The daily Nome industrial worker., 1916-12-01


 only trying to remove our own res
 possibility for social things to an-
 other, sphere, when as matter of
 fact it is the harvest of human acts that is now being reaped in the | reddened fields of Europe. Isn't it | plain that in giving thanks for the |
 material prosperity that may be our | lot or another's, responsibility for all the dead hopes, dead loves, dead | happiness that strew the path or
 such prosperity is directly placed l with him who is thanked therefor i It is true that we are creatures ot environment. It is true that to a
 great extent our environment shapes
 our lives rough hew them how We
 will It is true that our hopes and
 fears, our emotions and our ideas all spring from such an environment, in
 the past as hereditary experiences
 or in the present. But our very
 acts react upon that environment
 and we can intelligently regard it,
 knowing that as we SOW so shall we
 reap. That power to react upon our
 environment implies also our power
 to change it. And because we have
 that power and because we have the
 unfailing knowledge that unless
 we do change our environment, our
 acts will be the same and accompa-
 nied by definite consequences, our
 own is the definite responsibility for l those consequences.
 Our fault is not in the stars, nor } in the creator, but in ourselves. So
 our achievements good or ill, fraught with consequences evil or
 good also are in ourselves. We may : not shirk responsibility by thanking } God that we are not as other men; nor in thanking God that he has ] made us what we are, when we have r made ourselves individually and col
 lectively, and been a partner in the ] social crime even if sharer in the ( social virtues. l That the countries of Europe are r now at war is not a judgment oi { God, but the carefully worked out n resultant of definite social forces: :. the effects of well defined causes. { the consequences of a series of de . finite acts.
 I The war could have been fore ? seen It was foreseen. It was tolt g with no sense of prophecy at all tha d it was inevitable. The nations ;. knew it. They built them grea |, ships of war; they organized grea
 armies; and they piled high vas + supplies of arms against the Da! e they knew was inevitable. To blam' J. that upon God when human being B. kenw long before that the acts O ,- the ruling classes within the natiol q were travelling with seven leaguet e boots towards such a fatal condition l, is absurd and puerile and is super C stitition of the blackest sort.
 l. Why then is it not just asCidicul tt ous to thank God for peace? Tn U United States and the people thereil
 if they so will can remain indefinite d ly a peace. Wars are not causeless le They do not come from heaven n, They are not spontaneously develop ,r ed within any nation. They are tn n continuation of series of social an ,r economic causes which evolve ulti al mately to the battlefield. Huma T. beings all know that. The reaso that the United States today is a t. peace is because it is not ready flo IS war; because peace is more profit to able; bcause the people do no le want it; because peace is preferabl s, in the minds of the people to tn Id horrors of war.
 at These are not supernatural thing a. We are not living unde m supernatural conditions. performin
 supernatural acts which will hay le supernatural consequences. Todd W as yesterday and the day before a es we SOW, so shall we reap or ou l? children reap. The sins of tn ,e fathers today as yesterday descen lg to the children who reap the harves ,h in suffering and death. We cannC t. violate the laws of our existence h. abuse our individual or social healt ht and expect to pass unscathed. W