The Hawaiian star. [volume] (Honolulu [Oahu]) 1893-1912, 1900-12-31
THOUSAND YEARS IN THY SIGHT

obs OF time INTO centuries, arDltrary
little marks upon the great bosom of
eternity, and then initiates himself with
lookir~ back upon what his own race
has done during the short span of a
hundred years. We all like to do it.
Thousands of printing presses are turn
ing forth the most elaborate accounts
of what was occurring at the opening
of 1901, and comparing the strides that
have geen made at this opening of
1901.
Yes! It is true there have been
strides made. We have become more
proficient in mechanical arts and in
Harvesting some of the forces of ma
ture, in part, to our use. Steam and
electricity have been made to do our
biddin~ but at times they turn upon us
puny masters and rend us, as witness
boiler explosions, railway accidents,
live wires, and many other unpleasant
accessories Of our advancement Still
we can say that we have made a gain
in speed and with it We have lost the
dignifed leisure of our century ago an
cestors
Have we improved so very much in
manners and morality? We like to
think so in our pride. But the man
ners of the people in 1901 were more
dignified than those of 1901, and there
was a chivalry about those ancestors,
which many of us might copy, with
considerable advantage to ourselves. As
for morality, there may have been
coarse vice in 1901, but it is doubtful
whether there were greater sinks of
iniquity at that period to be found than
can now be found in Paris, London,
Vienna, New York, Chicago or San
Francisco.
Have we become more peaceful, more
forgiving? We pirate of peace in a con-
ference of powers, and then Great
Britain promptly starts in for bloody
wars in the Transvaal which is still rag
ing. The United States has a war in
the Philippines still on hand, and the
Powers of the civilized world are carry
ing on a war with China, the details
of which are certainly not conducive
to a high opinion of our advance in
methods of carrying on war from the
days of Napoleon.
Are we less cruel? The brute crops
out in us in murder all over the globe.
We hear of negroes being burned alive
of men being put to death without
law. More liberal? Men still lose their
liberty for their opinions in some coun-
tries, their means of livelihood in
others. More religious? The strong
Foi Of
dred years ago, has become Slapped in
their present descendants. One has only
TO go to New England and old England
to see that
1t looks a dark picture. It is not
nearly so dark as it seems. 1t looks
dark when we apply broad washes to
the microcosm of time called a century.
1t is as if a man were trying to see
how great his mental Improvement was
after half an hours work, The writer
of the Psalm &c, understood the
breadth of historical events, the petit
ness of mans single or aggregate exist
ence. "A thousand years in thy sight"
sang he ARE but as yesterday when
it is past, and as a watch in the night"
And of the individual he hymns, he is
like grass which groweth up" and "in
the evening it is cut down and wither-
eth"
Viewed as this man Of the ages past
viewed human events, we need not put
on magnifying glass to see what we
were hundred pears ago, Let us go
back to the year 90t. Then on such broad
lines we can see the grand washes the
true advance of civilization
At the beginning of the tenth century
the lamp of Christianity was unlighted
in Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Russia
and much of what is now Eastern Ger
many, the inhabitants were fierce,
blood thirsty and the chiefs ruled by
their strong arms. Might was right.
The Western Civilization which at the
commencement of the Twentieth Cen
fury has encircled the globe, and which
is now coming face to face with the
Eastern Civilization, was confined to
=. the Earring and warning states Of
Italy, France, Germany, England I'M
der her weakly Saxon Kinglets, Scot
land, and the Byzantine Empire. Each
of these was threatened with extinction
from barbarous tribes in the North, and
from the Mahommedan power in the
South Though the latter wave had
been checked it was still surging
throughout the Mediterranean and oc-
cupying fair provinces in SPAIN in Italy,
in Sicily, and was eating up all that
was left Of Western Civilization in
Asia Minor
1t was a period of dense ignorance,
of famines, of pestilence. Packs of
wolves ranged over France because the
inhabitants did not till the fields, but
huddled in little cities, carrying on pre-
carious trade, and a cultivation scar
cely a bow shot from the walls. Only
here and there in the monasteries did
the feeble light of learning burn. In
ByEantium and the cities Of Italy class
raVpaf and aVan praM