World Set Free there was, Ithink, another motive in holding the

Great War back, and that was to allow the chemist to get well

forward with his discovery of the release of atomic energy.

1956-or for that matter 2056-may be none too late for that

crowning revolution in human potentialities. And apart from this

procrastination of over forty years, the guess at the opening

phase of the war was fairly lucky; the forecast of an alliance of

the Central Empires, the opening campaign through the

Netherlands, and the despatch of the British Expeditionary Force

were all justified before the book had been published six months.

And the opening section of Chapter the Second remains now, after

thereality has happened, a fairly adequate diagnosis of the

essentials of the matter. Onehappy hit (in Chapter the Second,

Section 2), on which the writer may congratulatehimself, is the

forecast that under modernconditions it would be quite

impossible for any great general to emerge to supremacy and

concentrate the enthusiasm of the armies of either side. There

could be no Alexanders or Napoleons. And we soonheard the

scientific corps muttering, 'These old fools,' exactly as it is

here foretold.

These, however, are small details, and the misses in the story

far outnumber the hits. It is the main thesis which is still of

interest now; the thesis that because of the development of

scientificknowledge, separate sovereignstates and separate

sovereign empires are no longer possible in the world, that to

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