



Produced by Ronald Lee








  _BY THE SAME AUTHOR_

  A MODERN SYMPOSIUM.

  THE MEANING OF GOOD.

  JUSTICE & LIBERTY, A POLITICAL DIALOGUE.


  _PROBLEMS OF THE DAY SERIES_

  RELIGION & IMMORTALITY.

  LETTERS FROM JOHN CHINAMAN.

  RELIGION: A FORECAST.




  APPEARANCES




  APPEARANCES
  BEING
  NOTES OF TRAVEL


  BY

  G. LOWES DICKINSON
  AUTHOR OF "A MODERN SYMPOSIUM,"
  "JUSTICE AND LIBERTY," ETC.


  [Illustration]

  MCMXIV


  LONDON & TORONTO
  J. M. DENT & SONS LIMITED
  NEW YORK: DOUBLEDAY, PAGE & CO.




  All rights reserved




PREFACE


The articles included in this book have already appeared, those from the
East in the _Manchester Guardian_, those from America in the _English
Review_. In reprinting them, I have chosen a title which may serve also
as an apology. What I offer is not Reality; but appearances to me. From
such appearances perhaps, in time, Reality may be constructed. I claim
only to make my contribution. I do so because the new contact between
East and West is perhaps the most important fact of our age; and the
problems of action and thought which it creates can only be solved as
each civilisation tries to understand the others, and, by so doing,
better to understand itself. These articles represent at any rate a good
will to understand; and they may, I hope, for that reason throw one
gleam of light on the darkness.

For the opportunity of travelling in the East I am indebted to the
munificence of Mr. Albert Kahn of Paris, who has founded what are known
in this country as the Albert Kahn Travelling Fellowships.[1] The
existence of this endowment is perhaps not as widely known as it should
be. And if this volume should be the occasion of leading others to take
advantage of the founder's generosity it will not have been written in
vain.

I have hesitated long before deciding to republish the letters on
America. They were written in 1909, before the election of President
Wilson, and all that led up to and is implied in that event. It was not,
however, the fact that, so far, they are out of date, that caused me to
hesitate. For they deal only incidentally with current politics, and
whatever value they may have is as a commentary on phases of American
civilisation which are of more than transitory significance. Much has
happened in the United States during the last few years which is of
great interest and importance. The conflict between democracy and
plutocracy has become more conscious and more acute; there have been
important developments in the labour movement; and capital has been so
"harassed" by legislation that it may, for the moment, seem odd to
capitalists to find America called "the paradise of Plutocracy." No
doubt the American public has awakened to its situation since 1909. But
such awakenings take a long time to transform the character of a
civilisation and all that has occurred serves only to confirm the
contention in the text that in the new world the same situation is
arising that confronts the old one.

What made me hesitate was something more important than the date at
which the letters were written. There is in them a note of exasperation
which I would have wished to remove if I could. But I could not, without
a complete rewriting, by which, even if it were possible to me, more
would have been lost than gained. It is this note of exasperation which
has induced me hitherto to keep the letters back, in spite of requests
to the contrary from American friends and publishers. But the
opportunity of adding them as a pendant to letters from the East, where
they fall naturally into their place as a complement and a contrast, has
finally overcome my scruples; the more so, as much that is said of
America is as typical of all the West, as it is foreign to all the East.
That this Western civilisation, against which I have so much to say, is
nevertheless the civilisation in which I would choose to live, in which
I believe, and about which all my hopes centre, I have endeavoured to
make clear in the concluding essay. And my readers, I hope, if any of
them persevere to the end, will feel that they have been listening,
after all, to the voice of a friend, even if the friend be of that
disagreeable kind called "candid."


    Footnotes:

    [Footnote 1: These Fellowships, each of the value of L660, were
    established to enable the persons appointed to them to travel
    round