War and CivilizationT.Y. Crowell & Company, 1901 - 52 pages |
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action adapt our political adapt ourselves American Anglo-Saxon world-empire Apostles artistic believe cant Christian cial citizens civilized nations civilized powers Congress corrupt COSMOPOLITANISM AND PARTISANSHIP Count Tolstoi Crimean War critics Democracy dum-dum Duty and Destiny endeavor English entire race evil fact failed to adapt Federalist foreign France French future Germany Gladstone gospel of Duty governmental machinery group system hand highest honest honor human imperial intelligence legislature lessons liberty Lincoln living loveth matter means ment modern moral mourned nature nineteenth century noble party system peace pension scandal philosophy of war poet police measure political machinery political questions present President protest qualities of heart race selfishness reason recent reforms régime remember semi-socialism served the race Sewanee Review shouted the barbarous slavery slough soldiers statesmen sure tariff teach teenth things thought tion to-day Tolstoi true cosmopolitan truly two-party system vote William Ewart Gladstone
Popular passages
Page 45 - Already our agriculturists and our laboring men have organized into groups which, while they have not been able successfully to cope with the major parties as yet, are surely, if slowly, disintegrating them. Other groups will be formed in time — indeed, exist to-day — for the capitalists work together, and so do the members of the liberal professions, even though the latter call themselves Independents and lack coherent organization. Such would be the course of our political development in all...
Page 11 - ... war may be applied, history teaching us that the very powers of evil themselves may, in God's providence, be developed into instrumentalities of good. The eve of a new century especially invites such a scrutiny and comparison. Arbitrary periods of time can in themselves have no effect upon the course of events; but the human imagination, attributing effects to such periods, may affect events. The close of the eighteenth and the beginning of the nineteenth centuries were marked by great changes...
Page 17 - He made and loveth all." What Coleridge would have thought of the love that manifests itself in the shooting down of feeble peoples who do not appreciate the blessings of the American and British Constitutions may be left to you to determine.
Page 46 - Such would be the course of our political development in all probability, even if things were working smoothly to-day, but the present confused state of politics will inevitably hasten the consummation described. Our two great parties, having no logical basis of division, have naturally floundered frightfully, and have cast about blindly for some plank in the shape of an effective issue that would float them. Thus it is that they have deluded the people into voting on questions of the currency, which...
Page 50 - ... the other hand, that the man who remains inside a party some of whose actions he despises countenances wrongdoing, and in so far loses in moral character and moral influence. It is certain, also, that if all good, true men would not only withdraw from corrupt parties, but denounce them, the glamour which has already begun to vanish from politics would completely depart, and we should all see — what some of us now see — that with the practical settling of theological and strictly political...
Page 49 - ... criticising and restraining legislature or Congress, strong only in a negative way through the proportional power of each group to be placated or through the combined power of two or more groups joined to resist an unjust and unwise measure, as are implied by the group system as it is understood to-day. It is to be observed, further, that neither semi-socialism nor the group system can be in reality subversive of the ultimate authority of the people, if the people is alert and vigorous. The socialism...
Page 10 - It is equally fatuous pessimism to say that it cannot be mended because human nature is human nature. Human nature is just as truly divine nature, and no evil was ever got rid of by the reiteration of its inevitability. If war is not an evil, let us give up the cant of dilating upon its horrors; if it is an evil, let us give up the cant of extolling the statesmen who bring it about, and the soldiers who are their instruments. We do not extol judges in their black caps, and public hangmen; yet they...
Page 26 - ... seems shameful that the duty of making it should have devolved on a foreigner. The answer is simple. With all his greatness, Bismarck had not been a genuine servant of humanity. He had served Germany, but in so far as he had served the world he had done it indirectly. Washington and Gladstone had spent their lives for their countries ; but they had also served the race, and every man, woman, and child knew that they would have cut off their right hands rather than promote the selfish aggrandizement...
Page 45 - ... little part among us now. The last great political question that confronted us was settled by war a generation ago. From Maine to Texas there is a practical unanimity, regardless of party, about the cardinal principles of democratic government. The questions that confront us are social and economic. It is true that in the South there is a socio-political question concerning the suffrage, but this, we trust, is being settled, and when it is settled we shall be in line with the rest of the country....
Page 49 - I think that the group system will be found to harmonize better than the two-party system with the semi-socialism which is slowly but surely revealing itself as the dominating governmental force of the future. Semi-socialism implies the same strong executive head, the same powerful chiefs of departments, the same permanent commissions and courts and boards, and finally the same criticising and restraining legislature or Congress, strong only in a negative way through the proportional power of each...