The Helena independent. [volume] (Helena, Mont.) 1875-1943, 1891-09-06
ICopyrisht, 1901, BY s. IS. MoClure.]

~ in the brave deeds of war identified
with their names. There are no finer pieces
Of prose In our language than those In
which Some mighty fsAts Of arms are de-
ssribsd. The historian as we'll as the bard
loves TO brighten his pages with stories Of
individual prowess. For the picture,
whether II be in words or in %colors, q cen
trail figure, 1 concentrated idsa, ID neoss-
sary When that central figure has just
won, or ID in the act of winning, rsnown by
some chivalroua exploit, the picture goes
straight to the heart Of most men and
women.
Without rAnsacking ancient history, let
ms ask what British subject can read ''The
Battle Of the Baltic 2 1.-THE Burial Of Sir
John Moore,' Napisr's description OF the
s.storming 81 Badajos, 1.-THE Charge Of
the si1 Hundred'' Or Only 8 Private in the
BUFF without feeling the blood run
quicker than usual and pride of RAGS take
possession Of svery thought? rs
OF late years We have heard much of the
philosophy of history. Some able writer's
writer's would apparently have us believe
that the doings OF individuals have, after
all. little influence upon the great history
OF tho world and upon the human race;
that the wave Of progress'mustrol forward,
though its course may be rippled At times
hsrs and there BY the chance action OF lido
aynorasy Of some strong individual. Human
thought. the natural aspirations of man after
somsthing better, gathering strength like the
river fed by minor streams in it's course
and growing larger like the SNOWFALL as it
rolls, must in the end, We are told, bear
down all opposition; that no man, no king,
no people even, no matter how strong, can
resist ita onward flow. There have bssn
modern historisns who seemingly thought
1t was moro their duty to describe the ma
ture and; course Of these waves OF thought
than the history, character and deeds
of the great giants who hswed
cut the rocky channels along
which those waves rolled forward. The
history Of the French revolution is a case in
ger than a mans hand on the horizon at
first, grew and spread, until at last it COW
cred tho sky to windward, and then 0aHe
on AS q rushing hurricane. Like the boro
coming up some great gulf Or river, 1T
sw9ptSover everything IL encountered. Moth
ing checked it; neither man nor mans work
couldsgtand against it, NATL at Last it spent
all 1ts lR~elf-contAined power, as this waves
of the sea do upon the sloping, 5pebbly
ghere. Tho philosophical historian seems
to ignore the fact that at first that little
cloud might have been most easily dispersed
by She king Of France, had he been a real
man as we'll as q hereditary monarch. He
can see no central agent. no individual man
OF manager, in all the great movements
which have shaken the earth. It is the
in each instance, and not of any individual
man. Hero worahip stinks in the
nostrils Of many agood creature Of the pros
ent age. To hint thata hereditary Frederick
tho Great or an upstart Napoleon in the
place of Louis XVI. would have made short
work Of this wave of human thought, Of
philosophical aspirations and progress, is
as repellant and obnoxious a notion rs the
notion that behind and above all is the
directing though unseen hand of an omni-
potent and all seoing God. That the history
Of the worId is, as Plutarch thought. the
rent treason to the philosophical theorist.
He would have us eliminate individual
leaders, men Of action, from thu history Of
mar on earth. The theorist-nye, some
times even the thinksr-doss not caro- much
for the man Of action, and the philosopher
he is, the great leader of men, and he is
not to be snuffed out or his name and his
deeds obliterated from the page of history
by any contemptuous aphorism or Cynical
bon mot.
If in our own days it were required Il, il
~lustrate the fact that tits individual men of
action who make history. who shape the
destiny of nations and initiate the great
movements which constitute the history Of
man, one could not do better than name
Prince Bismarck, Field Marshal Won
Moltke md King Frederick William, Of
Prussia. Is il to be supposed that any
amount of thinking or of philosophical
writing could ever have created the new
Germany of to-day?
Whose work is that great and potent real
ity, the empire of Germany?
Surely it is the handiwork of those three
great mon of action. That it should be the
work Of a trinity and not of one leader
marks it out from the other great national
creations OF any n generation. With
draw from that trinity any one of the three
Germany wa know would be in existence
to-day. Each had his own great and
special function. The distribution of work
bstwesn them wouN form of itself a most
interesting chapter. my present concern is
alone with the character and work Of Won
and no mar in his day has been more a his.
tory maker. He directed and ordered
events in a way and degree that has not
fallen to any mans lot since the great Cor
sican embarked in her majssty's ship Bel
lerophon. &#%%$ "
In May last all Gsrmans bewailed the
loss of their great general, as "all Judah
and Jerusalem mourned for Josiah" To
write about him 10 q c%ongenial, and, in one
sense, an easy task. The life of many Il
celebrated soldier has n dark as we'll as a
bright side to il. The splendor of glorious
achievements is often furnished by con-
duct nevor to be explained away. Mean
ness, insincsrity, untruthfulness, self-seek-
ing, overbearing insolence or cruelty can be
laid at the door Of many of the worlds
grsntest leaders. But Moltke's light shone
before men from frat to last with q clear,
unolouded ray, and no shadows, no clouds,
dim the lustro of his fame.
Like the atanoh, loyal and hard fighting
Blucher, Helmuth Karl Bernhard Won
Moltke Was q MecklenburRer. His family
had been land owners in that grand duchy
for centuries, and continued to be 80 until
his grandfather, Fritz, a Prussian officer,
sold the property and migrated into the
Priegnitx district. After a short residence
there he returned to his native province in
1888, where in tho town of Parchim
his son Helmuth was born tho following
year. In 1903 he transferred his homo Va
Lubbock, whore he remarked for four or five
years. Hia son was all through life very
proud of his ancient lineage. a feeling that
is at once q spur and q curb to tho right
eously ambitious man. 1t incitea him to
great actions and serves to keep HIM on the
path of truth II honesty in all he does. 1t
lifts him above low ambitions, to strive
rather for great national objects than for
personal riches and the case and luxury
they bring With them.
In 1900 Europe was still in tho throeH OF
the direst revolution that has ever IN
syclone fashion swept over her quaint cities