Life — December 15, 1898 — page 4: what you’re looking at

Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.

“ While there is Life there's Hope.” VOL. XXX1 DEC ay. $6. a year In ad. forelun countries In the Postal Je Single current coples. umbers, after three months from Gate oft pathendian Beeora. No contribution will be returned unless accompanied by stamped and addressed envelope. The illustrations in Live, are copyrighted, aul are not to be reproduced without special arrangement with the publishers. Prompt notification shout be seut by sub- scribers of any change of address, T was noticed last spring, before we went to war with Spain, that the war . sentiment was very largely Ya matter of age; that the young and eager wanted to fight, and that the mature and wary didn’t. So it seems to be, more or less, about the Philippines, the ten- dency of youth being to bave A confidence that in the end we IXY shall come out of that scrape AYA © all right, and the tendency of “maturity being towards all man- ner of grave apprebensions. Our Commissioners have agreed that we shall take all that Spain has to give up in the Philip- pines, and pay her twenty million dol- lars. What sort of a bargain that is for us is entirely a matter of conjecture, and conjecture which, in almost all cases, is based not so much on information as on feelings. Youth, when it is worth anything believes in itself and its powers, and its future. Whatever is young in us believes blindly and ignorantly, but with contidence that we will do well by the Philippines. Whatever is old in us, and can look back on our dealings with the Indians and negrocs, and recall our Propensity to Gemonstrate that offices exist for the benefit of office holders, feels low-spirited about our new responsibili- ties. and looks for all sorts of jobs and bad work in connection with them. Senator Hoar opposes the treaty, and declares that he will fight it in the Senate. Ex-Senator Edmunds speaks of annexation as a proposal bordering on madness; Mr. Edward Atkinson gets out his slate and computes that the LIP E expansion which promises to result from our set-to with Spain will cost us about two hundred millions a year, Even the Reverend Henry Van Dyke, of the Brick Presbyterian Church on Fifth Avenue, ageatleman not yet visibly touched by senility, declared on Thanksgiving Day his convicticn that expansion would raise hob with this country. ‘The answer to all these gentlemen, and to the rest of us who are affected by analogous sentiments, seems to be that we are all too old to have sound views of the future; that instinct is a safer uide than reason or precedent, and that instinct is only trustworthy while it is still comparatively fresh, and has not been poisoned by experience. Sane T has not been definitely settled yet at what age one’s feclings about annex: ation and expansion cease to be, trust- worthy. Some conservative authorities maintain that men as old as forty-five may still be responsive to the leadings of dest Others hold that there is no progress after thirty-five, and that alla man is good for after that is to steer discreetly and profit by the momentum he bas already acquired. Others put the age of true political wisdom somewhere between cightecn. and twenty-five, and aver that the aspirations that come with the wisdom teeth are what determine the future of the individual, and that the sum of many such aspirations must settle the course of a nation, So they argue that if the youth of America yearns for expansion, maturity and age had better realize what is coming, and try to ar- range the details so as not to be too much burt. a WE shall see what happens. The Senate is not very young, and may reject the treaty that the Commis- sioners have arranged for. But prob- ably it won’t. The sentiment that we bad to get the Philippines away from Spain, whether it is sound or unsound, has wide popular acceptance. ‘The sen- timent that we ought not to take the Philippines without paying Spain a round sum of money is also pretty gen- eral, so that the Commissioners in what they have done will have strong popular support. But as to what we shall do next there will be profuse discussion, with the result, no doubt, that events will have more to do with settling the limit of our activities than cither our theories or our wishes. Our present theory, backed by desires which are pretty generally prevalent, is that we are to maintain in the Philippines a sufficient force to kecp order while the Filipinos work out the problem of self-govern- ment. gH d- Orv obvious truth we may as well recognize. There is nothing at Wasbington which will get between us and any slings and arrows that out- rageous fortune may be pointing at us. Whatever is coming will come. There is to be nointerference with Destiny, and none, probably, with Congress. No superior wisdom is anywhere available to save us from the consequences of any indiscretions that we may elect to commit. The Great Father at Washington is an indulgent parent, and if bis rampagious children bave a mind to surfeit them selves with indigestibles he will not hin- derthem, We must try to believe Doctor Bull when he says thut more tropical fruits will afford an agreeable variety to American diet and that any stomach aches which may ensue will be instructive enough to more than compensate for the PzERsoNs who suppose that Mr. George Aldridge, of Rochester, the suspended Superintendent of Public Works for New York State, is a miscel- laneous rascal who ought to be locked up, are in danger of being misled. Mr. Aldridge is a politician, and has spent the public moneys of New York likea politician; but he is not a thief, and not a man who has grown rich in office. He represents a bad system of doing public business; but personally he is respected by many honest men who know him pretty well, and who believe that he has much less to fear from an investigation than is commonly supposed.