The Richmond palladium and sun-telegram. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1907-1939, 1915-11-11
~ EDGAR iLiFF.

~ EDGAR lLlFF.
The natural law or absorption has
been the primal cause Of the rise OF
great nations. The most distinguished
and powerful people have been Of mix.
ed races and commingling blood.
The melting pot" into which all the
races OF the earth have poured their
virility, has been the builder Of the
greatest powers. From this seething
caldron has arisen one spirit. A great
race arises with one common senti-
ment and we call 1t nationality.
This spirit, call 1. what we may.
performed marvels In the building Of
ancient, monarchies, in the spread of
the Roman empire, in the rise OF the
English people from a state OF semi
barbarism. 1t is slowly and surely
building vast nation now In the name
Aof the American.
Contrasts Produce Power.
It has become an axiom among his
torians like Rawlinson that union OF
various races, between whom there is
q marked and violent contrast, pro-
duces the most distinguished new race,
destined to most vitality affect the pro-
gress of the world.
The Roman, Norman and Danish
invaders Of the British Isles never sue
ceeded in stamping out the individu-
atty of the ancient Briton. The con-
auerors were absorbed. They fell into
the melting pot. They came under the
spell and were transformed by mar
rage and social environment. The sub
jected became the real conQuerors
through the natural law OF selection
and were masters In time. The con-
trolling ingredients in the melting pot
was the sturdy Briton spirit. 1t put iron
sinto the Norman. smelter into the Ro'
man and harmony into the Dane. The
spirit Of the ages selected from the
mass of mixed peoples and produced
from the fusion In the furnace what
we call the English people.
Like all marvellous works OF genius
this spirit of progress transformed
tfrom the crude to the refined. The In
ldefinable and uncomfortable spirit, SO
in the single balm OF Snakes.
lpeare, which absorbed. selected and
Transformed, which took common clay
land turned 1t into gold-thts spirit
does seize races, shakes them well TO-
'Eether, and from crude and cnaotlc
conditions builds up great world pow
ers and solid nations.
No race or tribe, keeping within IT,
self, keeping itself racially pure, mar
rying within its own race, practlclng
strict endogamy or inter-breed1ng, has
over risen to power or national dlstinc
,tion. Rome flourished by mixture wh1le
Israel, a chosen peon.e," became the
Football and gibe of all nations.
interbreedine Fails.
In plant life and animal life OAR
Awin discovered that close INTERPRETED
ding degenerated, that animals finally
became incapable OF breeding at all,
THAT plants lost constitutional vigor
;degenerated into little lap-dogs, and
degenerated into little lap-dos. and
fowls fell to long, spindling legs and
small bodies.
Exogamy, or going outside OF family.
race or social spheres for husbands or
wives, produces strong people. Inc
vice of wealth and royalty has been Its
exclusion and it reaps it's reward IN
sexual barrenness and degenerate of
spring. A mixture of the weakness and
narrowness Of wealth with the vigor
and common sense of the working
world keeps nations alive and restores
the necessary health and virility re-
uuired for national longevity. This law
must be obeyed in order to give peo-
pie permanent place of distinction In
the world of immutable natural laws.
Wealth and capital are necessary to
high states of civilization. but no ma
ton can keep itself fresh and vigorous
If there is not a constant mixed racial
tendency and commingl:ng going on.
Wealth must change hands. There
must be a mixture CT rich and poor.
an alliance OF wealth and health. and
the idler and the producer must strug-
gle forever for existence and place,
power and influence. Perhaps this was
Goldsmiths thought when he wrote
these lires in his deserted Village"
I'll fares the land, to Fastening ills
prey.
Where wealth accumrlates and men
decay"
Americana Are Distinct.
The American people have become
distinct race. We are no longer Ger
man. English. Irish. Scotch. Greek.
italian. Spanish or French. We are
Americans The roots of every Amer
lean strike deeply into nearly every
nationality of the globe.
As long ago rs 1882 a Frenchman
living in New York recorded in his
Letters OF an American Farmer his
observations upon what we now call
the melting pot" He said:
'Americans are a mixture OF Eng
lish. ScCtcN. Irish French, Dutch. Ger
man and Swede. They are either Euro
pean or descendants Of an European.
Hence this strange mixture Of blood
which you will find in no other coun-
try. could point out to you family
whose grandfather was an Englishman
whose wife was Dutch. whose son mar
tied French woman, and whose pres
snt four sons have now four wives Of
different nations He is an American
who. leaving behind him all his anci-
ent prejudices and manners, receives
hew ones from the new mode Of life
he has embraced, the new government
he obeys. and the new rank he holds.
He becomes an American by being re-
reived in the broad lap of our alma