The Bridgeport evening farmer. [volume] (Bridgeport, Conn.) 1866-1917, 1916-02-01

Whether this new year sees the end
of the war or not, it is time to think
of what is to be saved from the wreck
of the world. The first and greatest
asset of the future is the salvage of
the wreck.
If we can count only upon having
what is left over of what the world
had before it was ravaged by the war,
the balance will be altogether to the
bad. The whole world is intellectually
poorer for, having lost the mult1tude
of good lives, the inestinab1e property
values and the treasures of art, lit
erature and architecture which were
among the richest heritages of the
race
worse still is the loss OF, the ideals,
the reliances, the hopes and the hu-
man relationships which have gone
down irr@the wreck. How much we
have all lost of these assets of the
present and the future we little real
ize But it is a disturbing sign OF
the times that hitherto forward-fa--
cling stout-hearted men and women
are apoIogizing to each other for hav-
ing held higher hopes and more adj
yanced ideals than the. stern. hard
facts of war seem to have justified
Nevertheless, may there not be
some new standards and relations,
some different rea1ignments and Coop
Grafton which may be the source of
new hopes the basis for new ideals?
The old internationalism has col
Iapsed The hands that labor stretch
ed across seas and other national
boundaries, broke their clasp and went
down in the welter of brothers blood.
Law has lost its international recog-
milton and authority. Like national
treaties, international law became "a
scrap of paper" Religions eccles-
iastical expression of it's universal
bonds of brotherhood as completely,
and even more strangely 1d suddenly
| disappeared
But a new nationa1isr1 appears
Such a national unity Germany and
France have never experienced before.
Evan Russia is more nearly united
than ever before. Glass distinctions,
which are more irreconcilable, the
more free and democratic the people
are, have yielded to each other and
| blended as never before the cap1-
talist classes of Europe freely or by
consteaint, are bearing their heavy
share Of each nations common bur-
den In silence which gives consent,
or in votive offerings expressing 10y
aIty possessions and prerogatives nth
| atty, possessions and prerogat1Ves
/ hitherto ffercely fought for have been
Surrendered without struggle or even
a murmur. The profits of the few at
| the cost of the misery and necessity or
the many, the gain of greed in the
manufacture of war munition, are in
significant compared with the new
royalty of wealth.
Labor's Free VIII Gift.
It was harder for labor to yield the
hard-earned gains of its century of
struggle and sacrifice, without any
guarantee of having its hitherto con-
| ceded rights restored. But labor too
has yielded its costlier offering to ma
| tienal loyalty, by toi1ing on as never
before in mine and shop as self-sac-
rfficingly as in trench and stoke-ho1e.
/ Through such national cooperation
in production and distribution, in loss
and gain, in suffering and conquest
over obstacles, may not "co-opera-
tive comm Onwealth'' arise within one
| or another nation?
| Of one and another of the nations
at war, it has been said, there is not
a selfish man left among u.s. Is it
inconceivabIe that such a spirit, even
though expressed in terms of pa
triotisn so narrow as to be exclusive OF
the greater loyalty due to- all that Is
human, can exhaust itself and disap-
pear with the war? Will not peace
have her victories no less renowned
than warp It cannot be that either
class, after the war, will resort to its
former exclusively class conscious
claims and ostracisns. In every ma
ton there must be concessions, inter
relationships, new rights, more dem
ocracy, unless the old tyrannies are
ed by revolution.
This new patriotism in Europe can
not forever remain national Per