The Farmington times., 1918-02-15
WAR A FORCE FOR DISCIPLINE.

in your textbook on social psychology
you have read William McDougalls
| testimony:
"As one travels up any of the larger
rivers of Borneo one meets with tribes
that are succcssively more warlIke. IN
the coast regions are peaceful commu-
mites, which never fight save in self
defense, and then with but poor sue
cess, while in the central regions,
where the rivers take their rise, are
number of extremely warlike tribes,
whose raids have been constant
source of terror to the communities
settled in the lower reaches of the riv-
ers. And between those tribes at the
center and those in the coast regions
are others that serve as buffer be-
tween them, being decidedly more bel
licose than the latter, but less so than
the former. 1t might be supposed that
the peaceful coastwise people would be
found to be superior in moral qualities
to their warlike neighbors; but the
contrary in the case.
Advantage With Warlike.
ain almost all respects the advan-
tage lies with the warlike tribes.
Their houses are better built, larger,
and cleaner; their domestic morality IS
superior; they are physically and men,
tally more active, and, in general, are
more trustworthy. But, above all,
their social organization is firmer and
more efficient, because their respect
for and obedience to their chief and
their loyalty to their community are
much greater, each man identifies
himself with the whole community
and accepts and loyalty performs the
social duties laid upon him. And the
moderately warlike tribes occupying
the intermediate region stand midway
between them and the people of the
coast as regards these moral quail
ities."
Similarly in China and India, Nc
Dougall goes on to say, the people are
patient and long suffering, have no
taste for war, and despite the military
virtues. "At the same time they seem
to be deficient in those social qualities
which may be summed up in the one
word "conscientiousness," and which
are the cement of societies and essen
tial factors of their progressive inte-
grafton" In other words, war can be
among savage peoples, powerful
civilizer.
Among the most peaceful races the
absence of warlike spirit makes a
flabby social system. And, though we
conflict with Germany, and though we
seek no territory, no imperial power
and no commercial advantage, but aim
only to defeat military autocracy
that is an old enemy of peace still it is
already evident from the new tone Of
our public life that such social psy-
biologists as James and McDougall
have not been wrong. The war is
bringing US a private gain that we
had not counted on.
In our recent struggle for the new
freedom of which President Wilson
wrote, the great obstacle to political
and economic reform has been our lack
of social conscientiousness.
We Were Apathetic.
We were apathetic. We we're self
seeking. We felt no moral obligation
or patriotism in doing our political du-
ties, no sense of responsibility for the
welfare of our citizens. 1t was
said of the nations affairs: What is
everybody's business is nobody's busl-
ness" And it was true. The country
was hopelessly divided into class an
tagonisms, sectional quarrels, individ-
ual ambitions, exploiters and exploited,
oppressors and oppressed.
Suddenly in few months the war
has done what all the political preach
ing and reform crusading of decade
had hardly begun to do. Men who
could not be bothered to vote for their
country find themselves called upon to
die for it. Warning classes that saw in
political power nothing but an oppor-
tunity to pursue their enmities have in
a moment realized that they must ally
their strengths in a common self-de-
Tense or both may perish. A nation
that scarcely seemed to exist as ma
tion has come miraculously into be-
| ing. What was nobody's business is
now everybody's business, and every
body is attending to it, fhe war has
acted to harden the cement of society.
The nation has integrated.
National Isolation Gone.
/ And it is inconceivable that the old
laxness and social responsibility can
ever return. The national isolation
that made these possible has passed
forever. The oceans no longer sepa-
rate US from Europe and Asia. The
submarine and the flying squad have
beleagured us as they have peieagured
England. Whether we wish it or not,
we are now partner in affairs of the
whole world, compelled to help pre-.
serve the peace of civilization and bar
barous races.
After the threat of war, the emula-
tion of peace. The million men who go
now to repel that threat Will never re.
turn to the Indifference from which
they have been aroused. The citizen
who has been called upon to die for
his country will come back with a
proper sense that he must live for it
and live to mako it worth lying for,
Wealth has fond that it has no hands
with which to defend itself, and that
the poverty of its neighbors makes a
feeble soldier in its defense. The re-
forms that were needed to make the
nation whole ana healthy, will nc
longer be discouraged by the men who
protited by the nations disease, since
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