BY
EDWARD F. MURPHY
Quite recently our country was merely a pupil at the Hague, a student of
the Science of Peace. In her studies she manifested a little more zest,
and evidently progressed much more rapidly than her companions. For, when
a very significant test came from Mexico, she passed the examination
gloriously. Her answer to the great Mexican question was implicitly this:
no matter how great a grievance may be, it is less a grievance than war,
since war includes all grievances. The world admired her wisdom. The
Hague smiled approval.
True, to preserve peace with Mexico, we had to leave Mexico at war with
herself. The malodorous moral vapors from that civil seethe are still
filling our country with nausea. But if we allow our laudable and just
indignation to be tempered with reflection, we shall have to confess that
war would only enrage our illiterate neighbors to even grosser excesses;
at best, could finally quell their restlessness for only a time; at
worst, would create for us more difficulties than it would solve.
Besides, to add to Mexico’s crimes the ravages of our weapons would be to
increase the world’s woes; to increase them at a time when all hell seems
to be conspiring against the human race. Grievances, better than anything
else, bear postponement. They are proved by the test of time. If real,
they endure.
Mexico is now in the throes of liberty-birth. She is painfully working
out her destiny, just as we and other nations have done before her. She
has a right to be let alone. There will be time enough for us to settle
with her when she has settled with herself. There is honor for us in the
waiting. In the interim, humanity, the universal law, demands that we do
our diplomatic and charitable utmost to win the innocent sufferers in
Mexico from torment.
Our country’s attitude toward Mexico has won for her a unique
distinction. From pupil, she has become teacher of peace. Europe’s
agonized eyes are now appealingly fixed on her. Naturally, such a sudden
and unexpected elevation has somewhat dazed her. She doubts that her
voice will be heard, or, if heard, be heeded, in the unearthly clangor
of arms. She is apprehensive that stray shots from the war-zone may
ricochet across the Atlantic and inflict wounds upon her which it would
be dishonor not to redress. This nervousness, forsooth, is a kind of
stage-fright. She is much like a player, possessed of all such requisites
as talent, memory, and trappings, but timorous of throat difficulties and
gallery missiles at the première.
We are a people of energy, hence of nerves, hence of imagination, hence
of fears. But let us compose ourselves. Poor performers are deservedly
criticized. The world is our audience; it is expecting great things;
shall we give it disappointment? No, of course not! But are we not making
a bad début?
Comes a murmur from all sides the regular army and the navy should be
augmented. Those who dare say nay are forthwith stigmatized as madmen. At
the outbreak of the European War, however, armaments were acknowledged
by everyone as the cause of the conflict. But now it seems that
belligerency has so heated our blood that cool reason has been boiled
out of our heads. Facts, nevertheless, remain; even though our opinions
and sentiments have changed. Whether we at present care to consider it
or not, it is a sorry truth that Europe’s armies have rendered the Hague
helpless and inaugurated an era of horrors.
And now, must we, the only nation influential enough to champion Peace,
genuflect to Mars?
Notwithstanding the lively jeers of militaristic scribes, the statement
stands that the possession of weapons is the strongest stimulus to their
use. Germany armed to the teeth, felt too puissant for Peace; too easily
she found a cause for war: the world weeps. Experience is the queen of
instructors; but do her pupils always learn? Mammoth calamities have
testified, and are at this moment witnessing, that martial means to avert
trouble draw down on men their greatest sorrows. They have caused History
to be couched with a sword-point and blood. The nations across the sea
are now madly struggling for life, although up to a few months ago,
they were cheerfully and blindly making ready for death,—creating the
instruments with which to slay one another. Are we, who should be wise
with a firm realization of their lack of wisdom, about to be false to our
national policy and follow the unhappiest of examples? If the defects of
our present national defence speak to foreign countries of our weakness,
an increase of militia would indicate military design. A reputation for
bellicoseness, fully as much as for impotence, invites complications.
Martial rivalry, suspicions, and jealousies are the recipe for disaster.
With military combustibles in perfect order, a tiny spark from Servia
set Europe on fire. If we similarly prepare for disaster, the slightest
of grievances will serve to prepare disaster for us. Indeed, even with
our present limited army, many of us wax perkily indignant, defiant, and
menaceful over sundry occurrences. Some hotly mumble that the Tennessee
incident is not yet settled; though, in truth, it is difficult, in cool
consideration, to establish any reason for continued heat. Others with
flashing eye, grumble over the alleged maltreatment of Americans in the
belligerent countries; though all United States citizens were bidden home
at the very beginning of the contest, and were given every reasonable
means of conveyance. Which facts assuredly stamp the troubles of those
who have deliberately remained abroad as personal and not national
affairs. The moral is this: if, without an adequate national weapon of
defence, we are inclined to take such haughty umbrage upon such inferior
provocation, how much greater and dangerous will be our resentments, when
we are animated with the confidence inspired by an ample military array!
In these turbulent days, when some excuse for war is encountered at
almost every turn, the consciousness of unpreparedness is our greatest
defense. Our weakness is our salvation. If we clothe ourselves with
strength, there is little doubt that certain noisy newspapers which,
despite the President’s express wishes, are even now doing their subtle
best to stir up mischief, will goad us on to a proof of that strength.
God only knows where we shall be, if we forge for ourselves the grim
means to get there! And, if the war-god finds homage in the United
States, the only remaining powerful luminary of Peace will have set. The
world will be enveloped with affliction. Chaos will reign.
But why do we fear the possible advent of turmoil? It is quite
improbable. Shackled with a thousand problems and interests of her own,
Europe could not harm us, even if she would. Far from desiring to hurt
us, however, she seeks to be helped by us. Ours is a sacred trust.
Peace and plenty are our charge. While the terrible conflict rages, we
can mitigate its ravages. When it closes, we shall have the moral and
material wherewith to revive and cure a maimed and bleeding continent.
Shall we be such traitors to humanity as to adopt measures which may
imperil that trust?
Perchance we sniff complications with Japan. Yet we have received
diplomatic assurances from that quarter which should leave us reasonably
easy. But if our sense of prudence is so strong that we must provide for
emergencies, let us cast about for means which do not spell danger We
shall not have to look far, nor ponder much. For securing our country
against future catastrophe, there is an obvious method, much cheaper,
more effective, and less jeopardous than army-building. It is simply
a promotion of that principle whose presence is really the cause of
Germany’s greatness and whose decay is the most ominous of England’s
menaces: national spirit. Let us not posit the safety of our country in
the hands of 120,000 paid soldiers. As patriots, each and every one of us
should keep the precious spirit of the nation aglow in his own breast.
Then, if disaster threatens, we shall meet it in a phalanx against which
it can but patter in vain. Millions, armed with disinterested love of
country, are much more mighty than thousands, equipped with perfunctory
training, brand new guns, and nicely burnished swords. For, the security
of our land is in ourselves, not in our army. When the Spanish-American
War burst upon us, we were, so far as militia goes, unprepared, but, in
point of national spirit, we were practically a unit. Like magic, unity
made soldiery appear. The call for volunteers was answered by many more
than could be accommodated. If we are now as united as we were then,
why are we fearfully clutching about for new defences? If we are not,
let us earnestly endeavor to be. The condition of England is a darkly
significant example to spur us on. In her hour of greatest trial, those
on whom she chiefly relies for sustenance, her seamen, have leapt at
her throat, demanding what she is ill able to give. They fervidly argue
that their increased risks should and must be renumerated with increased
salaries. They prefer a fat pay-roll to their country’s welfare. Much
will England’s vast navy and great army avail her, if her children thus
fall away from her best interest and from each other. Heaven forbid that
any similar division should obtain in America during time of public
distress! To prepare against it, is by far more prudent, serviceable, and
necessary, than to rear armies.
In fine, let us not insult the Peace with which our land is blessed, by
presenting it with arms!