The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1866-05-16
The World at War.

from TIE HOTto.
The actual condition of Christendom to-day
affords a striking commentary upon an observa
ton OF Stuart Mill that 1.-The remark of the early
enemies of the Gospel, see how these Christians
love one another, is not likely to be made by
anybody now" While the Mohammedan and
Pagan nations of the world are getting on peace
fully and quietly enough, the Christian powers
in both continents are in a ferment of war and
wars worst passions.
In the new world, Christian Canada is armins
against the Christian Fenians; Christian Mexico
is in blaze Of domestic conflict; Christian Bra.
zll and her republican allies OF Eastern South
America are laundering away at the gates of
Christian Paraguay; Christian Chill and Peru
are battling for dear life with the fleets of her
Most Catholic Majesty of Spain; and in our own
model Christian republic OF the United States,
great political party protessedly devoted to pro-
gress and philanthropy, is making the most per-
sis,ent and furious efforts to keep alive and in
tensliy all the hatreds, rancors, and spites engen
dered by the greatest and most terrible civil
war on record.
In Europe, Prussia and Austria, fresh from a
combined and successful attack upon the laws
OF nations, are preparing to cut each others
throats over the division OF The spoil snatched
by them from the gallant little monarchy of
Denmark; Italy is summoning all her str 9ngth
into the field TO strike for the liberation of
Venice from the tyranny of a foreign State and
France while loudly declaiming against a
violent solution of the great European ques-
tions of the day, calls out her military reserves
and raises an army as large as the host with
winch the First Napoleon marched to the inva-
sion OF Russia.
With what face can the missionaries sent out
by pious people in Christian States to preach to
the rest OF the earth an evangel OF peace on
earth ana good will to man, undertake now to
fulfil their errand Turkey and Persia, Egypt
and Morocco, really seem to be in less nee1
OF such dispensation Just now than ourselves.
The Crescent Just now sheds q milder and less
hnl of tIrI FI1,
go no further than our own Capital we must
admit that the worst rawlings of y cruel and re-
morseless fanatcism unoer the conquering
lsamite Caliphs of old are daily paralleied by
the way in which men claiming to be Christian
and republican Legislators talk of their fellow
citizens, lately their enemies, but now lying
defeated in the power of the Government.
What dervish or cadi ever transcended Mr..
Thaddeus Stephens atrociOus exclamation on
the floor OF the American Congress, that 'the
people of the South ought to be confined by
bayonets in the penitentiary of hellr And is
1t not enough to try ones faith in the reality of
human progress that a temper such as this
should, after eighteen centuries of Christianity,
be the outcome of the great American expert.
ment OF government by the people?
1t certainly implies higher average civiliza-
ton in the Old World that there is probably no
country in Europe in which public man could
venture to-day to utter such savage and brutal
sentiments as this of Thaddeus Stevens, which,
bad as 1t is, has been repeatedly rivaled by the
VI OlucT plOWlueuJ men OF Ilo same
party speaking on the same subject. But the
present political condition OF Europe reveals the
formidable ascendency on that continent, also,
OF the same spirit of violence which Just now
domineers over the West. Three years ago the
Emperor Napoleon Ill expressed his tears of the
progress OF that spirit to the greater European
cabinets, and urged it upon them to convene
general European Congress, in which the
European questions then pending might be
settled by diplomacy. England defeated this
appeal OF the French sovereign by her refusal
TO take part in such Congress; her statesmen,
accustomed to policy OF temporlzin and evasion,
having convinced themselves that it was better
to run the risk of a general European coniagra-
ton than to have France acquire an absolute
and visible predominance IN the councils of
Europe by carrying through to satisfactory
settlement all the veXed questions of the hour
All that Napoleon III three years ago loresaw
and feared has already come or is fast coming to
pass. Central Europe, from the Baltic to the
Adrlatic, has been suffering for months past
mos. of the worst financial and moral mischiefs
which actual war could impose; and the Lon
don journals which, three years ago, pooh.
poohed the Imperial propositions for congress
OF nations are now uttering doleful cries over
the prostration of commerce, and querulous
complaints of the brutality which insists upon
fighting over questions which diplomacy ought
to resolve.
Meanwhile, every day which passes weakeus
the hold OF reason and law upon the public con-
science OF Europe, and strengthens the passions
Which lead directly TO the worship of force as
the arbiter OF nations. Gerat armies are march
ing and countermarching; the uncertainty of all
things, political and financial, unsettles mems
reason, and eXcites their emotional nature; the
pride of blood and the traditions OF national
glory are evoked. In Prussia an energetic and
INSCRIPTIONS premier sees his golden opportu-
nifty daWning; in Austria high-spirited and
vehement young monarch, chahng under the
memories of the last war with France, grows
daily more impatient Of the provocations ad.
dressed to himself and his people by his Prus-
sian rival on the one hand, and his Italian
enemy on the other; in Italy the passions of a
whole race are aroused TO complete its triumph
over a hereditary foe, and to crown its newly
constituted unity by the redemption OF every
acre OF Italian soil to the protection OF the
Italian banner. To keep the peace OF the world
IN the midst OF such iIstigations and such
chances OF strife Is probably task beyond the
reach of diplomacy; and all signs conspire to
ind cate that Europe is entering upon another
Battle summer not less terrible than the
memorable season which earned that dread
name on fields drenched With blood from the
Rhine to the Yistula, and from Naples to the
Northern Sea-
If this return of Thor the Hammerer to the
control OF human affairs were accompanied by,
or were the melancholy but necessary condition
OF, any great development of new principles in
politics, ii would be less shocking and alarming
than it is But this is very far from being the
case; so far from being the case that both in the
Old World and III the New there is Just now
visibly growing disposition to abdicate much of
the ground gained for political freedom in the
past The thirty years. peace which in our
time has come TO an end, really threatens, 1t
would seem, to be followed by an age OF politi-
cal lassitude, in which the soundest principles
OF liberty are as likely to be called in question
and for time oVeIthrown as to be pushed for
ward to new and erander results,
MEETING OF Troy BANKERs.-A general meet
ing of all the Bank Presidents and Cashiers of
TROY was neld On Saturday afternoon ar tha