Evening journal. [volume] (Wilmington, Del.) 1888-1932, 1919-02-24

against the Imperial Government OF
Germany. April 6, 1917, had certain
place in the worlds appraisemont. she
was admittedly one Of the great powers.
Her trade and commerce had grown 20
huge proportions. Above all, she was
rich. A nation Of riches. And yet, the
stark truth was that her influence
abroad stopped short with her material
wealth and power
What had become Of the hope OF the
fathers that she was 20 be the bacon
light for new ventures IN freedom by
other peoples7
1T IS true, the doubtful political ex-
pertinent OF the Western Hemisphere
had become a stable and established
fact. but II was also true that the pro-
gross toward freedom which the world
had made in the later nineteenth cen
tury was due more TO natural develop
ment and evolution than 10 the Ameri-
can example.
THE world, too, had made an ap-
praisement OF the American people.
They were admitted % be capable, re-
sourceful, efficient individually, II nos
politically. hard headed, shrewd' SELF
conferred.
Americans themselves had little fault
10 md with this appraisement. Indeed
II hit hard by their own estimate or
their nation ard themselves
What OF their forebears, the pio-
noers and oolonists OF the early eigh-
tsenth century? Theirs. too, were those
same qualities, but were they all? What
OF the vision? the vision that N the
depths Of the unbroken wastes OF for
ests. that in the face OF hard and for
bidding nature saw clear a new world
freed from the oruelties and oppres-
sions that had smoared the old world
they had quit?
This idoalism OF our forboars was
fact which the world, and Americans
themselves. had lost sight Of IN the
march OF time. ! went hand IN hand
with a hard-headed realization Of the
rights OF the individual citizen and Of
the necessity Of converting the material
resources Of the country into sources
OF Individual prosperity. and the truth
is that the success which crowned the
merely material part Of their under
taking became so unprecedented, so
phenomenal. that in its amazement, tho
world lost sight OF the moving cause
behind the great task, and America and
Americans become more synonyms for
success in material things, And Amer
leans accepted tho verdict, because they
were proud Of this success.
Had the old ldoalism vanished? Had
Americans become merely materiallsts?
who could say2
ut is only in the furnace Of great
trials that the true character Of men
becomes revealed. America had had
her trials but they were all Of the kind
which could be met by qualities un-
mixed with strong idealism.
"Since the great Washington had ut
tered this warning against foreign al
lance, aloofness from political Europe |
had become a cherished American doc /
trine. and that other doctrine which We |
had developed from President Monroe !
and which had become a fixed Ameri-
can policy-cOuld we be true 10 these
legaeies OF our ancertors and take ac-
tive part in the great conflict Was
there not reserved for us service to
the world which we could render only
II we remained apart--the service OF
acting when the time was ripe the
arbiter between right and wrong2
There was division Of opinion, divi-
sion Of counsel, and we waited. And
the horror went on, and Europe lay in
agony and bloody sweat. And over
here: here in America. even as we
doubted and hesitated, down, deep
down in the hearts Of the people began
10 burn that spark which our fore
fathers had kindlcd, the spark Of their
old idealism, and surely though slow
~. 10 ate its way through doubt and
and sophistry until 10 burst
forth on that sixth Of April, 1917, into