The Clio messenger. (Clio, Mich.) 1907-current, 1914-09-04

| JOoCpu, VI huotIidS CO years
old, practically dead on foot for the last
fifteen years. is said to be the immedi-
ate cause of the great conflict now go
ing on in Europe. although it probably
would have come, sooner or later. with
out his fundamentally.
But the idea that this senile. dotard,
because he considered his ''honor" had
been impugned, could plunge hundreds
of thousands of his fellow human beings
into struggle that'means death, dis
aster and misery unfathomable. is mon
strous. Especially does it thus appear
when we consider the fact that the
poorest peasant, forced to become food
for buzzards in behalf of his emperor's
''honor," fills more useful and equit-
able and Indispensable place in the
scheme of human economy than does
the emperor himself. The latter and
all his kind are mere social parasites, of
an aggravated species, existing only
because of superstitious tolerance of
the usages of dead, dark and barbaric
past.
Thousands of acres given up to game
preserves that the PEOPLE need to pro-
duce bread; magnificent palaces for the
emperor's occupancy and like quarters
for the whole brood of royal progeny,
while the majority of subjects" live
in novels; princely incomes spent not
for the betverment of those who pro-
duce them but for the qualification of
wanton extravaganza on the part of a
few; gold braid, shining helmets, wav-
ing plumes, compulsory military SER
vice-the whole dead load upon the
back of productive industry are
the concomitants of autocratic power,
from which may God deliver US and all
men.
And the German emperor-unlike
many Of his illustrious countrymen. his
personality is not distinguished because
of absorbing devotion to the arts and
sciences and those peaceful, construct
i've forces that tend to the permanent
betterment of conditions under which
men may commonly live. On the cnn-
trary, his constructive instincts have
found congenial expression through
membership in the great gun works at
Essen, where the most terrible engines
of death and destruction ever devised
are the principal product. Has anyone
ever seen his portraiture except when
decked out in all of the trappings of
war? For twenty-five years he has
been known as the war lord of Eu-
rope" for twenty five years he has
been perfecting the most gigantic and
awful instrument of destruction known
to human history, for twenty-five years
his ideals have found personifcation in
the careers of Frederick the Great,
Won Moltke and Bismarck, men of
''blood and iron.' Is it not inevitable
that he should seek to use the instru-
ment he has perfected and make a
niche for himself in the hall of fame
alongside those characters that have
been his inspiration? But it is strange,
withal, that the German emperor can
see his way clear to call upon God so
frequently; to call upon the God Of
peace and mercy and brotherly love, to
succor war and hate and wholesale
butchery. How long, Oh Lord, how
long will.men endure such CHASTITY bur-
lesque?
And all that has been said of Franz
Joseph and Wilhelm may be said with
equal truth of Nicholas, of Russia,
whose sway lover the destinies of his
fellowmen is doubtless more despotic,
less intelligent and less beneficial than
theirs.
OF the progress Of the war itself we
read of the destruction of beautiful
and ancient cathedral and the Univer-
sity buildings at Louvain, Belgium; we
read that bombs are being dropped in
Paris, where the finest gems of art and
architecture that the finest genius of
man has been able to devise are threat
ened with destruction; we read of in
comprehensive carnage; the burning
of hundreds of humble homes and of
children and the aged and infrm being
set adrift homeless and hopeless upon
their devastated countries.
We know that the common people of
the countries at war are not to be
blamedlfor this terrible state of affairs.
We know the people desire not war
and destruction, but peace and the
blessings of peaceful industry, and
in the depths of every intelligent
mind must arise the wish and the
hope that in the final settlement of this
great conflict militarism and autocracy,
which thrive and maintain their worse
than useless existence upon the horrors
of war, may receive such check that
thew shall forever cease to be dominent