“WHOM the Gods would destroy, they first make mad.” Surely this wise old adage has a significant and sinister bearing on the condition of the world today. To every thoughtful man, our world appears to be drifting towards madness. The old restraints are being removed or ignored, while license and extravagance are apparent on every hand.

The tendency is to run to extremes, especially with the younger generation. Moderation is a forgotten virtue, and all the graver issues of life are flung aside in the insane pursuit of “pleasure.” We are presented with the spectacle of whole communities who are from day to day obsessed with an endless succession of crazes.

Startling clothes, freak fashions, jazz music, cubist and futurist pictures, meaningless “poetry”; these are but a few of the more obvious and least harmful symptoms. In the ceaseless rush for amusement, for excitement; in the mania for speed and every form of excess, we find an indication of the real nature of the psychic malady which has infected every class and invaded every activity today. Through one and all runs the high, harsh, strident note of insanity.

More sinister still is the prevalence of the same spirit of unrest and insanity in the wider worlds of international relations, and of economic, social, and commercial questions. Every newspaper brings tidings of crime waves, child murders and suicides, and an increasing number of cases of sudden and unaccountable “possession.” Even in the religious world we see the same extravagance, a zeal