Morris tribune. [volume] (Morris, Minn.) 1880-2000, 1882-10-26


which, consisting of mingled personal
attachment and devoted loyalty, causes
them to met death for his sake, and
bless him when dying"
WHAT walked THE WORLD.
The Movement Which Aroused AL
Christendom Against Slavery,
From "Hot Plowshares," in Our Continent
October IL.
In Our Continent, Judge Tourgee
sketches in powerful words the combina.
tons of events that led to our great civil
and political conflict of twenty yearsago
He brings into their true relationship the
great discoveries of the time in chap
ter which every Americae ought to read:
Time fled. The world moved faster
than ever before. The telegraph was be-
ginning to unity thought. Like giant
centipede, it crept over the land. 1t
stole the merchants secret and sold it to
rival thousand leagues away. 1t
made principal and agent one. It fed
brain with fact, and gave to mind the
obiquity of the Infinite. It made every
man an Adam, and marshaied the worlds
life before him.
The curtain of darkness was rent in
twain, and beyond the Mississippi a
boundless empire was revealed. The
Golden Gates were uplifted, and the ira
ditions of the Orient begglared by the
facts of the Occident. For 200 years the
world had hungered for gold and found
no new supply. The temples and pal
aces of India had been ravaged by ruth
less hands to satisfy the greed of civil
zation. The jewels of her godss hone in
the royal crowns of Europe. Brave men
wore with pride the gems that valor had
sweethearts and courtesans of Christen-
dom Haunted upon the snowy arms and
billowy bosom the pillage of the I'M
believer.
But, alas! the supply was almost ex-
hausted. The lands that Cortez and Pr
zarro ravaged, stripped of the stores the
Abtecs and the. lncas has amassed In the
unknown centuries before the robbers
torch shed light On their stores, lay bar
rem and unheede;l under the torrid sum
shine. When the chance for plumber
passed away, the light of civilization
fled. Mexico, Potosi and Coquimbo gave
steadily decreasing output. All the
rest of the world was guessed by beg
carly ten million yearly of actual gain
of the worlds u re. When begums and
rajahs became pensioners rather than
victims of legaliz d plunder-when the
East called for all, instead of offering an
unlimited chance for looting-then the
romance of India was gone, and it be-
came only refuge for parsimony an.
tn thrift, a,r which Gill; were we're content t
long delay for moderate gain.
The wall that encircled China had
been broken down, but only the paltri-
est tribute could be wrung from peo-
pie whose economies stupefied even the
thriftiest of Europeans, and demanded
for their expression a coin hundred
times less in value tran the meanest that
ever boosted queens face.
The world was base and man was
greedy. For 100 years the supply of the
precious metals had steadily diminished.
Commerce had increased meanwhile q
thousand fold. The accepted basis of
exchange had grown less and less suffi-
cient for the worlds need. Already the
human mind was busy devising substi-
tutes. Production was limited, not by
| demand or by the capacity for supply,
but by the difficulty Of transport and the
| paucity of an indestructable measure
Of value. "Gold! Gold! Goldp' was the
hopeless cry of all the world. It was
generally believed that the earth was
virtually exhausted ofprecious minerals,
and no one supposed that the supply
would ever be materially enhanced.
So the world ran wild when gold
en- plains and silver mountains out
spread themselves before its famished
eyes. All Christendom felt the throb of
| an Unsuitable greed. The lust of sudden
wealth thrilled peer and pauper. The
| desert that lay between was robbed of
fear. The tropic sun blazed down in
vain upon the reckless wayfarers. The
! CLINT ofgold outsnone the stars. Distance
could not dim it. Difficulty could not
quench desire. A grain of yellow dust
| infamed hundre he ,rts. Asingle mug
| get fired thousand souls to new exer-
ton. Men who would have died clods
lived to be envled of princes through
the lust born of gold streaked
| lump of snowy quartz shone in a shop
window. Thousands failed. Thousands
died. The highways to the land ofprom-
Use became endless channels. Dead
mems bones pointed the way to those
who came after. The sharks of
/ tuO SCOutucTu seas STcW ldb Oll Ire.
quent corpses. Yet over the dead all
the more greedily pressed the living.
For eve:y one that fell there was
thousand that sprang up. For every
one that went there ten thousand that
| sought to 60. For every one that came
! back laden there were a million that
| dreamed that they might some time
know like good fortune; and because
of this dream wrought more earnestly,
saved more persistently, and so achieved
more richly than they would other
wise have done. So science and greed
/ stirred the world into new life.
Wherever trade went the fever flew.
Gold flowed through the world like
water III comparison with the dearth
4 that had been. Half decade yielded
more than half century had given be-
fore. dust" and nuggets grew familiar
to all eyes. The slang of the mining
camp crept into the worlds speech.
Palms that had only known shillings
were gladdened with crowns. The
child leaped from his cradle
to join in the struggle for gold. The
/ peasants heart grew big and his arm
waxed strong as he saw possibility that
he might yet be richer than his king
Mammon gave his right hand to Democ'