The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1885-1921, 1891-07-06

nearly four millions of miles-all by pur-
chase, and not one foot by conquest. To
bring this vast domain under the infiu-
ence of cultivation, civilization, and polit-
| ical freedom has been the task of the
descendants of the revolutionary fathers.
1t has been giants task. and they have
| performed it like giants. Stanlcy gives a
| dramatic picture of The extent and SOM
| breness of the forest of the Aruwimi. 1t
is little worse in character, however,
| than the American forests encountered
| and hewn >down by the American
pioneers, and in extent, by comparison,
it is insignificant. These men, with ak
in one hand and fintlock in the other,
not only knew how to hew down forests,
but they were equally skillful in carving
out political communities, dedicated to
civil and religious freedom.
The work of these strong, brave, and
vigorous pioneers has found no adequate
expression in literature. Their story is
yet to be told. Material for poem, epic,
and drama, stranger than any yet exist
ing in romance, will be found to exist
in reality in their conquest of the great
West. They were swifter of foot
than Achilles, stronger of heart than
Ajax, and more cunning of head than
Ulysses. From the Alleghanies to the
Pacific Ocean, they prepared the way for
the march of that vigorous civilization
which is the wonder of the age.
Rough as to externals they might have
been. Yet they were rich in all the es-
sentials of manhood. In forest or in
mining camp, helpful to those in need,
tender to the sick, and throwing halo of
chivalric devotion around woman, quite
in contrast with the half-contemptuou
veneer of the highly civilized centers of
the old world. Alas that they are pass
ing away! We shall never see their like
again!
In the track of these couriers of the
wood followed another order of men quite
as remarkable in their way-men OF ac-
ton, seeing what was to be done and
knowing how to do it; for knowing what
to do and the doing of it are one with
these intelligent and practical Ameri-
cans. Railway builders, developers OF
the vast mineral resources of the country,
turning out in vast quantity and variety
the products of the shop and the loom,
with lightness, strength and finish un-
equaled anywhere else.
1t is due largely to this class of acute
and enterprising men that the abundant
and are being so rapidly developed. A
network of railways practically puts the
laboring man upon the Atlantic sea-
board upon an equality with his Western
brother l 800 miles away, with respect to
the great foodfelds OF the West. So in
ventive and skillful is the American
mind, and so apt in organization that it
seems the great problem of high wages to
| the laboring man and low cost of pro-
duct is in fair way to be solved with
out the least jar to social organization.
| The American is more pre-eminently
| than any other man a tool and machine
using animal It is this highly-developed
| faculty that enables him, with fve-fold
the wages, 5000 miles away, to lay down
cheaper food in the chief cities of Europe
than his European rival.
The American mechanic is not welded
| to work as an end. He does not believe
in work for. works sake. He does moth
ing as a drudge, which by his subtle
brain and skiilful hand, he can COM
mand the tireless forces of nature to ac-
| complish. In the application of scientific
| discoveries to the production of things
for his comfort or gain, he stands alone
1t is largely owing to this skill for inven-
tons, to the power for work and to his
sobriety and educated intelligence, fos-
tered by free government, and the public
free school, that the unparalleled COM
fort of the whole nation depends.
'But," says the great Scotch philoso-
pher and critic-with a bad stomach
"this is pig philosophy" Men who work
for material comfort should be ashamed
of themselves. 1t is not material COM
fort, it is not happiness, but blessedness'
whatever that may which hu'
manity should work for"
Unless the BODY eat, how shall the
spirit live? might be asked of him. Ii
he mad been nourished with a better
diet in his youth, perhaps his temper
had been sWeeter in his old age.
When a member of Parliament said he
hoped the time would come in England
when everv man could read Bacon
Golden retorted that he hoped to see
! the time come when everyone In Eng
land could eat bacon. Fond as the
scholar and the philosopher should be o.
Bacon, a hollow and Improbable bust
ness, I fear, the reading of him would be
, without bacon, or its equivalent In the
, stomach. Could the condition Of the
submerged tenth," and the precarious
: livelihood of the, perhaps. nearly one
} half of the English people be raised tt
the level of comfort, virtue and intell1
r gence of the sixty-five millions of Amer
cans, it seems to me, that the phllan
t thropist and the Christian might foreg(
2 the Novum Organum altogether. A gov
: eminent is not for the purpose. pr
t marily, of encouraging literature. Wh'
8 ever heard OF governments being organ
n | lied for the production of work OF art
e It is, or should be, instituted for the com
mon welfare; and what constitutes tn
e common welfare ? Those concerne'
8 should be left to determine that, MATHEW
Arnold says that conduct constitute
n four-ffths OF life. My own experience
l. in a not very restricted field of observa
s ton, forces me to believe that the variou
kinds of effort to earn an honest llvell
l. hood-top put themselves upon moderat
IS plane of material comfort, constitute
n least six seventies of conduct, for vas
e majority of the worlds workers. Ths
d form or condition of government is cor
n fessedly the best, which is consonan
with the greatest possibility OF individus
n liberty; which throws as few obstacle
n in the way, and honestly endeavors I
s. remove those impediments not posslbl
l. of accomplishment by individual actor
IN In thus regard it is but trite to say that
n other government existing, or that eve
e. has existed, stands so pre-eminent as tt
G. TTnitod Gfotoss M overwhelming