The news & observer. [volume] (Raleigh, N.C.) 1894-current, 1904-10-19
Some G characteristic of an
Average American.
Continued from Page one.)

ency, ana ecenlTlClly. IL HtS PREVENT
ed many Social and political errors,
and where it could not prevent, it has
promptly expelled.
A third trait in which the average
American stands pre-eminent is his
love of liberty. This brought him
here, and this has made the example
of his country known wherever free
champion.
few years ago it was my fortune
to room next to young Roumanian
at the University of Paris. He knew
little of our literature, or of our ma
,tional progress, or of our political par
ties. But our Declaration of indie
pendence was as familiar to him as
were the ballads of his own country
which he had had come to Paris to
edit. 1 expressed surprise, ana ne
expressed a counter surprise, saying
that everybody in Roumania knew
that America led the world in the fight
for freedom, Tsshall never forget that
lesson, / knew that our Declaration
OF Independence came as revelation
TO the French. TO the MeXicans, and
TO the people of South America; but
had not realized that in far away
European Kingdoms the watchers OF
the dawn still found in our Declara-
ton the inspiration of larger hope,
Not only has the love of liberty
CldEdCletlZeu the AIllCIICdll II Olll Tx
beginning but it is the quality that
above all others gives unity and CO.
herence to his history. Sometimes 1t
was religious liberty or the liberty to
establish his own creed and forms of
worship; sometimes it was political
liberty or the liberty of being govern
ed in his own chosen way; sometimes
it was social liberty, or freedom from
the unjust distinctions of birth anu
rank that obtain among the iVied in
situations of older lands; sometimes it
was economic liberty. or freedom to
produce and sell without any other
restrictions than those that insure the
greatest good to the greatest number;
but in the last analysis the great ma
tional impulses in our history are re-
solvable into some form of the battle
for human rights.
Perhaps the average American needs
still to be reminded that liberty is not
license, but opportunity for wider ser
vice; that true freedom is not a legacy
but daily conquest, not donation
but an achievement. "All men are
born slaves" says Hegel that they
may conquer freedom" We need to
know the hush as we'll as the hurrah
of liberty; we need to dwell upon its
responsibilities as we'll as its privileges.
And this lesson should for all time be
"a theme of the school, the nulpit, and
the press.
The fourth trait in which the av-
erage Aemrican excels is his inyen-
tiveness, a trait that has made the
whole world the beneficiary of his in
genuity. No other nation has pro-
duced 50 many useful inventions in so
short time. One has only to men,
ton in this connection the names of
Robert Fulton, Eli Whitney, Cyrus H.
Mccormick, Elias Howe, Cyrus W.
Field, our own Calling, and Thomas
A. Edison. Already the American
leads the world in the invention of
firearms and agricultural machinery.
The mechanical inventiveness of our
people, says Prof n. S. Shaler in his
book called 1.-The Citizen may be
taken as "a sign of a certain readi-
ness TO adapt their institutions and
themselves to the varying needs of
life, of q quick adjustment to their
changing needs which enables them
rapidly to go forward on any path that
may be opened to them" Mr. Byrce
noticed with astonishemnt that "tele-
phones were in use in every little town
over the West, while in the city of
London men were just beginning to
wonder if they could be made to pay.
Even when the American does not
originate a abOr-SaVing device, he so
improves and adapts it as to entitle
him to almost equal credit with the
inventor. IA NLiIICdSo man met a
Frenchman at the Worlds Fair ir
Paris who was Dragging about Il new
French ausage-machine. ITS like
this said the excited Frenchman: at
has a large funnel-shaDed apparatus
into which you drive the hogs in single
file. The machine catches them up,
WhirlS them around a few times, and
in q moment you have the bristles the
skin, the ham, the bacon, and the
sausage separated and sorted in differ
ent apartments 'That reminds me,
replied the American, "of a somewhat
similar invention | saw in Chicago just
before leaving America, but it had al
Improvement over yours. We also
drive our hogs into the funneI-shaped
apparatus; but when the sausage comes
out, if we taste it and don't like it..
we just dump the products back into
the machine, reverse the wheel, and
turn the hogs out to feed a little
longer" That is what the American
has been doing with foreign inven-
tons fer a hundred years.
The last quality that L shall mention
as contributing to the distinctive SUI
periority OF the average American is
his attitude toward woman. There is
nothing in Europe comparable to the
fine conradeShip and mutual under
standing that exist in this country be-
tween men and women. 1t is a form
OF social reciprocity from which the
average American has reaped more
good than he would get from mer-
camille reciprocity with ali the nations
Of the world. Most foreigners Wh0
study our institutions comment on the
Ieniency of our juries to all oflenses
except offenses against women. Pro
fcssor Munsterberg even fears that
American society and American char
acter are in danger of becoming fem
iniZed''; but the fear is groundless,
and this in spite of the fact that no
where else does woman occupy so hiGh
or so influential a position as in
America.
In France the average woman IS &
toy, in Germany drudge, in England
a necessary piece of ancestral furnl-
ture. For a European young lady t.
walk to or from church with young
man, provided their engagement has
rot been announced, is to lose caste
The presence. however, of American
girls in German universities is already
all influence making for wider socia
freedom and for saner relations. Ger
mans do not criticise the American
girl. They realize that she belongs to
a different social regime, and. if [ am
nf iGfl lYnp harr iY,C~ tc