Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-08-17

children In certain way; we build our
houses In certain way, and so on. And
these ways are all wrong ways. because
the ways for all those things are very differ.
ent "over there"
Perhaps our ways are not the RIGHT vav.-
Undoubtedly some OF them are the wrong
ways; but not for any such reason as that
given. Conformity is not the way of saliva
ton for us. 1t is assumed that the standard
OF our critics is necessarily the correct one
Why? Why NAV not our standard be right
and theirs wrong? Probably neither Of
them is the best. Then we must set one nm
for ourselves that is the best. and try to
reach that 1t is just as much in order for
US to say to those OF other nations, "you ara
absurd, because you don't do things our
way, as 1t is for them to say to US. We
don't say it; and we won't, having too much
courtesy Tor that, but the temptation is very
strong sometimes.
Flunkeyism Our Peril.
But whatever we do it is just as well 10
remember that we were set of here on a con-
tinent BY ourselves expressly that we might
not be funkeys. Flunkeyism is the dis
tinct peril of democratic Independence.
Never mind about the Frenchman or the
Englishman or the German or the Congo.
man. We are quite as likely to be right 40
any OF them. There is no danger that any
OF us, In any country, will go too far in the
right direction. We are not likely to be-
come too cultivated, too refined, too civil
lzed In any way. But when we find our
selves In wrong way let us forsake it, be-
cause 1t Is wrong, not because somebody else
happens to be wrong in different way.
AND let us try to get into the better course
because 1t IS better, not because it is the
course somebody else has chosen.
But that is the wrong spirit, the con-
formlsts assure us. We are a Young nation
yet; necessarily crude and immature. We
must take advice from those older peoples
and chasten our spirits to accept and sub
init to their criticisms. They speak to us
with authority for our own good because
tney are older. The present generation Of
Americans is precisely as old as the present
generation of Englishmen or Frenchmen or
Chlnese. As to the generations that went
before this one, we are joint heirs with all
the rest. We inherit just as much as they
40 from Shakespeare, and Goethe, and
Mollere, and Dante, and Confucius. The
world IS not so big as it used TO be. Tbs
treasurers of the past that once belonged to
one little corner of the earth now circulate
freely over all its surface. Even the
Pharaohs are on their travels. And America
taxes toll Of every country and of every age.
She shares the best with all the Others
And she has as much capacity as any Of
them to make the best use of the best.
= y
CritIcising the Critics.
She is not day younger than her critics,
and she is not necessarily inferior to them
because she is different in some of her vays.
Perhaps some of her ways are better than
theirs if she were not too ready to concede
the contrary; and she might criticiss some
of the criticisms if she felt disposed to talk
back" One of the most eminent and merci-
less Of our foreign censors took comb from
his pocket at the dinner table and calmly
combed out his whiskers in the presence Of
his other guests. or course his personal
habits had nothing to do with the abstract
doctrine he preached; but that action weak
ened the effect or what he had to saw
Another, critic of forms of speech, said:
1.-THE Americans all guess that this or that
Is thus or so. None of them speak quite cor.
rectly, I fancy" And every American
present forebore to inquire how fancy" was
any better than guess"
But all that has nothing to do with the
case; any more than the patronizing i'm
pertinence we sometimes have to endure, or
the unfairness which compares the whole
people of one nation with the most favored
class of another. The point is that this
country is quite qualified TO set MP a
standard of manners and customs for herself
and is not bound to consider whether II il
the same as any other standard under the
sun. Let other countries do as they please,
and we will do as we please. IF we find on
careful consideration, that pie three times
lay is desirable, let us eat pie three timesa
layl II we enjoy ice water, and can get the
ce to make that seductive tipple, why, that
s our affair, and why should we not drink
It? If our climate makes furnace-heated
rooms the thing neediul for US, let rs oon-
'inue to live comfortably in furnace-heated
rooms; and all that without any uneasy
as to what other people are say
ing about it.
Take the American eagle off his perchI
JAMES G. PURDY,