objects of Rotary, and do
not allow ourselves to be sidetracked
into various and devious paths which
cause us to forget our real objectives,
we can avoid those cleavages and mis-
understandings which come about
through differences in our environ-
ment, in our language, and our philos-
ophies. No Rotarian is asked to accept
a particular theory of economics. No
man is asked to change his philosophies,
his opinions, nor his religion. But
every Rotarian can safely be asked to
believe high
ethical standards in business, and in the
broadening of the basis of his acquaint-

in better citizenship,

anceship, so that he may extend his
influence for good to his neighbors, to
his countrymen, and to all the world.

[5]

WILL R. MANIER, JR.
Past President, RI

The future does challenge Rotary,
and we have tried to meet that chal-
lenge. There have been many extrava-
gant predictions made about Rotary in
the past. However, I say that no predic-
tion that any one of you here could
make today would be as extravagant
as that of Paul Harris and his three
associates had they predicted in 1905
exactly what has happened in the last
39 years. |

I had my fling at trying to save the
world in far-off places when I was
President of Rotary International.
When I got back, I made up my mind
that the place to make my contribution
was right in Nashville. I’m not much
interested in doing anything except in
Tennessee and in my own community.
I believe that we are going to win this
war in the communities as much as in
the South Pacific and in Europe. If
each one of us and if each of our Rotary
Clubs can just do our full part back
home, and then multiply that by the
5,200 Rotary Clubs that we have now,
and ultimately by ten or twelve thou-
sand Clubs, we can achieve the goal of
Rotary—and with all of those members
from every classification and each of
those members a real Rotarian, there is
no telling what we might achieve.

So I say to you fellows, take Rotary
seriously, take your job seriously, but
don’t take yourself seriously. Let’s keep
Rotary simple. Let’s make Rotary real-

 

istic. If you do, you may achieve far
beyond your own vision of Rotary, just
as Rotary has always exceeded the
vision of everybody who has ever
thought about it.