Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1883-11-10

if there be any praise have these in your
mind, let your thoughts run upon these.
He continued That is what Plato and
the Prophets mean by loving righteous
ness, and making ones study in the law of
the Eternal. The philosophers and proph.
cts maintain that these matters, and not
the combinations of which the heads of the
politicians are full, do really govern poll.
tics, and save or destroy states. They
save or destroy them by silent, mex
orable fatality while the politicians are
making believe, plausiblY and noisily, with
their American institutions, British Con-
stitution, and civilizing mission of France.
And because these matters are what do
really govern politics and save or destroy
states, Socrates maintained that he and
few philosophers, who alone kept insisting
on the good of righteousness and the un.
proftableness of iniquity, were the only
real politicians then living"
He gives instances illustrative of the
truth he claims alone will save the State,
as, that the mere politician will not bring
about as close a union between England
and Ireland as exists between England and
Scotland. Again, the French literature
and drama of the day, viewed critically, in
cline one to exclaim that the French are
worshipers of the great goddess "Lubri.
city," Though the higher French literature
has more knowledge and broader range
than its great predecessors, it is less sound
and exerts less influence. Action and in
fuence are with the lower life nature of
France, and it promises to extend in Amer.
lea and England better than its predeces.
sors. But the worship of the goddess " Lu.
briefly" is against nature, human nature,
and it is ruin. So, instead of saying with
M. Renan that nature cares nothing for
chastity, we must realize that human ma
ship of the goddess in France constitutes
the real danger of France; and if the
French cannot see it, it is proof OF how far
the disease has progressed. The French
politicians, he holds, are so busy about cler-
icalism, Legitimist, Orleanist and Bona
partist intrigues, and colonial alliances
and foreign acquisitions, and the glory of
the flag, that they lose sight of the truth,
and of the real thing that must save the
state, for, as he puts it, the Eternal has
attached to certain moral causes the safety
or the ruin of states, and the present popu-
lar literature of France is a sign that she
has most dangerous moral disease"
The hope for France is that she is of
great numbers, and but for that she would
scarce escape the throttling arms of the
goddess. In the United States of Amer.
lea, with $1,000 600 people, the majority
doubts whether the majority is unsound-
"or, rather, they are sure it is sound" |
But, the lecturer insisted, our majority is
unsound philosophize as we may, that !
truth remains, and we cannot get away
from it, Where is our danger, then =? Mr.. |
Arnold tells us that it will be found in |
"the absence of the discipline of obedi. |
ence, the discipline of respect in the
prevalence of false acuteness, false |
smartness, false audacity. Whatsoever
things are nobly serious, or have true ele-
things are elevated
that perhaps, in our catalogue of maxims
which are to possess the mind, is the
maxim which points to where the failure
of the unseund majority in great democ-
racy like yours will possibly lie."
He then proceeds to apply the text, and
we apprehend that there are very few,
even if they deny his statement, who will
object to his conclusion, that moral causes
govern the rising and falling of States,
and that the failure to mind whatsoever
things are elevated "must impair, with an
inexorable fatality, the life of a nation,
just as the failure to mind whatsoever
things are just, or whatsoever things are
amiable, or whatsoever things are pure,
will impair it and that if the failure to
mind whatsoever things are elevated
,hould be real in your American democ-
racy, and should grow into disease, and
take firm hold of you, then the life even Of
these great United States must inevitably
be impaired more and more until it per.
sh." But from this hard doctrine he turns
TO the remnant, and finds consolation for
Us; it will heal itself first, and then "re-
cover" the unsound majority. We are
growing, and what vast power our "rem.
nant will become if only we do not de-
stroy it; what mighty influence, what a
saving force in the State. But there is
something more. We are not only great
in millions, but we spring mainly from
German stock, of which it is true that it
has been stock, says Mr.. Arnold, "of
the most moral races of men that the
world has yet seen, with the soundest
laws, the least violent passions, and the
iairest domestic and civil virtues" Then,
ne says, we have had Puritan discipline
Iaulty as it was, it was still good for us in
The absence of better; SO, with possibly
vast remnant, good parentage and the
OF Puritan discipline, this teacher
Of "sweetness and goodness" this incisive
Dut kindly-hearted critic, finds there is a
glorious possibility for us, if only things
go happily"
SCHOOL NoMINAFIoNs-A CUSTOM THAT
SHOULD BIZ ABANDONED.