The Redwood gazette. [volume] (Redwood Falls, Minn.) 1873-1940, 1876-08-03
International Prejudices.

Undoubtedly it is difficult to keep our
affections from prejudicing our reason; to
judge things by their intrinsic value, and
yet TO value them in practice by their i'm
portance to ourselves; and, in short, to re-
frain from declaring our own favorite
geese to be swans. But that is Just one of
the lessons we all have to learn in our pri-
vate relations, ON peril of bitter disap-
pointment to ourselves and serious injury
to those we love. A man who is capable
of learning by experience finds out that
the face of one whom he loves need not be
the most beautiful in the world in order
to be most delightful to his eyes: and that
he may admit that the maternal instinct
which proportions affection to the weak
ness of its object instead of to its abstract
merit is SO far from being irrational that
it represents the great condition of dOmes-
tic happiness. The paradox of patriotism
is precisely the same. A man may hold
that Frenchmen or Americans are every
whit as good as Englishmen IN all essen
tials; that virtue and wisdom are unfOrtu-
nately not confined by the four seas or the
horizon visible from his parish steeple );
and he may be as ready as his neighbors
to die for his country, to do his best to
carry the English flag to the North Pole
or Timbuctoo, or to give his whole strength
to remedy the many evils which threat
en- our social welfare. In this sense, in
deed, the worse his country may be the
greater its demands upon him, and the
more convinced he is that it is behind
his neighbors, the greater should be his
efforts to bring it up to their level. The
whole difficulty, in fact, lies in this per-
sistent assumption that because l love a
country or a person l must logically hold
it to be the best of all countries or persons.
That is the temptation, not the legitimate
inference. My country is, or ought to be,
dear to me, because l am tied down to it
by thousand bonds of birth, connection
and tradition; because it is that part of
the world in which can labor to most
purpose; because my affections are gov
erned by all kinds of associations which
have no connection whatever with my in
tellectual estimate of its value. But this
is just what people in general refuse to see.
They insist upon drawing an illogical in
ference. If am forced to admit by evil
dence that another race is in any respect
better than my own, they declare that l am
unpatriotic. They do not condescend to
inquire whether my recognition of that
fault leads me to love my country less.
That is taken for granted; and therefore
the test of patriotism is taken to be my
persuasion of the truth of certain conclu-
sions about matters of which, in ninety
terly incompetent judge. 1t is sought to
my emotions shall have logical basis
result is that l make a fictitious basis
by inventing the propositions which graft
fy my vicarious vanity, and then
assuming that it is the cause instead of the
effect of the vanity. must, for my part,
decline TO stake my patriotism upon any
such test whatever Something may prove
tomorrow morning that another nation is
better than mine, and then I must either
believe lie or cease to be patriotic.
claim the right, on the contrary, of express
ing such opinions as l can form, with alb
solute freedom, and without admitting
any inference as to my sentiment. l be-
lieve that Englishmen are in many and
important respects at the rear, instead of
being in the van, of civilized races. As a
mere matter of taste, generally prefer
the society Of intelligent Americans be-
cause they are not hide bound by British
prejudice. never 60 to Paris, or travel
in Italy without being impressed by the
great superiority of foreigners in many
respects, intellectually, artistically and So
cially. But for all that, may be just as
patriotic as the Briton who makes his first
trip to the Continent, when he is already
soaked to the core with native prejudices
and swears that all foreigners are filthy
barbarians because he does not find soap
by his basin in the first hotel. Why not
A man may love his children better than
all the world, and yet know that they are
short, ugly, stupid and far from being
models of all the Christian virtues
COrnhiW MAGAZINE.