Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1883-05-09
A PECULIAR ARTICLE IN THE
HOME JOURNAL.

publication of an apology for dynamite
as the leading article of the New York
organ of fashionable society, the Home
Journal. The following is the singular
production:
We may denounce dynamite with right
eous indignation, but we must Acknowl-
edge the revolution it is efecting In the
arts OF offense and defense. AS gunpow-
der and rihed cannon and railroads
changed the former methods OF war, SO
this new agent has shifted against the
balance of power, reducing still further
the supremacy of brute force and mere
numbers Great armies and vast cities
are indeed, source OF weakness IN dy-
Mantle warfare, furnishing, as they must,
| the most vulnerable points OF attack for
| it's wholesale destruction. A barren rock
| in the secret mountains Of Switzerland,
with it's dynamite laboratory and conveys
by air or land, may set at naught all the
standing armies of The prond German
Empire, and drop annihilation upon its
walled cities at any hour by night or day.
At this moment single wayfarer, with
dynamite in his pocket, throws the cities
in England in greater terror than weuld
an army of 100000 men landing
at Dover, with only the ordinary weapons
of guns and sabres A handful OF hunt
ed, homeless Nihilists are able to terrorlze
all the Russias, forcing its Emperor to
live the life of fugitive, and making
bis very coronation a problem of chance.
Jupiter with his lig Innings was scarcely
more master of the ancient world than
is the MOB with its bomb of dynamite,
the avenging Fate of modern monarch
| les.
At first glance the dynamite bomb
seems an implement of fiends, but clos
er view discovers in it potent minister
| of good. All triumphs and inventions
work inevitably in the end for the people.
| II is these scientific victories which have
made the populace of to-day other than
| the slaves and chattels of the ancient CIV
| ilizations But for these "the devine
right of kings" would still dominate the
world, and the great mass would be but
cheap material to builIl the tombs of the
Pharaohs. Every advance in science has
given the people an additional hold of
the sceptre of power Sometimes by an
increase OF the general wealth, as in the
| case of the steam engine, the loom, the
| sewing machine, sometimes by general
MULTIPLICATION of the means of destruc
ton, as in the invention of gunpowder,
cannon and firearms, making single
often more formidable than a phalanx ct
ancient swordsmen. Every increase in
the destruct:veness Of weapons of war
- rocnoot onI
ance for the individual war-maker. Thus
to-day the poorest Nihilist with his dyna-
mite is al object of more consideration
from the Gar and his mobiles than would
be forty thousand serfs of the Olden time
armed simply with slaves and forks AS
direct consequence the case of these
Door malcontents will be more needed
than it has been heretofore. Not even
proud England can escape the alternative
She may resist for time and try laws of
excessive rigor. but at last she will come
to respect this hidden force aud find it
wiser and cheaper tocultivate the Irish
mans good will than his i'll will. Thus
it will be found when the first mad out
burst of murder and destruction has clear
ed away that there will follow throughout
the world a more ready disposition on the
parts of governments to listen to the pet
ition of the humblest classes of the COM
munity, and to see that no burdens of
unjust laws are maddening them to re-
volt. The consequence will be an era of
comparative peace and good WILL greater
stability and less frequent revolutions in
Governments, and the eventual abolition
of standing armies. This consummation
can evidently be achieved most directly by
some agency like the perfected dynamite
bomb and electrical battery, which will
make great armies useless, make them
mere targets for destruction en- masse, in
stead of reserves of strength. In the fu-
ture. little corps of engineers with tele-
scope. batteries and balloons will take the
place of the numbering armies of the past
and finish in few days, Eperhaps hours,
what in olden times would have been a
thirty years war.
These effects will be observed wherever
the dynamite wave reaches; horror and
attempts at repression at first, then the
better counsels of discretion and human
itv. and at last a genuine recognition OF
the brotherhood of the despised classes,
and a sincere purpose to relieve their es-
tate and remove from them all unjust
determinations. We say unjust discrim-
nations, for it is increditable that all this
discomfort, this unanimity of outcry,
should appear through all Europe without
some serious justification in bad laws. 1t
is not human nature to vince without
pain; and in all ages the common people
have been more ready to accept and en-
dure impositions than to rebel without
cause against fair and equal institutions.
1t is a weakness in all Governments to
favor the rich at the expense of the poor.
Monarchies are avowedly Governments
of privileges for the few; but even repub
lies cannot quite counteract the tendency
of power to gravitate to the powerful.
Here is New York. which has been a
hundred years perfecting its system of
free institutions, and yet how many OF
lis laws discriminate against the poor in
plain defiance of principles? Happily
the case is not one to call for the inter
position of dynamite, but the discrimina-
tions are irritating to the classes discrlm-
mated against, and tend to ALLEVIATE them
| from the state which thew should look up