The Wheeling daily intelligencer. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1865-1903, 1899-02-27
THOSE WHO DESPAIR.
Tho Republics Past is IN All.suffi.
cicnt. Assurance ofits Future,


cicnt Assurance ofits Future.
New York Times Und. Dem): The
men who are sitting around In the
ashes OF the republic, benoanlng the
catastrophe that ended It. must have a
mighty poor opinion of Its founders, Its
people. and OF its worth and stability.
Washington, Jefferson, the Adamses,
Hamilton, Jay, Madison, Monroe. King,
Franklin. Otis, Ames and Livingston,
were among the VISIT the most gifted,
and the most unselfish men that ever
lived. These extraordinary men founded
this republic not alone on the ancient
models with which study had made
them familiar, but by the force of their
creative minds No other government
in the world was ever built up with
such wisdom. with such pains, or by
such builders.
Let the lamenting Je.emiahs wall
and smitc their breasts. They are be-
yond the pale of reason. But does any
sane and healthy-minded man believe
that nation sprung up from the
minds, the hearts, and the toll Of that
unequaled group Of statesmen Is TO
have this ignoble ending, Is to go to
It's death and ruin over question Of
Islands and wild men half world
away? Iailf
We strike our roots deeper than the
founders. For our origins we look far
Their back. We are the products of the
same racial and evolutionary forces
that produced them. Not only Saxon
and Norman and Dane are we." but Of
other strong kin and ancestry. The
blood of the most indonitabie and civil
lizing races on earth blends In the
veins of the men of this republic. He
reditary and environment assert them
selves in the continuing production Of
statesmen Of high capacity. The names
of Clay. Webster, Calhoun. Randolph,
Douglas, Lincoln, Grant, FesseEden,
Chase. Tilden. Cleveland. Edmunds,
and Thurman prolong to our day the
great traditions that sprang up In the
birthtime of the nation. 54,-'
Is q country that breeds such men
doomed to stumble and fall In the at
tempt to solve political problem OF no
greater magnitude than that which now
confronts US In the Philippines?
We have principles, too They outllve
men and control their action. We derive
our principles, above all the living prln-
ciple of liberty. from England, where It
has been the handspring of progress
for thousand years: from Holland,
where men Won martyrdom and death
less fame by their love OF It. In that
spirit this nation was born. In that
spirit it has lived century and q
quarter.
Yet men tell us to-day that we have
thrown away our precious birthright in
the pursuance OF design to seize and
hold against their will a people whose
business and political value to us is less
than that of any city of fifteen thou
sand inhabitants in the United States.
There are many corporations in this
country whose annual business exceeds
the entire import and export trade Of
the Philippine Islands We suffer from
no such poverty OF the elements OF
greatness at home that We have need to
throw away the least OF our principles
in such bargain. The prophets Of evil
talk like fools when they tell US we
have sacrificed the very cornerstone
and brought down the whole structure
in ruins.
Gu: powers of endurance have been
proved in far greater trials, from which
we issued triumphant. VIII any anti
imperiaiist have the hardihood to pre-
tend that the little knot of perplexities
In which the results of the Spanish war
have involved us Is to be mentioned In
the same breath with the civil WARP.
They are pronouncing prognosis Of
death from a flea bite on the person Of
patient who has got up strong and
lustg from typhoid fever. We have en-
dured without III result far more mo-.
mentous changes In our national policy.
II the woe of the gloomy souls who
despair OF the nation Is not put on as q
part OF the game they are playing, We
think they would be vastly cheered up
by study of the history OF their coun-
try. They would be far less doleful II
they could once get 1t through their
heads that we belong to the category OF
the living, not the dying, nations.