Evening star., 1925-04-14
WOODROW WILSON, William Allen

White Houghton, Miffiin Co.
Not history itself-rather the ma
terial of history, the great body Of
writing that has accumulated around
the outstanding personality of Wood
row Wilson. Excellent as some of it
is, brilliant as at least two examples
of this work undoubtedly are, 1t all,
nevertheless, belongs to the volumi-
nous and emotional first period of BIZ
ographic study. Since Mr.. Wilson's
death not time enough has passed to
season opinion concerning him, nor
time enough to reset an overturned
world 10 the proper appraisal of any
dominant figure in the universal up
heavaI. Woodrow Wilson a hundred
years hence will be another figure, in
comparably greater one believes, than
the one around whom today such an
excess of unreas asoned feeling Surges.
At the moment the bulk of the Wilson
literature is purely eulogistic-and
correspondingly of little worth. Not
entirely strange, this unstinted praise,
when one considers the two chief
sources of Mr.. Wilson'S support. On
the one hand the South, passionately
devoted to a Southern-born President,
freely expressing his partiality toward
that section. On the other hand the
college world, enormously enthusiastic
that one of their kind should reach
the supreme political office. BY tenn
permanent or outlook both of these
classes are ardent advocates, passion
ate adherents. They are the true
Muggletonians of whom Oliver Wen
dell Holmes tells us so graphically.
Even a wry suggestion against the
idol of their own choosing raises a
pandemonium of protest among the
Muggltonians. And so it is here.
Any faint hint that here is a man
with any one of mans many short
comings upon him raises a hurricane
of denial. So, the Muggletonians read
Josephus Daniels Life of Woodrow
Wilson and are happy.
x *
The rest of us will delight in
William Allen White on this subject,
! Just as we a year or so ago delighted
| in Robert Amin on the same subject
Both are outstanding men, familiar
| with other men and with affairs and
with a world outlook before them.
| 1t is on this basis. that Mr.. White
takes up the subject of Woodrow
Wilson. On the basis, too, of a
| fluent and engaging writer who makes
| the story as readable as any novel or
any adventure that has been written.
He enters the business with a gusto
| that carries one along lines that seem
highly original, though they are not
It is only the man himself who is
original in the way of putting what
| he has to say in the way he has of
| looking at this or at that. The sub
stance. of Mr.. Wilson's life doesn't
change in his hands. 1t is merely
| his manner of dealing with it. BY
| this time the main features of that
| life are familiar as the school lesson.
In dealing with Mr.. Wilson the author
| INDUCES his very keen sense of
psychology at many point of con-
| tact here. He grows busy and alb
| sorbed-and immensely entertaining
over the Scotch Woodrow strain and
| the Irish Wilson strain having it out
! in the person of this Scotch Irish
| woodrow Wilson. First along one
| line and then along the other he
| trails the man through youth and
| early manhood and in maturer years,
much as if these two lines took turn
and turn about in controlling the af-
fairs of their immediate kinsman.
| All the time he has a very keen eve
out for the discernible causes and eff
| fects of Mr.. Wilson's career, through
| the Princeton controversy, through
| the short political period in New Jer-
sew. through all the vital points in
| his subsequent career as President
and world peacemaker. Some one
| discussing William Allen White, in
respect to the contents of this book
has called him benevolent enemy
to Mr.. Wilson. Rather, fair-dealing
4 and competent student of human ma
TURF and human AFFAIRS who &C;