Clinch Valley news. [volume] (Jeffersonville, Va.) 18??-2019, 1898-02-25
"a HUNDRED YEARS
FROM NOW" !"
Will 1T BE WEEL OR WOE.
The Closing century.-0ur
country's Prospect,
New York World.1


81 should like to see thiscountry again
in hundred years from now"
How often this sentence is heard on the
lips OF men OF all classes aud conditions
In the history OF nations IL hundred
years is brief period. Yet while there
are centuries that appear monotonous
and chnngelcss, there have been centuries
that were critical and crucial-centuries
that made or marred the fortunes of
stntes and the destinies of nations.
Such were the centuries of Pericles and
OF the Christian era, pf the crusadps and
of the Reformation.
The century which is drawing to it's
close has been nm epoch h-mnrking period.
The century which is ready to dawn on
us promises to be even more momentons
Some of it's results we can forecast: 9th
ers we may conjecture.
In this country we may Judge the fu-
tnre by the past" We may to n certain
extent guide our feet by the lamp of en-
peri'nc"." Its light will shine on WON
ieriu changes.
In the mere matter OF population we
have II right to anticipate astounding
results.
We shall Increase, not by 30 per cent.
decrnnial periods, us heretofore. but
surely by 20 per cent. Merely doubling
every hall century, we shall number
3OO,000,000 OF people-not helplesss
Hindoos nor bloodles Chinese, but Amer
lean citizens. This alone will present n
problem such as the world has never
faced
Our increase in population will be sur
passed by our increase in wealth. We
have multiplied 'ties wenlth-producing
capacity OF the human machine ten fold
i'll the last century. What limit shall be
set to it's expansion OF capacity in the
next hundred years? May we not multi
ply it tenfold again, and again tcnfod?
And if we do, how will this wealth be
divided ? No dream of avarice n hum
dred years ago could picture the indi-
vidual fortunes which are the common.
places OF today. Are the men with the
hundred millions to be as numerous ms
the men with million today? Shall
we DO called on to contemplate the pluto
crat with thousand millions before we
have got over our amazement ut his
predecessors with mere one or two
hundred millions?
And out OF this growth in numbers and
wealth and power what will be the re-
snltant effect on our political and social
conditions?
That political corruption OF the AGE. {
which is spreading with a movement as
that OF the tides Of the seq, is no delus-
ion born OF fear and ignorance, but fact
visible to all eyes. 1t is not an Incident
but the working OF natural laws vast in
their scale and resistless in their force.
Its immediate impulse comes from the
greed oil gain among the rich working on
the greed OF gain among those who want
to be rich; and this hunger for wealth
regardless OF how it is got, common
alike to the needy schemer and the NH.
-lanthropic plutocrat, is seemingly the
strongest, most enger aud persistence in
fiuence in or national developement. In
the shape i'll which we know it now it
did not exist n hundred years ago. In
the Intensity OF its greed, in its energy
and it's eagerness, in tho resources il
commands mud the courage OF it's suc.
cess, it was unknown thirty years ngo.
1t is in lis infancy. What will it be in
it's full manhood II we have not been
able to resist its beginnings, how shall
we be able TO make Roadway against its
gathering strength? Aud il we do not
resist it and overcome it and destroy its
supremacy utterly, what is the alterna-
tive? d.
EssEsizsaz K za4ss'