The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1875-02-06

Il d truth which cannot bs too often told
or said With too much emphasis that anything
short Of complete success Of this great COM
memoration viii be simply . disgrace to
the people Of the United States Why it
will bs 30, and why every element Of pride in
our classic history will be frustrated and set
at naught BY such . confession Of indifference
and impotence it is hardly necessary to show.
Yet it may not b wholly amiss, in view of what
We shall presently explain to Do some dis
couraging aspects of the immediate future,
TO say . few sober, earnest words on the
higher relations Of this great enterprise,
and it, influence, for veal or for woe, on
the social, political and economical future
Of our country. We ere the more free to do
80, not because we are converts to new faith
on the subject sharers of new hopes and
fears, but from . consciousness, entirely in
telligible to ourselves, of deeper and stronger
interest in il, growing in strength and in
tensity as the time of realization or disappoint-
ment draws near. 1t must be success, and
it is the duty Of every journalist in the land
for where has the press greater powers ?-to
make it so.
And here, on tho threshold, let us refer to
tho possible discouragements to which We have
alluded They do not amount to great
deal. but they are something. They resolve
themselves pretty much into disposition to
delay cooperation. It can hardly be called
indifference, but it is procrastination, and in
such matters procrastination has its perils and
its penalties. We would not do the heart Of
the great community in which we live, with
its afuence of means and generosity of tenn
per, the injustice to believe that when the time
comes, it would not feel a sharp pang at the
thought that through its delay to act in time,
in the presence of the world, of Christian and
Pagan nations, with their representatives at
hand to watch and mock, there had been fail
ure or questionable success. Yet it does not
act. It has not done its share. It has not, in
q tangible form, shown that it takes any, or
at least adequate interest, in what it would
deeply blush not to see splendidly succeed.
To say that at this moment New York cares
less about tho centennial commemoration Of
than it does about the Beecher
tricl or any other superficial ulcer that vexes
rs may Do somewhat Of an exaggeration,
but it has . monstrous favor Of truth about
it. Journalism has written tenfold more and
more earnestly on this wretched theme-which,
and its actors, accuser and accused, will, be-
fore o year has ended, have passed into the
limits Of forgetulness, among things tabor
tive, monstrous and unkindly mixed
than it has on tho picturesque termination
Of our century Of glorious national life.
There must be turning Of tho current into
better channels There must be an awaken
ing from lethargy, If lethargy it be. There is
infinite peril in delay. New York must act
now or her action win do no good. Unless
something b done We must sink down into
the poor attitude of spectators of . scene
which for success viii owe nothing to us
Thus it is that the Centennial now presents
itself to our view in what We have termed its
higher relations. We we'll know how difficult
it is to urge such matter on public attention
without falling into platitudes and spread eagle
ism and that tone at which fastidious taste
revolts- But We must take the risk. The
national music-the heroic airs of every peo-
ple-is very trite and common, played alike
on hurdy-gurdies land with high organ SYM
phonies and yet it never fails to stir the
heart Is there any reason, then, for reserve
on great historical themes which tho
schoolboy reads of and the statesman
ought to study, simply because they are
familiars Shall we, in connection with its
great and due commemoration, shrink from
writing and talking about the great event it is
meant anew to embalm merely because great
deal of puerile nonsense has been and
will continue to be talked and written
about it?
There is one direct and practical question
Of negative nature we put in this connection.
What would have been said and thought by
ourselves at home here in New York and all
over the country, and by the carping world
abroad, if the Fourth of July, 1875, had been
passed by unnoticed-if the first century of
q glorious and generally happy and pros
porous existence as q nation had been
allowed to die out like any common
year or month or week2 No one doubts
what the answer to this is. Anniversaries
and centenaries, like condolences, may
be very irrational, unphilosophical things. but
they have their influence, and . tender and
graceful sentiment hangs around them. We
celebrate our own and our children's birthdays,
not as Dean Swift did his own, by having .
jeremiad read. but joyously, and our silver and
golden weddings, and on sadder anniversaries
we go TO the graves of the dead. Yet nations
hundredh birthday, we are told, is not to
be honored; at least we won't take our share
in paying that reverentlal tribute.
Putting aside for moment the remote past
and its supposed associations, is there not
something to stimulate cooperation in that
which il more recent and far more sadi Can
we say that after all our trials and sacrifices
We are . united or a reunited people I; that