Alpena weekly argus. [volume] (Alpena, Mich.) 1871-1893, 1883-07-25
Dynamite as a Home Comfort.

One Of the oldest incidents in the
history of dynamite is the laudation of
IL by paper called the Home Journal as
means of elevating the condition of the
poor and oppressed, by enabling the
humblest and most obscure TO blow up or
kill at trifling expense anybody who
seems TO stand in the way of his happi-
ness. The home in which these doc
trines were accepted and acted on
would be very strange place, indeed,
and would not long need journal OF
any kind There is one comic side to
these views, but only one, and that Is
the notion that if the use of dynamite
by the downtrodden, unhappy, became
general, it would only be used for the
destruction of the tyrant and oppress-
or. 1t would be used, as everybody
knows, or ought to know, principally
for robbery and the unadorned
murder of enemies, just as the re-
volver has been. Nearly everybody
who buys revolver thinks, or
tries to think, he is buying il for self
defense, but the cases in which anybody
defends himself with it are very rare.
1t is mostly devoted to killing the unof-
Tending, or making them keep still
while their pockets are being rifled. The
man who invented it has a great deal to
answer for, rs any one will see who re-
fleets for moment on the awful de-
struction of life which IL has enabled
desperadoes in all parts of the world to
accomplish during the last thirty years.
1t gave the rufiian the power which he
never had before of carrying five or six
shots in his pocket without exciting OBJ
servation, and he has so used it as great
ly to increase the difficulty of maintain
ing law and order in all civilized coun-
tries. The best elements of society
have not profted by it at all. Its adj
vantage to the army or navy or police
has been very trifling, and there are
but few households whom it has ever
protected against attacks on either life
or property.
One of the most dangerous of the an
archical notions now afloat is the notion
that the oppressed, even when acting
singly, have just rs good right to use
the means of destruction against their
enemies as organized Governments have;
that an Irishman who does not like the
way his country is governed is as much
justified in blowing up the Houses of
Parliament as the Prussians to lombard
Paris. But the reason why the use of
the weapons of war against life and
property is reserved by old-fashioned
moralists for established Governm ents
carrying on openly declared hostilities,
is simply that it is for the interest of the
human race that the destruction of life
and property should not be undertaken
except in cases where large body of
persons, forming an organized society,
have after deliberation agreed that it is
necessary or desirable, and guarantee
that the world shall have occasional in
tervals of peace.
The progress of civilization has been
marked from the beginning by restric-
tions on the right of making war. First,
every one could attack anybody he
pleased, Just like the wild animals.
or families of savages under chief, and
finally was reserved exclusively for the
societies called nations. When the tide
of civilization rcccded during the Mid
die Ages, the right of waging war again
became diflused, and fell into the hands
of every large landholder. To go out
and attack Il neighbor, and carry off his
cattle, became one of his every day
pmusements. When the tide of civili-
Zation again began to rise, the right of
attacking people again began to be re-
strictcd. In every century we find the
number of those allowed to exercise it
diminishing, until finally it has become
confined in practice to the great nations.
Even small nations now are rarely al
lowed to go to war, and, when war
takes place, it is carried on by q million
of men on side, and is therefore rarely
undertaken unless very large body of
persons have agreed both that il is de-
sirable and that it is likely to attain its
object.
This is certainly on the whole great
gain for humanity. 1t may crowd a
great deal of killing into a short space
of time, but it gives long spaces of time
when everybody is sure that he will not
be killed, and will enjoy the fruits of
his labor. Moreover, it cnlarges the
role of discussion in human affairs, and
nothing is so important for the race as
this. Nothing does so much to educate
it, and make it reasonable; or, i'm other
words, to remove it from the animals,
whose unhappy fate it is not TO know
how to persuade.
The Nihilist plan of allowing every
man To carry his own bomb, and ere
move" such persons as he thinks SUI
perfluous or injurious to the commune
ty, would be u return to the wild-ani-
NAL stage of human history. 1t would
assimilate man once more to the tiger,
and, of course, if generally adopted,
would make organized society impossi-
BILE. The Industrious, the energetic,
the upright would in every generation
be blown up by the idle and vicious,
and these would finally have to live
apart in caves or trunks of trees, would
forget how to make dynamite or even
gunpowder, and have to rely once
more, like their progenitors, on their
nails and teeth, and on clubs for the
promotion of their happiness.-N. y
n