Evening journal., 1917-01-31
The Wilson Dream
(From the Louisville Courier-Journal)

When one not himself under the
spell Of dreams attempts calmly to es
innate Presidents address on world
peace which he delivered in the Uni
ted States Senate on Monday, he
cannot escape the conclusion that this
remarkable performance was the re-
lation, in deft, phrase. Of a splendid
dream; the relation as his own. by
one rubbing his eyes as he emerges
from a students clOister, of human
ity's dream of dreams through the
nights of the ages-the dream of the
universal Utopia, the millennium OF
mankind.
In the relation of this dream the
President more than once refers to
people who think. II would have been
highly interesting il he. as a think ng
man, had supplemented his relation
with plain matter-o -of-fact exposition
OF how the realization of the dream is
to be brought about. It is one thing
to announce in stately sentences the
pattern on which the world should be
made over: it is a very different thing
to lay down the specifications by
which the world can thus be made
over
Speaking. he explains. both as an
individual and as the head of the Gov
ernment, he prescribes the lines on
which he thinks the Government
should be willing to enter a world
trust to insure world Justice and
peace, The peace which is to end the
present war in Europe must be a
peace drawn on those lines if we are
to do what he believes we are OBJ
ligated to do-bind ourselves with
other powers to enforce it. He ad-
mits that we are to have no part in
making the terms of that peace but
he tells the powers that are fighting
for peace just what sort of peace
terms they must make II they are to
have our cooperation in maintaining
Justice" and peace on the earth.
At the outset (did the dreamer OF
dreams ever before go so farO he de-
crees that the peace must not be
peace founded on victory. No peace
founded on victory can endure, he pro-
claims, though on what reading OF
history he bases such proclamation
he does not reveal. But all belliger-
ents. as the laborers lay down their
implements in the field at the sound
Of the Angelus, must lay down their
arms wherever this call to peace
reaches them, and everywhere all who
have quarrelled and wrangled and
fought over ideals of Government and
conflicting ambitions and purposes
must abandon all those ideals, ambi-
tions and purposes; must purge them
selves OF all the motives which have
stirred them to strife and enter forth
with into that sublimated state OF
heaven on earth which Mr.. Wilson
would obligate tho United States TO
fight for II necessary.
To secure this beatihc state does
not seem a consummation at all re-
mote or difficult All that is required
is that the belligerents now at one
another's throats shall put aside and
forget any Of the things for which ,
thew are fighting that may be incon- |
sistent with the plan Of peace that Mr.. /
Wilson has drawn IN his dream; revo-
lutionize their governmental systems
In so far as they may do violence 10
lbe ideals Of democracy; roarrange /
their territorial dominions in a new
man of three continents; establish a
new code OF international law; disarm
10 such an extent as may not disable
hem 20 maintain peace by going 70
war when necessary; and all the par
powers slipping, as nat
Irally as the "dewdrops slip into the
shining sea" OF Nirvana. into a world
federation for the surrender OF ma
ional independence and the submerg-
nee OF national resources into the