Iowa County democrat. [volume] (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1877-1938, 1904-12-08


nounced that TO transform this wicked
world into an abode fit for the gods
all that was needed was the overthrow
of tyranny, ignorance and want-those
three dread powers 50 long in league.
Today other preachers proclaim the
same gospel. We have seen that the
unquestionable diminuton of want
has made man neither better nor hap
pier. Has this desirable result been
more nearly attained through the great
care bestowed upon instruction? 1t does
not yet appear SO, and this failure is
the despair of our national educators.
Then shall we stop the peoples ears,
suppress public instruction, close the
schools? BY no means. But educa-
ton, like the mass of our ages inveu-
lions, is after al only tool; every
thing depends upon the workman who
uses it. So it is with liberty. 1t is
fatal or life giving according to the
use made of it. Is it liberty still when
1t is the prerogatiye of criminals or
needless blundercrs? Liberty is an
atmosphere of the higher life and it is
only by a slow and patient inward
transformation that one becomes capa-
bic of breathing it.
All life must have its law, the life of
man 50 much the more than that of in
ferior beings, in that it Is more pre-
cious and of nicer adjustment. This
law for man is in the first place an
external law, but it may become an
internal law. When man has once rec
ogniZed the inner law and bowed be-
fore it, through this reverence and vol
untary submission he is ripe for liber
ty. So long as there is no vigorous
and sovereign inner law he is incapa-
bic of breathing its air, for he will be
drunken with it, maddened, morally
slain. The man who guides his life
by inner law can no more live servile
to outward authority than can the full
grown bird live imprisoned in the egg
shell. But the man who has not yet at
tanned to governing himself can no
more live under the law of liberty than
can the uuhedgCd bird live without its
protective covering. These things are
terribly simple, and the series of dem
onstrations old and new that proves
them increases daily under our eyes.
And yet we are rs far as ever from
understanding even the elements of
this most important law. In our de
mocracy how many are there, great
and small, who know from having per-
sonally verified it. lived it and obeyed
it, this truth without which people is
incapable of governing itself? Liberty?
1t is respect. Liberty? 1t Is obedience
to the inner law, and this law is nei-
Their the good pleasure of the mighty
nor the caprice of the crowd, but the
high and impersonal rule before which
those who govern are the first to bow
the head. Shall liberty, then, be pro
scribed? No; but men must be made
capable and worthy of it; otherwise
public life becomes impossible, and the
nation, undisciplined and unrestrained
tricablc tangles of dcmagogy.
When one passes in review the in
dividual causes that disturb and COM
plicate our social life, by whatever
names they are designated, and their
list would be long, they all lead back
to one general cause, which is this
the confusion of the secondary with
the essential. Material comfort, edu-
cation, liberty, the whole Of civiliZa-
ton these things constitute the frame
of the picture, but the frame no more
makes the picture than the frock the
monk or the uniform the soldier. Here
the picture is man, and man with
his most intimate namely,
his conscience, his character and his
will. And while we have been elab-
Grating and garnishng the frame, we
have forgotten, neglected, diSfigured,
the picture Thus are we loaded with
external good, and miserable in spirit
ual life. We have in abundance that
which, IL must be, we can 80 without,
and are infinitely poor in the one thing
necdful. And when the depth of our
being is stirred, with its need OF low
ing, aspiring, fulfilling it's destiny, it
feels the anguish Of one buried alive
is smothered under the mass of sec
ondary things that weigh it down and
deprive it of light and air.
We must search out, set free, re-
store TO honor the true life, assign
things to their proper places and re
that the center of human prog
ress is moral growth. What is Il good
lamp? 1t IS not the most elaborate
the finest wrought, that Of the most
precious metal. \ good lamp is
lamp that gives good light And so
also we are men and citizens, not by
reason of the number of our goods and
the pleasures we procure for ourselves,
not through our intellectual and arts .
tic culture, nor because of the honors
md independence we enjoy, but by
virtue of the strength of our moral
fiber. And this is not truth of today,
but truth of all times.
At no epoch have the exterior condi-
tons which man has made for himself |
by his industry or his knowledge been |
able TO exempt him from care for the .
state of his inner life The face of the /