Daily capital journal. (Salem, Oregon) 1903-1919, 1910-05-12

| leadership in any line Of thought or
effort must now look beyond the limits
of his own country. The student of
sociology may live in Berlin or st.
Petersburg, Rome or London, or he
may live In Melbourne or San Fran
cisco or Buenos Aires, but in whatever
city he lives he must pay heed to the
studies of men who. live in each Of
the other cities.
When in America we study labor
problems and attempt to deal with
subjects such as life insurance for
wageworkers we turn to see what
you do here in Germany, and we also
turn to see what the faroff common
wealth of New Zealand is doing
When a great German scientist is
warning against the most dreaded en-
emies Of mankind, creatures Of infin-
itesimal size which the microscope re-
veals in his blood, he may spend his
holidays of study in central Africa or
in eastern Asia, and he must know
what. is accomplished in the labora-
tories of Tokyo, just as he must know
the details Of that practical application
Of science which has changed the 18TH
mus of Panama from a death trap into
what is almost a health resort.
Mankind Knit Together.
From a new discovery in science to
a new method Of combating or apply
ing socialism, there Is no movement
of note which can take place in any
part of the globe without powerfully
affecting masses of people in Europe
America and Australia, in Asia and
Africa. For veal or for woe, the peo-
pies of mankind are knit together far
closer than ever before.
A hundred years ago, when this uni
versity was founded, the methods of
transportation did not differ in the es-
sentials from what they had been
among the highly civilized nations Of
antiquity. Travellers and merchandise
went by land In wheeled vehicles or
on beasts of burden, and by sea in
boats propelled by sails or by oars,
and news was conveyed as it always
had been conveyed.
What improvements there had been
had been in degree only and not in
kind, and in some respects there had
been retrogression rather than advance.
There were many parts of Europe
where the roads were certainly worse
than the old Roman post roads, and the
Mediterranean sea, for instance, was
by no means as well policed as in the
days of Trajan
Now steam and electricity have
worked a complete revolution, and the
resulting immensely increased ease of
communication has in its turn COM
pletely changed all the physical ques-
tions of human life.
Moreover, the invention and use of
machinery run by steam or electricity
have worked a revolution in industry
as great as the revolution IN transpor-
tation, so that here again the differ
ence between ancient and modern civil
lization is one not merely of degree,
but of kind
In many vital respects the huge
modern city differs mSre from all pre-
ceding cities than any of these diff
fered one from the other and the
giant factory town is of and by itself
one of the most formidable problems
of modern life.
Steam and electricity have given the
race dominion over land and water
such as it never had before, and now
the conquest of the air is directly i'm
pending. AS books preserve thought
through time, so the telegraph and
telephone transmit it through the space
they annihilate, and therefore minds
are swayed one by another without
regard to the limitations of space and
time which formerly forced each COM
munity TO work in comparative isola-
tion.
1t is the same with the body as with
the brain. The machinery of the fac
tory and the farm enormously multi
plies bodily skill and vigor. Countless
trained intelligences are at work to
teach us how. to avoid or counteract
the effects Of waste.
lronless Age Is Coming.
The enormous and constantly in
creasing output of coal and iron neces-
sarily means the approach Of the day
when our childrens children or their
chlldren's children shall dwell in an
ironless age and, later on, in an age
without coal and will have to try to
invent or develop new sources for the
production Of heat and use of energy.
But as regards many another natural
resource scientific civilization teaches
us how to preserve it through use.
The best use Of field and forest will
leave them decade by decade, century
by century, more fruitful, and we have
barely begun TO use the indestructible
power that comes from harnessed wa
ter.
The conquests of surgery, of medi-
cine, the conquests in the entire field
Of hygiene and sanitation, have been
literally marvellous. The advances in
The past century or two have been
over more ground than was covered
during the entire previous history Of
fha human raca