The San Francisco call., 1910-05-13
NATIONS WARNED TO OKEEP
FIGHTING EDGE" KEEN

y EhLiN, May lZ.-Speak1ng be-
fore the University of Berlin
- today Colonel Roosevelt took
IS the subject matter of his lecture
THE World Movement" He said
in part:
The play Of new forces is as evil
dent in the moral and spiritual
world as in the world of the mind
and the body. Forces for good and
forces for evil are everywhere evil
dent. each acting with a hundred or
Thousand fold the intensity with
which 1T acted in former ages. Over
the whole earth the swing of the
pendulum growe~ more and more
rapid the handspring coils and
spreads at a rate constantly quick
enlng. the whole world movement is
of contantly accelerating velocity
In this movement there are signs
OF much that BODIES Ill. The ma
chinery IS SO highly geared, the ten
sion and strain are SO great the
effort and the output have alike so
increased, that there is cause to
dread the ruin that would come
from any great accident, from any
breakdown, and also the ruin that
may come from the mere wearing
out OF the machine itself.
PRECEDED DOWNFALL
The only previous civilization
WITH which our modern civilization
can be IN any way compared is that
period of Graeco- Roman civilization
extending, say, from the Athens of
Ihemistocles to the Rome of Marcus
Aurellus Many of the forces and
tendencies which were then at work
are at work now. knowledge, lux
ury and refinement. wide material
conquests, territorial administration
on vast scale, an increase in the
mastery of mechanical appliances
and In applied science-an these
marx n1a,ias our tI civilization as they
that fourished in the Mediterranean
lands 20 centuries ago. and they
preceded the downfall of the older
civilization
and some of them are quite as strik-
ing as the similarities The single
fact that the old civilization was
based upon slavery shows the
ehasm that separates the two Let
me point out one further and very
slgnlf1cant difference in the develop
ment of the two civilizations, diff
ference so obvious that it is astonz .
lshing that it has not been dwelt
upon by men of letters.
Loss of ssFIGHTING EDGE
One of the prime dangers of civ
llization has always been its tend
ency to cause the loss of the virile
hghting virtues, of the fighting
edge. When men get too comfort
able and lead too luxurious lives
there is always danger less the soft
ness eat like acid into their manli-
ness of fiber. The barbarian. be-
cause 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 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.
What is the lesson to us today?
Are we to go the way of the older
civilizations? The immense increase
in the area of civilized activity to-
DAY; SO that 1t is nearly eoterminous
with the worlds surface; the inn
mense increase in the multitudinous
variety of it's activities; the i'm
mense increase in the velocity of
the world movement-are all these
to mean merely that the crash will
be all the more complete and ter
rible when it comes? We can not be
certain that the answer will he in
the negative; but of this we can be
certain-that we shall not go down
in ruin unless we deserve and earn
our end. There is no necessity for
us to fall; we can hew out our des-
tiny for ourselves, if only we have
the wit and the courage and the
honesty.
FUTURE GLORIES
Personally. l do not believe that
our civilization will fall | think
that on the whole we have grown
better and not worse. I think that
on the whole the future holds more
for us than even the great past has
held. But. assuredly, the dreams of
golden glory in the future will not
come true unless, high of heart and
strong of hand, by our own mighty
deeds, we make them come true. we
can not afford to develop any one
set of qualities. any one set of ac-
tivities. at the cost of seeing others.
equally necessary. atrophied. Neither
the military efficiency of the Mon
gol, the extraordinary business
ability of the Phoenician, nor the
subtle and polished intellect of the
Greek ayailed to avert. destruction
I'VE, the men of today and of the
future, need many qualities if we
are to do our work we'll. We need.
first of ali and most important of
all, the qualities which stand at the
base of individual, of family life
the fundamental and essential quail
ities-the homely. every day, all i'm
portant virtues. II the average man
will not work, il he has not in
him the will and the power to be
good husband and father; if the
average woman is not good house
wife, a good mother of many
healthy children. then the state will
topp1e, will go down, no matter