The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1898-11-25

What would Miles Standish say if he
were here? For the answer of it. we
are not without some valuable mate
rial in our own history. We have been
from the beginning a people with a
message, and we have been a propa-
eating people. We have believed in
certain high truths about man. about
human rights, about local self-gov-
eminent We have believed in the
town meeting, school house, franchises, /
rotary system of Office holding, rule of
intelligent majorities and religious lib
erty And this not for ourselves, but
for the world
SO. while we have held high ground
about stealing what belonged 20 9th
ers even though they made bad USE
of it, and about CoVetng other peo-
pies land or privileges, We have he
lieVed in enterprise in earning. in buy
ing, in expanding, wherever we could.
In making our hold on the earth larger
and influence greater. And that rot
merely geographically-our geographic
can ambition has been really small But
morally we have sought to publish or
ideas, to make people restless. even
insurrectionary by sowing seeds of
liberty. We have not hid our light un-
der a bushel We have never felt au-
thOriZed to do it. and no bushel has
it on the lamp-stand. We have sent
our missionaries and teachers and COM
merce to the ends of the earth. and
brought back to our enlightened schools
the brightest of their young men for
study
More than that, we have welcomed
continuous territory to our fellowship
and 80 far as possible have made it an
equal part Of our own possessions. We
h
lana and Alaska, by purchase Califor-
MIA and New Mexico as spoils Of war
and Texas and Hawaii by Joint resoIu-
ton. Whether our construction provides
for the acquisition of territory or ter
l1tories, we have gene on. not seeking
conquest, vet conquest-making. as
things were thrown in our way. AID
in every instance by a sort of situa-
ton, amounting almost or quite to a
necessity, every acquisition has occss-
Toned serious debate and divided coun-
ellis and has seemed to some a disrupt
ing evil of some sort.
If all the fearful prophesies of the
past about our beloved land had come
true, it would have been dismembered
and forgotten long 100. There is noth-
ing said Of our fears today which has
not been said before, and oftentimes
When we We're weak, prosecuted. and
SpiuGluilcu ny the HdIlOIlSt ana our al
legiances were nothing
Yet let us be thankful for all men
of caution. Well may we decline 90
portunity if we can. Pity the day when
Boosting of our strength, we advance
eagerly upon new responsibilities ard
uncalled of God; except new and form
liable missions among the nations. Is
rael of old was appointed to exist alone
and to do her work without ships col
onies of coalitions with neighboring
people.
If like her we are to do our work
alone, safe in our fortress within the
seas, a moral influence and example
only. to emanate the oxygen of better
life for the world to breathe let US see
1t as our duty and undertake 1t. SO
some men and ages do their work best.
Large, lofty, unsullied, they stand for
elevation, majesty, uplifting power as
the spires of the Alps Of Switzerland.
Is this our mission? Then let us
make haste to retreat as soon as hon
or opens the door, back to our accus-
TONED realm of life. But that this is
not the only possible destiny of Amer
rca, even the most conservative must
see. Her widening boundaries for three
hundred years seem to snow an eKpan-
sive destiny never more alert or spon-
taneous than now. And the provdential
movements OIL che decade and wear
seem to point a pathway
Is this signal ahead Of US only the
lamp of some wrecker on times storm,
coast, reckoning to ruin under the
guise of pilot Of safety? Or is it the
signal of destiny swung out of times
sky, which points the way our farther
mission leads7
AT least four questions seem to lie in
this challenge.
Can l1fe's enthusiasm without which
no nation either can live or win, be
maintained in this country if we step
backward from the claims we now hold
as prizes of war? Emerson says: "Ev-
cry great and commanding movement
in the annals of the world is the tri-
umph of enthusiasm" OF that expert
ment have we had enough, or do our
paltry frfcGong in national life need the
stimulus of some great occasion such
as is now upon us? Can We withdraw
from what we hold, without palsied
hand?
If we live to arouse the world to the
knowledge and appetite for manhood,
fraternal love. self control and rule.
can we decline the call of their need, if
not even OF their expressed desire. if
they ask us to not only teach them lib
erty, but help them to be free? RI our
history inspires men in bondage to re-
sequence whether their revolt succeeds
or not? Is our mission of ideas only,
or perhaps also Of the iron heel strik-
ing shackles off the spirits we have
taught freedom?
AS nation which prays for the ma
lions and sends our missionaries there,
solitary men and women by ones and
tWos, and threes, carrying a personal
gospel to Individual souls can we re
sic Ae-ir - = 1,
everywhere sometime to become social
and material? Is there never 10 come
time when not only Americans but
America will reach out her hands to
redeem the darkened nations? Sh9u
ii ever be a gospel OF
persons. two persons and never
a gospel of the nations, two ma
tons? If religion is dying among us,
as sometimes asserted but not proved.
may it be because in a time when it
has come to the era of social ind or
ganic advance, we seek to keep it still
in the heart? In the nature of things
all ideas are first in man, personal
possession, a thing to live by his own
affair as before God but later it grows
outward, affects public life, becomes
social and universal, or it dies within,
baked in its natural progress. That a
nation which has a message to man
kind, good for every man, should not
sometime be called upon to exploit it
to the world, seems to me unthinka BILE
and if sometime, then perhaps. now.
Has the awakening of the Anglo
Saxon unity and love the past year no
significance? While we are grateful for
it and clearly recognize it's help to us
in this emergency OBTAINING as by a
mighty hand the impending concert of
Europe against US in moment of per-
il, may it not be that Great Britain,