Atlanta tri-weekly journal. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1920-19??, 1921-06-02
The Way to Destruction
y HAT distinguished and engaging v

er on the powers of present-day
chemistry, DR.. Edwin E. Slosson,
says that not since the battle of Crecy, when
the armored knight first fell back before
the cannon, has there been so vast revo-
luton in warfare as the next conflict, if
next there is to be, will witness. "It is now
possible he explains, "to send an airship
with or without pilot, by day by night
over the enemys country to sprinkle the
ground with a liquid so deadly that Whit
Inhaled or few drops touching the skin
will cause death. The airships or self-pro-
,elled projectiles will simply move over the
land, as a potato bug sprinkler goes over
held and certain strip of territory, say
nile wide and a hundred miles long, will be
lnstantaneously depopulated and will remain
aninha btable for days to come. In the next
war there will be no frontiers, no en-
)renched line, no exempt cities, no dlst1nc-
ion between combatant and non-combatant.
This, be it noted, is not the .ncy of
Jules Verne but the matter of fact state
nent of chemist and publicist who knows
yell whereof he speaks. The formulas for
he all-devastating poisons are writ, the de-
ices for scattering them are available, and
here are men, it would seem, who are will
ng if not eager for a renewal OF 1nterna-
lonal strife that the death-clouds may be
lnleashed. But the most striking thing IN
Dr.. Slossons statement is the query with
which he concludes it: Can we say that
nan has reached a mental and moral matur-
Ity so that he can be safely entrusted with
such weapons? 1t is clear that unless man
learns to make proper use of his new found
knowledge he is likely to destroy himself
AS makers of war our generation has prov
ID frightfully efficient, but as makers OF
peace we have been no better than sham
bling cave men. In the United States OF
America itself, with such opportunity for en-
lightened and generous world leadership as
never before was vouchsafed nation, we
are deyoting, out of every dollar of Federal
taxes ninety-three cents to purposes of war,
we are pouring oceans of wealth into death
dealing devices, while to preserve and pro-
mote peace amongst men we are doing
what? We are not even lending ne1ghbor-
ly hand in the effort to build up an interna-
tional league for good will and creative CO.
operation We are but sulking in the isola-
ton to which a grudgeful Senate committed
us along with Russia and Mexico, while Am
bassador Harvey chatters to Europe that we
would never have joined humanity's strug-
gle against Prussianism had we not been
fearfully concerned COR our chattels. Billions
for slaughter, but not one cent for peace!
Is it not evident that while the physical
sciences have made wOndrOus strides, leav-
ing in their wake marvels of material wealth
and opportunities that call trumpet-voced
to mans most heroic self, yet the political
and social and moral sciences lag more than
two thousand years behind? Long, long ago
men dlScarded the astronomy, the geography,
the physics which prevailed, say, 500 B. c.,
but still they cling to the politics of that
dead world, still speak and think as unpro-
crossing ancients on the gravest concerns of
their lives.
Continued gains in material power and
skill, and continued impoVerishment in spir-
it fibre and vision can lead, in the nature
of things, to but one end-the destruction
of all that is human Man will vanish from
this planet, as other species have vanished
before him, if he serve no worther pur-
pose than to slaughter his kind, thousands
mayhap millions, in a day, as a gardener
kills potato bugs with poisoned vapor. II
matters little who the victor may be in such
a war as the chemist now pictures (that
war which some persons apparently desire
and which others in authority have done
nothing to prevent) if it is to be won al
fatal cost to humanity. world Of souless
mechanicians would not be worth saving
though heaped with gold to the tips of the
moon and peopled with beings smugly
smart as Ambassado" Harvey himself. The
supreme concern of education, the supreme
duty of citizenship, the supreme task O.
school and church and all institutions dc
voted to the cOmmonWeal should be to bring
the soul of man abreast of his machinery.