The mirror. (Stillwater, Minn.) 1894-1925, 1902-03-06
THE SOURCE OF NATIONAL
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INDIVIDUALITY

j statesmen and orators, will ever
remain as monuments of wonder
working intellect. They had been
| taught to the Summit of their
| faculties" their minds were filled
with lore. "But their poets drank
from the fountain of vice and the
poison was instilled into the minds
of the populace.' Taste was
vitiated and corrupted, which
turned art and wisdom into i'm
proper channels and sunk man in
the scale Of being. 1T was corrupt
taste that led them from the
proud eminence of mental great
ness down the winding way to
degrading sensuality and soul
whitening vice. Tho intellect
differed in different individuals,
yet, from the emperor to the
plebeian, the highest object Of
their aspirations was to excelin the
Esports and feats.
England, France and America
may now boast Of their refined
systems of ethics, their poets and
sages. England may point to a
Pitt, Fox and a Sheridan:
France to her Massillion and
Bourdaloue and America to her
Henry, her Writ and her Lee in
revolutionary days, and may beast
of her Clay. Calhoun, Webster,
Lincoln, Blaine, Garfield and
others; but the language of the
moderns is not SO perfect, their
orators are inferior, and their
poets attempt in vain to vie with
Homer, Virgil or even Anacreon.
Yet as strong and as ardent as was
the Greeks love for science and
belles-lettres, it was equally ardent
to vie with competitors in the
meanest amusements, in crimes
that would aout-F[erod Herod."
The ancient Grecians and Ro-
mans rank highest among the
nations in literary requirements,
while in horrid contrast they pre-
sent us with specimens of puerile
weakness, of rude, uncultivated
habits and continual scene of
crime; and these extravagant con-
| trasts were found combined in the
same character, as antagonistical
and as belligerent as the refined
charity Of Howard united with
the savage forocity of Caligula.
The modern nations aspire after
their literature, their fine arts, in
which are exhibited superior and
refined talents; while their games
and sports, the glory Of the an
clients, are now spurned and re-
jected as untitled to another, and,
as we believe, better taste.
Thus do we perceive that all
nations pursue that course of life
which they are taught to love. 1t
is this principle that determines
the character of a nation. 1t is
this that makes the civilized life
lone of refinement, of gentility and
sociability, and the savage life a
theatre of sports and games, of
ferocity and war. 1t is this that
makes the native Indian of the
forest bound like the wild
deer over the western mountains
in pursuit of the panther and the
bear. In this his soul delights.
To range the woodland. to submit
to toll, to guide his frail bark upon
the bosom of the lake, to brave
danger in the din of war, to rouse
for fight at the war whoop or the
clarion blast, is the elysinm of a
savage life. This they have been
taught to love, and their taste has
moulded their minds to the adap-
tation of such novel occupations.
Yet in those very occupations
which our taste pronounces rude
and uninstructed are exhibited an
ingenuity and skill which, if
brought to bear on the arts of