Willmar tribune. [volume] (Willmar, Minn.) 1895-1931, 1910-05-18


laboratories of Tokyo, just as he must
know the details of that practical applica-
ton of science which has changed the
Isthnus Of Panama from a death-trap
into what is almost a health resort. Every
progressive in China is striving to intro
duce western methods Of education and
administration, and hundreds of European
and American books are now translated
into Chinese. The influence Of European
governmental principles is strikingly IL
Illustrated by the fact that admiration for
them has broken down the iron barriers of
Moslem conservatism, SO that their intro
duction has become burning question in
Turkey and Persia; while the very unrest,
the Impotence Of European or American
control, in India, Egypt. or the Philip
pines, takes the form of demanding that
the government be assimilated more close
ly to what it is in England or the United
States.
So much for the geographical side of
the expansion Of modern civilization. But
only few Of the many and intense &C.
tivities Of modern civilization have found
their expression on this side. The move
ment has been just as striking in it's con-
quest over natural forces, in it's searching
inquiry into and about the soul of things.
Steam and electricity have given the
race dominion over land and water such
as it never had before; and now the con-
books preserve thought through time, so
the telegraph and the telephone transmit
| it through the space they annihilate, and
| therefore minds are swayed one by an
| other without regard to the limitations of
space and time which formerly forced
| each community to work in comparative
| isolation. It is the same with the body as
| with the brain. The machinery of the fac
! tory and the farm enormously multiplies
| bodily skill and vigor. Countless trained
| intelligences are at work to teach us how
! to avoid or counteract the effects OF
waste.
! The advances In the realm of pure intel
lect have been OF equal note, and they
have been both intensive and extensive
Great virgin fields Of learning and wis
dom have been discovered by the few
and at the same time knowledge has
spread among the many to degree never
| dreamed of before. Old men among us
have seen in their own generation the
rise of the first rational science of the
evolution Of life. The astronomer and the
chemist, the psychologist and the his
| tor1an, and all their brethren in many diff
ferent fields Of wide endeavor, work with
| a training and knowledge and method
| which are in effect instruments of pre-
cision differentiating their labors from
the labors OF their predecessors as the
rifle is differentiated from the bow.
I
the moral and spiritual world as in the
world Of the mind and the body.
One Danger Of Civilization.
One Of the prime dangers Of civilization
has always been its tendency to cause
the loss of the virile fighting virtues, Of
the fighting edge. When men get too COM
Portable and lead too luxurious lives there
Is always danger lest the softness eat like
an acid into their manliness of fiber The
barbarian, because of the very conditions
| of his life, is forced to keep and develop
certain hardy qualities which the man of
| civilization tends to lose, whether he be
clerk, factory hand, merchant, or even a
/ certain type Of farmer. Now will not
assert that in modern civilized society
these tendencies have been wholly over
come; but there has been a much more
successful effort to overcome them than
was the case in the early civilizations.
This is curiously shown by the military
history Of the Graeco-Roman period as
compared with the history Of the last four
or five centuries here In Europe and
among nations Of European descent. In
the Grecian and Roman military history
the change was steadily from a citizen
army to an army Of mercenaries. In the
days of the early greatness Of Athens,
Thebes, and Sparta, in the days when the
Roman republic conquered what world it
knew, the armies were filled with citizen
soldiers. But gradually the citizens re-
fused to serve in the armies, or became
unable to render good service. The Greek
states described by POlybus with but few
exceptions, hired others to do their fight
ing for them. The Romans of the days of
Augustus had utterly ceased to furnish
| any cavalry, and were rapidly ceasing to
furnish any infantry, to the legions and
cohorts. When the civilization came to
an end, there were no longer citizens in
the ranks Of the soldiers. The change
from the citizen army to the army OF
mercenaries had been completed.
Modern Citizens Armies.
Now, the exact reverse has been the
case with us in modern times. A few
centuries ago the mercenary soldier was
the principal figure in most armies. and in
great numbers of cases the mercenary
soldier was an alien. In the wars Of re-
ligion in France, in the Thirty Years
war In Germany, in the wars that imme-
diately marked the beginning of the
breakup Of the great Polish kingdom, the
regiments and brigades of foreign SOL
diers formed a striking and leading fea-
ture in every army Too often the men
of the country in which the fighting took
place played merely the ignoble part OF
victims, the burghers and peasants ap-
pearing in but limited numbers in the
mercenary armies by which they were
plundered. Gradually this has all changed
until now practically every army is q
citizen army, and the mercenary has al
most disappeared, while the army exists
on vaster scale than ever before in his
tory. This is so among the military mon
arches Of Europe.
In our own Civil war of the United
States the same thing occurred, peaceful
people as we are. At that time more than
two generations had passed since the
War of Independence. During the whole
Of that period the people had been en-
gagged in no life-and-death struggle; and
yet, when the Civil war broke out. and
after some costly and bitter lessons al
the beginning, the fighting spirit of the
people was shown to better advantage
than ever before. The war was peculiar