The Columbus journal. (Columbus, Neb.) 1874-1911, 1910-12-14

Did you ever happen to overhear-
not on purpose, Of course. nor that you
are capable Of eavesdropping, or Of
opening letters that are addressed ia
other people-but did you ever happen
quite in spite of yourself and by pure
accident, to overhear some one talk.
ing about you, or happen to glance al
letter wherein some one was writ.
ing about you, and discover that most
paralyzing, angering, amazing, and
agonizing of discoveries-that some
one hates you?
1t may be a person you were indif:
erent toward, or even one whom you
have tried to treat kindly, or some man
that is actually under great obligations
to you; and what q SILVER then went
down your spine when you realized
that if you fell he would laugh, if you
lost money it would make him happy,
and if you ran into dark days of fog
and failure, sickness or shame, he
would think you had got your deserts!
Perhaps you have even been the re.
cipient of that nastiest and poisonest of
ambush shots, the anonymous letter,
in which the unknown knew all man.
ner of vileness about you and was ready
to dance on your grave.
And you have wondered at the mys.
terry of the enemy, and the miracle Of
hate. But you need not wonder.
Hate is the law of unintelligent pro.
gress; love is the law ofintelligent pro.
gress. War is the method of progress
among brutes; cooperation the method
of human progress.
FIGHTING BASIS OF UNIVERSE?
All the universe seems to be Organi.
zed upon the principle of fighting.
What a long, grim battle sounds in
that cold scientific phrase, the survival
of the fittest,," 1t means that ever
since life appeared on this globe it has
existed struggling. The plants Of the
field war upon each other until the
weakest are suppressed. The animal.
cluse in drop of water devour their
kind. One sort Of corpuscles in the
blood eat other corpuscles. The big
fishes eat the little ones and the para
sites eat the whales. Nature, that
Tennyson calls red in tooth and claw"
is huge slaughter house.
The worlds evolution upward has
been progressive bloody war. John
Fiske says: Battle far more deadly
than Gettysburg or Gravelotte have
been necessarily waged on every
square mile of earths's life bearing sur.
face since life first began"
Among men of the past we see the
same sad spectacle We have observed
in the lower orders Of animated exis.
tence. History is a record of battles.
Nations feed on historic hates. Just to
be a German is to be loathed by all
Frenchmen. 1t seems sometimes as if
the biting lines of the cynic poet was
true: Nov hatred is by far the long,
est pleasure; Men love in haste, but
they detest at leisure"
What a weller of feuds and grudges
is politics. Even the history of the
church has been far from uniform
picture Of brotherly love.
RECORDS BLIND OUR EYES.
Looking at all this record We are
easily deceived into concluding that
war is mans normal condition, that
business ought to be a competitive
and that We progress only by
contest. But as a matter of fact, We
forget here the important truth that
with the appearance of man in the |
world new force entered. In the in.
moral, and social realm it is |
not competition but corporation that |
makes progress.
The development of civilization has
been in spite Of and not because of wars.
Greece created her marvels of art and
letters by corporation; these things
we're destroyed by wal. Only as men
nave learned to get together have they
advanced in the arts and inventions.
War Of any kind is unnecessary,
tupid, and brutal. All the ends
ought could have been gained better
ONE other way.
All the vast achievements in the
business world, such as railroads, bank.
Poison In War.
When the French beat the Formo-