Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1898-07-28
War.

War.
On Sunday last, we humbly knelt in
our churches and asked God to assume
the glory of the results effected by our
improved guns at Santiago, and prayed
Him to so bless our army and navy
that such results will be continued.
If General Sherman is an authority
in such matters, we will not thus per-
suade an omnlscient God into assum-
ing our possibilities as, ignorant,
imperfect and passionate beings. Ac-
cording to General Sherman, war.
whether we engage in it for justice or
for glory, is ..all hell" And General
Sherman's march to the sea certainly
gave him opportunities for knowing
superior to any we can have as we
kneel to chat the s.Te Deum.''
When the time comes that men for
justice and liberty, for progress and
humanity, must 60 themselves to the
gallows, the stake or the cross, as in
dividuals, or, assembling together in
common cause, must set their breasts
against the bayonets OF oppression,
then Gen. Sherman himself, a plain
man, who could swear loudly on occa-
sion, headstrong soldier, incapable
of hypocrisy or cantlng, would doubt
less have admitted, that though it is
the devil not God who takes the fol-
lowers of Christ to the pinnacle Of the
temple and offers them dominion, they
have a right to kneel to God and ask
His blessing on the blood which from
their own veins they are about to shed
for liberty and humanity.
But when we read in the dispatches
that the ignorant, incompetent, help
less Spaniards, whose navy sank before
our superior force and intelligence,
like paper shells, stood by their guns,
hopelessly, but so bravely that many
of them went down in their burning
ships; when we hear that our own
gallant sailors saw through the rents
made in the hull of the Vizcaya by our
shells, the wounded of its crew roast
ing alive in the flames; when we read
daily of the armies OF buzzards wheel
ing in the sky above the wreck to feast
on the bodies of men for whom, though
Spaniards, we profess to believe that
the God we worship went to the cross;
and when we know that as a result of
war in our own country, our own near
kinsmen, have fattened such foul birds
of prey by the thousands, then kneel-
ing on our velvet cushions with our
nicely laundered and spotless handker
chiefs to our eyes, we may well think
of the blood left on the stony way
which we profess to believe Christ
who told US to love our enemies climbed
to die for them and for us-crying with
His last breath, Father forgive them,
for they know not what they do" And
thinking of it, we may we'll change our
lie Deums'' to litauies, praying: ''Be
merciful. o God!"
In whatever form it comes. war is
hell. When our own well-loved eoun-
try, from the Ohio to the Gulf reeked
with American blood and shut off the
sky from US with smoke. it was hell
then. It is not the less Internal when
we wage it against Spaniards. 1t is
not the less Internal waged against
Spaniards, because we are executioners
against them of laws of order and JUS
tice which govern even the ninth circle
of hell itself. When we are to do the
work of executioners; when we have
already committed ourselves to do it;
when not to do it would leave the
ignorant and barbaric Spaniards to in
tiict intolerable injustice on a weaker
people, then we would be imbecile and
cowardly to stop at less than our duty.
But should nation, guilty of such
crying wrongs as We have done each
other in this generation and the last,
ask God to share in the glory of feed
ing the buzzards of the world with our
own dead and the dead of our neigh
bors. slaughtered by our improved
machinery in war for glory, conquest
and imDeria1ism then every American
who loves his country, his countrymen
and his fellow men, must needs bow
his head lower than the lowest of those
who sing .+Fe Deums" and repeat be-
low his breath, .'Be merciful, o God"
mississippi Valley Democrat and Jour
nal.
z Plurlbus Unum.