The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-06-30
REWARDS OF PUBLIC SERVICE.
Messrs. Wood and Roosevelt Have
 Pared Very Well Indeed.

Messrs. Wood and Roosevelt Have
 Pared Very Well Indeed.
 Now, if the president fairly drives us
 to inquire what reward General Wood
 has actually had, we think it can be
 easily shown that the republic has not
 been ungrateful to him. The esteem
 and fame that have come to him have
 certainly been such as to crown labors
 more arduous than his. Public recog-
 milton has not erred, in his case on the
 side of being too restrained. He has
 distinctly been one of our heroes. MT.
 Roosevelt seems to imagine that Ameri-
 cans are deficient in the capacity for
 hero worship. On the contrary, we
 create our heroes too easily-so easily
 that we recklessly break their images,
 knowing that plenty more will be forth
 coming. But, strictly on the profess
 sional side, General Woods advance
 ment has been phenomenal, his reward
 glittering. Four years ago he was an
 army surgeon; now he has been pro
 noted over the heads of 300 of his
 seniors in the regular army to be a
 brigadier-general, with every prospect of becoming general commanding. And it is this splendid and almost un-
 paralleled rise that the president inti- mates is meager, and almost offset by the fact that General Wood has not been able to live on his salary and all lowances What the general himself thought of pecunary inducements, compared with the great prize he has won, was shown in his deliberate re- fusal of a civilian position estimated to be worth $35,ooO year.
 Nor can we think the presidents im- piled plea for immunity from criticism one which public man should urge, as if such immunity were part of his re- ward No might nor greatness in mor- tality ever escaped criticism, or ever will. It is one of the necessary inci- dents of the profession of public ser want, whether he be king, president or secretary, To take it spontaneously is an important part of a statesmans equipment It brings no dread and pro- yokes no bitterness in the real princes of mankind. They, as it has been said, again by that scrutiny which would kill and damn lesser beings" It is no sign of lack of appreciation of it's great men that a people should iealously examine | their public acts. For a democracy to | do that is simply to do it's duty. At any | rate, it will not be denied; the many | headed beast" will insist upon knowing | all about the work of it's rulers; and if | they are too thin-sknned or too | naughty to endure the consant peering | and questioning, their place is not in | high office.
 Tl,,n- Ja.a Roosevelt's ingenious address is a recognition, which we should have ex- pected from him. above all others, of the fact that true public service is it's own reward, which it reaps as it goes along, and that useful work is in itself the source of the highest human hap piness. "There is no fun like work"- that discovery, says Walter Bagehot, has been the making of many a young English lord. who has found that Blue books are really more fascinating than betting books, and the dust and drudg- cry of public office more attractive than polo or yachting or elegant dawdling That is the truth which We must bear down upon in all our appeals to young men to enter upon public service. The work to be done is the thing; and the ] tion of begging away at it, the joy of striving and the satisfaction of ccomplishment-thes arc tn, rewards which come with it automatically. Any one minded to cry out for the stars and ribbons and the other toys with which we children of larger growth amuse ourselves" shows thereby that he does not know the true zest of pub lie work. He needs to be set down to read Emerson's essay on "Compensa- fion." The only rewards worth having are those which come all in the day of work; and the public servant can hope | for greater rewards than the common nan only as his work is more difficult l md important, calls out every power | ( nore fully, and sustains with larger ( pleasure of struggle and achievement. i From the New York Evening Post