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the history of every other nation abounds.

"There is a rank due to the United States among nations which will be withheld, if not absolutely lost, by the reputation of weakness. If we desire to avoid insult we must be able to repel it; if we desire to secure peace, one of the most powerful instruments of our rising prosperity, it must be known that we are at all times ready for war.

"But in demonstrating by our conduct that we do not fear war in the necessary protection of our rights and honor, we should give no room to infer that we abandon the

desire of peace. An efficient preparation for war can alone secure peace.

"The organization of 300,000 able-bodied men between the ages of 18 and 26 for offense or defense at any time or at any place where they may be wanted. We must TRAIN AND CLASSIFY THE WHOLE OF OUR MALE CITIZENS and make military instruction a part of collegiate education. We can never be safe until this is done.

"To be prepared for war is one of the most effectual means of preserving peace. A free people ought not only to be armed, but disciplined; to which end a uniform and well-digested plan is requisite.”

If Mr. Bryan had made this little speech he would have been guilty of a noble plagiarism. The first two paragraphs were by George Washington, the third by John Adams, the fourth by Thomas Jefferson and the fifth by Washington.

What would the teachers who applauded Mr. Bryan have said to this? July 6, 1916.

THE NEW PROSPECT OF

PEACE

The portent of the new treaty between Russia and Japan is looming large upon the horizon of the British Empire. The Russo-Japanese explanation of the purpose of this agreement is too ingenuous to be true. Alliances are not formed to drive out a country which already has been driven out. Germany no longer possesses a foot of land, a harbor or a warship in China or its adjacent waters. Therefore the Russo-Japanese presentation of the aim of the new pact as being the permanent exclusion of Germany from the Far East sounds farfetched and fanciful to British ears.

Britons who direct public opinion and public affairs cannot fail to realize that it is England and not Germany that stands in the way of Japanese and Russian ambitions in the Far East. The summaries of the world's trade have shown for years that Britain was the dominant commercial factor in China. England's traders, scattered all over the productive parts of the Chinese republic, are the successful barriers to Japan's passionate desire to achieve the commercial domination of China. This fact is keenly realized in Tokio.

On the other hand, British statesmen and British traders alike are coming to a poignant comprehension of the fact that Japan is bitterly resentful of continued British commercial mastery in the Far East; that Japan is boldly throwing out commercial and political lines which will menace British primacy in China. A year ago, when Japan presented to Pekin the series of demands which spelt exclusive privi

lege for Japan and the Japanese in China, British public opinion was so strongly wrought up against Tokio's aggressions that only the highest political wisdom staved off an open breach between Britain and her ally who was fishing in troubled waters.

But that breach has been only staved off. It has not been definitely averted. Britain sees her commercial empire in the Far East doomed by the activities of two of her allies. That vision cannot fail to exert a powerful influence upon the course of events on the battlefields of Europe. It is an influence for peace, working in the direction of a rapprochement between Great Britain and Germany. While Germany was unqualifiedly victorious by the verdict of the map, peace could not be thought of at London. Now that Germany has been driven back somewhat on two fronts, the prospect of peace is not so unattractive to British eyes. The appalling price which Britain has paid for her inconsiderable gains on the Somme is another argument for an early peace. Britain has tacitly abandoned the plan which she proclaimed at the beginning of the war-the crushing of Germany. There is no more talk in England of putting an end to Germany by dismembering the German nation. Therefore, the inducement for a continuance of a war which is decimating the manhood of Britain as well as that of her great enemy has vanished.

On the other hand, Britain is realizing that the new alignment of military power suggested by the Russo-Japanese treaty-an alignment hostile to the very life of the British Empire will once more place her in her former position of

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isolation among the nations of the world. British statesmen are awakening to the fact that, by continuing their campaign against Germany, they are only throwing their one possible strong ally into the arms of their future enemies, the allied Russians and Japanese, after the war. Such an eventuality would place England completely at the mercy of her great commercial rival in the Far East. The picture of England's future is made still more somber by the fact that Japan already is geographically within striking distance of India, and by the additional fact that Japan's motto is "Asia for the Asiatics."

This combination of forces has

brought back the thought of many to the great vision of Cecil Rhodes. England, the United States and Germany in alliance could secure, for several generations, at least, complete dominance of western civilization and of West European ideals.

During the next two generations the fate of Africa, of South America, of Australia and much other territory that is not yet fully settled will be determined. How much of this surface is to be the white man's country? It is for us of this generation largely to determine, not by our words and professions, but by our deeds.

Mr. S. S. McClure's toast at a banquet of the staff officers of the German armies in Poland found hearty response. "To the United States, Germany and England, in alliance as leaders of western civilization!" Even in the midst of the bitterest fighting, the age-old dream of a white man's world lives as an indication of the deepest racial purposes.-July 18, 1916.

THE VITALITY OF NATIONS

The official bulletins from Petrograd these days indicate a dubious outlook for Austria-Hungary if they be taken at their face value. They would imply a state of mind in Vienna which is not at all in accord with the gay traditions of the capital of the "eastern empire." In Vienna itself, however, there is no depression observable which corresponds even measurably with the Petrograd bulletins. While they are making plans at Vienna to check the Russian advance, they are going on in buoyant mood with projects for the improvement of their city to fit it for the greater destiny which is in store for it in the event of a victorious outcome of the war for the central powers.

Vienna is so sure of the collapse of the Russian offensive and of the ultimate triumph of Austro-German arms that her chief municipal architect, Heinrich Goldemund, is perfecting a scheme of improvements which shall make the already beautiful city more beautiful than it is.

No great city would profit so much from the restoration of peace as would Vienna in the event of the retention of the "bridge" to the East which has been built by Austrian, German and Bulgarian bayonets. In ancient times the capital of the "eastern empire" was the great entrepot for the trade of the East, creeping by caravan from Asia across the Balkan peninsula and through Hungary on its way to the markets of the west. This trade, greatly augmented by the opening up of Asia Minor and by the improvement of land communications which have been already partly accomplished, will flow from

east to west and from west to east in an ever increasing volume after the war. Vienna is preparing to accommodate it even while the Russian guns are roaring at Kirlibaba.

And the ambitious designs which Vienna is preparing to put through as soon as the international council shall have withdrawn from the green table is a marvelous demonstration of the warm, young blood that flows in the veins of nations even the oldest of them, in a time of crisis.-Aug. 2, 1916.

PEACE NOT YET IN SIGHT

A grim determination to continue the struggle with unabated energy is the consensus of European feeling as indicated by the manifestoes of sovereigns, the utterances of statesmen and the forecasts of soldiers at the opening of the third year of war. Stripped of their verbiage, of their political appeal and of their partisan argument, these utterances resolve themselves into one unanimous declaration: "Nobody has yet won a decisive victory. We must fight on until the other side admits defeat."

Germany, despite some recent reverses, is still in a position to point to the map as the measure of its military achievements. And behind the military achievements is the outstanding fact of an improvement in the internal condition of the central powers, by reason of the good harvest, which in some parts is already being gathered.

The allies of the entente, having assumed the offensive on both fronts, are keen in their desire to push to the utmost whatever advantage they may have achieved. Of this group

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of powers Russia is especially unwilling to tolerate the sound of the word "peace," in view of the advance of her troops in both regions and especially in Asia Minor, in the direction of the much-desired outlet to open water.

In view of the belligerent voice of Europe on this sinister anniversary, there is every reason to expect

continuance of the terrible slaughter which has decimated the young manhood of the old world, and has sown a crop of rancors and resentments which will be transmitted from generation to generation.

There is only one hopeful feature of the situation. The demands of all the belligerents have been modified by the bitter logic of battlefields. It has become a settled conviction in the minds of peoples and of statesmen that no nation will be sentenced to death in the council chamber of Christendom at the end of the war. Each of the great belligerent groups has acquired a new respect of its antagonists. No nation, after the sacrifices and the heroisms which have marked all nations during two years of appalling conflict, is uttering the words "I will destroy."-Aug. 2, 1916.

Nationalism and Internationalism

COURAGE

On the body of a German officer who was killed in Champagne they found a letter. At the end of a description of what he saw in those three days of terrific war-a description in which he mingled expressions of hate and admiration for the French artillery--was this sentence:

"God knows what they have blown up now! From this moment I have lost all sensation of fear."

It was not that he had ever lacked courage; but the moment had come when his courage no longer was needed to combat with fear.

Philip Gibbs, writing from the British headquarters in the western theatre of war, says:

On

"Yet in the conclusion of this long dispatch I must say there are no signs of deterioration in the fighting qualities of our enemy. the contrary, the recent fighting has shown that the majority are very brave men, determined to sell their lives dearly, and in many cases willing to fight to death when surrender would be easy."

When Irvin S. Cobb returned from Europe he said that everything in war was different from what he had expected to see-except courage. "There are no cowards in the world," he said.

The thing hideous to consider is that every day, every hour, is lessening the numbers of the brave. Every hour the proportion of weak

lings in Europe is increasing. Men who have courage prove it and die.

When the war is over there will be work that will require a different, but equally admirable, courage. Repairing the waste will be a job for strong hearts. But if the courage that has illumined the battlefields can be applied to the duller work of field and factory the task will not be hopeless.-Oct 11, 1915.

AN INTERNATION OR INTENSER NATIONALISM?

Halil Bey, talking for the Turkish government, prophesies the creIation of a new economic unit that will comprise Germany, Austria, Bulgaria and Turkey with a free interchange of goods among themselves and tariff walls against outsiders.

"The most important result of the war," he asserts, "is that from the North sea to the Indian ocean a mighty group is being created which will forever maintain itself against British selfishness, French revenge, Russian ambition and Italian treachery."

Out of this speaks an intenser nationalism than has been known in the past. Instead of one power, a group of powers to build tariff walls against all other powers, consolidating their own armed forces and looking from within upon the world as a field for their commercial exploitation backed by military strength.

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