New-York tribune. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1866-1924, 1878-02-27
THE FUTURE or TIE REPUBLiC.

TIE FUTURE or TIE REPUBLIC
Ralph Waldo Emerson, ecturing in Boston
the other day on " TIC Future OF the Re-
''public,r vcnturcd such rosy and confident pre-
dictions Of our coming glory az bettted
patriotic American, and comforted his listeners
with the assurance that, in accordance with
the prophecy OF Napoleon Bonaparte, the
United States would ere long dictate the policy
of Europe. We are passing through great
crisis in our history, but nevertheless. the
humanity of all nations Is now in the Amer
I" lean Union; here alone is the pathway OF
progress free and open, the barrier of ancient
restrictions and inequalities removed, the
activity Of tho human mind con-
stantiy stimulated Our Institutions are
al! educational. We advance necessarily
from ruder to finer conditions. " If any great
"mstakc is made ont of which disaster grows,
"thc people correct it with energy" Our
"civl system, by perpetual appeal to the
"prople, preserves It's life The people
"shlick Their excamati0nS against the short
"comngs of the Government The fact that
eve are "A nation of individuals, with Il high
"ly intellectual organization, that we can see
land feel moral distinctions, and have such
ORGANIZATIONS that moral law and moral
forces must he heard and felt, these things
"arc our hope" 1t is true that onr civiliza-
ton is yet incomplete, but Mr.. Emerson feels
THAT III all directions the light Is breaking
THAT trade and government will not lose by
"thc overthrow of the enemies OF mankind;
"that the useful and the elegant arts will be
"cyerci,ed with us rs a Nation that reason,
"thc noblcst affections, and the purest rcllg-
zion will find their abiding home in our in-
" sttutIOns.'
II is n significant circumstance that Mr..
Emerson's hattcring sketch of the character,
tendencies and destiny of American civiliza-
tion has been received with loud cries of dis
sent. In the passages which we have quoted
there is nothing particularly new. American
orators have uttered the same praises and the
same predictions time out of mind, AMI Amer
lean audience. have listened 10 them with
enormous complacency. We seemed. little
willie AGO. TO have settled INTO the fixed be-
lief that there never had been, never could
be, q people so wise, so just, so gooh, so
strong as the people of the United States OF
America. But suddenly our temper has changed.
We have awakened from the placid contcmpla-
ton of orr own greatness. and discovered that
we are. after all, very much like the rest of
the world, only common men, with the faults
and failinys and temptations of our race, sub
iect to the dangers which have besct all other
nations, and to the punishment which surely
falls upon all countries which violate the
principles of morality and social order. Some
of our political leaders have cultivated vulgar
prejudice and ignorance, winkcd at dishon-
cstv, and flattered dcmagogucs. and we have
thought it no matter, because our Consti-
tuition was so strong that poison could
not hurt it, Now comes the rude
arousing. just and free government needs
some other foundation than just and free
constitution. 1t can rest secure only upon the
broad basis of popular morality and in
telligcncc, and the dreadful fear is beginning
TO attack us that this basis we have failed to
supply. In the light of recent events the
American people do not appear to be quite so
good "A they thought themselves. The quality
of which they show the greatest lack is just
that sensibity to moral distinctions and moral
forces which Mr. Emerson mentions as our
strongest hope.
Undoubtedly the depressed feeling 80 evident
lust now Ill lnOSc Tiils ol tiO CouItIN WHICH
have escaped the prevailing mama for repu
diation is not altogether jnstiliablc. But it
has some good cause. Mr.. Emerson says that
here we have "al mankind in its shirt
sleeves" We are all at work, and We have
naturally come to place an exaggerated value
upon merely material prosperity, and to pay an
exaggerated respect To material success. We ask
of Il PROPOSED measure not is II honorable Z"
but "Will it pay?" The most dishcartcning
thing about the cheap dollar movement is the
Indifference of the majority of its advocates
TO all circumstances against the intrinsic dis
honesty of what they propose to do, and the
plain determination of great many Of them
e support it expressly because it gives the
debtor an unfair advantage over his creditor.
There WAS, perhaps. not one Of the defeated
Senate amendments which they rejected with
more scorn than that which would have made
the silver dollar Of equal value with gold at
the start. If the new dollar is 10 be worth
one hundred cents they do not want it. We
shall live through this trouble. There is still
too much virtue III our people, too much Vi
tally in our political institutions, to permit ms
to despair of the Republic. But we fear we
shall not rise again from our disgraced stu
alton until we have learned by painful eXpe-
rience that moral uprightness "pays" better