Virginian-pilot. (Norfolk, Va.) 1898-1911, 1900-12-28
ivy ELVE PAGES,
FRIDAY. DECEMBER IS. 1900.
BRYAN AND HIS TIMES.


If he he'd consented to desert his
principles Mr.. Bryan might have had
the Presidency. BY the Quays, the
Platts the Germans of the country.
he is regarded as an impractical Wis
ionary, because he neglected such an
opportunity. 1t is the highest compli-
ment they could pay him. Mr. Bryan
Is survival OF a more stalwart day.
He is "a plain. blunt man" in an age
of shuttle and finesse. 1t has told pow
erfuly against him in both his races
for the Presidency. He is direct in an
age of indirection. and is therefore at
n certain disadvantage. He does not
believe in half-lights; it is a time when
there are a multitude of interests that
will not bear the full light. He re-
CARDS principles as rules of political
conduct, not as so many screens be-
hind which one may make deals and
shuttle into office. These things have
been the head and front OF his Offend
ing.
In his speech at Lincoln on We'd
nesday evening Mr.. Bryan said:
1.-THE Commoner will give me an OPP
portunity to participate in public dis
cussions, and 1 am sure that an editor
ial pursuit will furnish as much intel
lectual enjoyment as 1 could have
found in the White House. and in ad-
dition thereto will give me more time
for home pleasures.
1.-THE principles for which we con-
tended in the last campaign still live,
and we who believe in them must con-
tinue to fight for them. An election
does net change pa.ineiplesii 1t efl5s- eela
termines what principles shall be, for
the time being, applied"
Nothing MIR. Bryan has said affords
q better insight of the man and the
party leader. Speaking in n personal
vein to his neighbors and friends. Mr.
Bryan expresses sentiments that we
might have expected from Clay, or
Jefferson, or Calhoun, or any of the
men Of the earlier days. when office
was not something to be got any way
that was feasible: men who found
abundant compensation for defeat in a
conscious rectitude OF purpose, and
took life philosophically.
BY the same token Mr.. Bryan takes
much the same view of public matters
as the more rugged men of the earlier
days of the Republic. He is apt to
bark back to first principles and make
them the touchstone of present poll
cies. That is no longer fashionable
among the opportunists of either party.
He speaks the language of simple Dem
ocracy, when frlls and furbelows are
popular. Therefore, Mr.. Cleveland and
Mr.. Carlisle, ct i'd onne genus think
he IS g Populist. 1t is fact that any
sets much store by them, or sets them
ort in terms easily understood of all
men, is regarded by the old time
post bellum leaders Of both parties.
and their following. as a demagogue
and a charlatan. They do not take
principles seriously themselves, and
they cannot understand how another
should do so. A coterie of roues be
lievc that every man who contends
for the moral law is either hypo-
critic or q fanatic, and ridicule or hate
him accordingly, as he is. or is not, a
menace to what they are pleased to
consider their privileges. The parallel
Is obvious.
1t Is these characteristics of Mr..
Bryan that have given him his tremen-
does hold upon the part of our people
that takes its principles most Sc
riosly; they have also given rise to the
charge that he Is fomentor Of class