Chapter 11
What has been treated by incompetent critics as mere boastfulness has in reality been practical sagacity and foresight. Sam Slick was only expressing a truth when he said, "The Yankees see further than most folks." This was not because of any innate cleverness but because of their advantage in position. Americans have had a more unobstructed view of the future than had the people of the overcrowded Old World. The settlers on the shores of the Atlantic had behind them a region which belonged to them and their children. They soon became aware of the riches of this hinterland and of its meaning for the future. This vast region must be settled. Roads must be built over the mountains, the forests must be felled, mines must be opened up, farms must be brought under the plow, great cities must be built by the rivers and lakes, there must be schools and churches and markets established where now the tribes of Indians roam. The surplus millions of Europe must be transported to this wilderness.
It was a big task and yet a simple one. The movement was as obvious as that of Niagara--Niagara is wonderful but inevitable. A great deal of water flowing over a great deal of rock, that is all there is of it. The destiny of America was equally obvious from the beginning. Here was a great deal of land which was destined to be inhabited by a great many people. It didn't matter very much what kind of people they were so that they were healthy and industrious. The greatness of the country was assured if only there were enough of them.
From the very first the future greatness of the land was seen by open-eyed explorers. They all were able to appreciate it. Captain John Smith does not compare Virginia with Great Britain; he compares it to the whole of Europe. After mentioning the natural resources of each country, he declares that the new land had all these and more, and needed only men to develop them. And Captain John Smith's forecast has proved to be correct.
In the first half of the last century, a party of twenty young men from Cambridge, Massachusetts, started on what at that time was a great adventure, the overland journey to Oregon. The preface to Wyeth's "Oregon Expedition" throws light on the ideas of those who were not statesmen or captains of industry, but only plain American citizens sharing the vision which was common.
"The spot where our adventurer was born and grew up had many peculiar and desirable advantages over most others in the County of Middlesex. Besides rich pasturage, numerous dairies, and profitable orchards, it possessed the luxuries of well-cultivated gardens of all sorts of culinary vegetables, and all within three miles of Boston Market House, and two miles of the largest live-cattle market in New England." Besides these blessings there is enumerated "a body of water commonly called Fresh Pond."
"But Mr. Wyeth said, 'All this availeth me nothing, so long as I read books in which I find that by going only about four thousand miles overland, from the shore of our Atlantic to the shore of the Pacific, after we have there entrapped and killed the beavers and otters, we shall be able, after building vessels for the purpose, to carry our most valuable peltry to China and Cochin China, our sealskins to Japan, and our superfluous grain to various Asiatic ports, and lumber to the Spanish settlements on the Pacific; and to become rich by underworking and underselling the people of Hindustan; and, to crown all, to extend far and wide the traffic in oil, by killing tame whales on the spot, instead of sailing around the stormy region of Cape Horn.'
"All these advantages and more were suggested to divers discontented and impatient young men. Talk to them of the great labor, toil, risk, and they would turn a deaf ear to you; argue with them and you might as well reason with a snowstorm."
If you would understand the driving power of America, you must understand "the divers discontented and impatient young men" who in each generation have found in the American wilderness an outlet for their energies. In the rough contacts with untamed Nature they learned to be resourceful. Emerson declared that the country went on most satisfactorily, not when it was in the hands of the respectable Whigs, but when in the hands of "these rough riders--legislators in shirt-sleeves--Hoosier, Sucker, Wolverine, Badger--or whatever hard-head Arkansas, Oregon, or Utah sends, half-orator, half-assassin, to represent its wrath and cupidity at Washington."
The men who made America had an "excess of virility." "Men of this surcharge of arterial blood cannot live on nuts, herb-tea, and elegies; cannot read novels and play whist; cannot satisfy all their wants at the Thursday Lecture and the Boston Athenæum. They pine for adventure and must go to Pike's Peak; had rather die by the hatchet of the Pawnee than sit all day and every day at the counting-room desk. They are made for war, for the sea, for mining, hunting, and clearing, and the joy of eventful living."
In Emerson's day there was ample scope for all these varied energies on the frontier. "There are Oregons, Californias, and Exploring Expeditions enough appertaining to America to find them in files to gnaw and crocodiles to eat."
But it must have occurred to some one to ask, "What will happen when the Oregons and Californias are filled up?" Well, the answer is, "See what is happening now." Instead of settling down to herb-tea and elegies, Young America, having finished one big job, is looking for another. The noises which disturb you are not the cries of an angry proletariat, but are the shouts of eager young fellows who are finding new opportunities. They have the same desire to do big things, the same joy in eventful living, that you had thirty years ago. Only the tasks that challenge them have taken a different form.
When you hear the words "Conservation," "Social Service," "Social Justice," and the like, you are apt to dismiss them as mere fads. You think of the catchwords of ineffective reformers whom you have known from your youth. But the fact is that they represent to-day the enthusiasms of a new generation. They are big things, with big men behind them. They represent the Oregons and Californias toward which sturdy pioneers are moving, undeterred by obstacles.
The live questions to-day concern not the material so much as the moral development of the nation. For it is seen that the future welfare of the people depends on the creation of a finer type of civic life. Is this still to be a land of opportunity? Ninety millions of people are already here. What shall be done with the next ninety millions? That wealth is to increase goes without saying. But how is it to be distributed? Are we tending to a Plutocracy, or can a real Democracy hold its own? Powerful machinery has been invented. How can this machinery be controlled and used for truly human ends? We have learned the economies that result from organization. Who is to get the benefit of these economies?
So long as such questions were merely academic, practical persons like yourself paid little attention to them. Now they are being asked by persons as practical as yourself who are intent on 'getting results.' And what is more, they employ the instruments of precision furnished by modern science.
You have been pleased over the millions of dollars which have been lavished on education. The fruits of this are now being seen. Hosts of able young men have been studying Government and Sociology and Economics and History. These have been the most popular courses in all our colleges. And they have been studied in a new way. The old formulas and the old methods have been fearlessly criticized. New standards of efficiency have been presented. The scientific method has been extended to the sphere of moral relations. It has been demonstrated to these young men that the resources of the country may be indefinitely increased by the continuous application of trained intelligence to definite ends. The old Malthusian doctrine has given way before applied science. The population may be doubled and the standard of living increased at the same time, if we plan intelligently. The expert can serve the public as efficiently as he has served private interests, if only the public can be educated to appreciate him, and persuaded to employ him.
This is what the "social unrest" means in America. It is not the unrest of the weak and the unsuccessful. It is the unrest of the strong and ambitious. You cannot still it by talking about prosperity: of course we are prosperous, after a fashion, but it is a fashion that no longer pleases us. We want something better and we propose to get it. What disturbs you is the appearance in force of a generation that has turned its attention to a new set of problems, and is attempting to solve them by scientific methods. It is believed that there is a Science of Government as well as an Art of Politics. The new generation has a respect, born of experience, for the expert. It seeks the man who knows rather than the clever manager. It demands of public servants not simply that they be honest, but that they be efficient.
Its attitude to the political boss is decidedly less respectful than that to which you were accustomed. You looked upon him as a remarkably astute character, and you attributed to him an uncanny ability to forecast the future. These young men have discovered that his ability is only a vulgar error. Remove the conditions created by public indifference and ignorance, and he vanishes. In restoring power to the people, they find that a hundred useful things can be done which the political wiseacres declared to be impossible.
When I consider the new and vigorous forces in American life I cannot agree with your apprehensions; but there is one thing which you said with which I heartily agree. You said that you wished we might settle down to sound and constructive work, and get rid of the "muck-raker."
I agree with you that the muck-raker stands in the way of large plans for betterment. But it might be well to refresh our minds in regard to what is really meant by the man with the muck-rake. He is not the man who draws our attention to abuses which can be abolished by determined effort. He is the man who apologizes for abuses that are profitable to himself. He prefers his petty interests to any ideal good. His character was most admirably drawn by Bunyan:--
"The Interpreter takes them apart again, and has them first into a room where was a man that could look no way but downwards, with a muck-rake in his hand. There stood also one over his head with a celestial crown in His hand, and proffered him that crown for his muck-rake, but the man did neither look up nor regard, but raked to himself the straws, the small sticks, and the dust of the floor.
"'Then,' said Christiana, 'I persuade myself that I know somewhat the meaning of this; for this is the figure of a man of this world, is it not, good sir?'
"'Thou hast said right,' said he....
"'Then,' said Christiana, 'O deliver me from this muck-rake.'
"'That prayer,' said the Interpreter, 'has lain by till it is almost rusty. "Give me not riches," is scarce the prayer of one in ten thousand.'"
The man with the muck-rake, then, is one who can look no way but downward, and is so intent on collecting riches for himself that he does not see or regard any higher interests. I agree with you that if we are to have any constructive work in American society the first thing is to get rid of the man with the muck-rake, and to put in his place the Man with a Vision.
THE END
The Riverside Press
CAMBRIDGE MASSACHUSETTS
U.S.A.
* * * * *
THE CORNER OF HARLEY STREET
Being some familiar correspondence of PETER HARDING, M.D.
"A fair criticism, a complete defence, and some high praise of the doctoring trade."--_London Punch_.
"The book is ripe, well written, thoughtful, piquant and highly human. A thread of romance runs happily through it."--_Chicago Record-Herald._
"There is nothing upon which the genial Dr. Harding has not something to say that is worth listening to."--_-London Daily Mail_, "The publishers of 'The Corner of Harley Street' are really justified in comparing these critical papers with Dr. Holmes' 'The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table'.... They are charmingly discursive, often witty, and always full of a genial sympathy with humanity and the significant facts of life."--_The Outlook._
$1.25 _net_. Postage 11 cents.
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
* * * * *
PEOPLE OF POPHAM
By MARY C.E. WEMYSS
"As vivid in its way as 'Cranford'."--_Boston Transcript._
"One of the most charming chronicles of village life ever written."--_Living Age._
"Such a book as this may be read aloud evening after evening, with recurrent zest, with enjoyment of its humor, its quaint and human personages as they take their unhurried way through agreeable pages."--_Louisville Courier Journal._
"A book which will give many readers a rare pleasure."--_Chicago Evening Post._
"A sort of modern 'Cranford', good to read all the way through."--_Minneapolis Journal._
Illustrated. $1.20 _net._ Postage 11 cents.
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
* * * * *
A YEAR IN A COAL-MINE
By JOSEPH HUSBAND
"Mr. Husband enables the reader to carry away a vitalized impression of a coal-mine, its working and its workers, and a grasp of vivid details."--_San Francisco Chronicle_.
"It is a story of vivid and compelling interest and every word bears the impress of truth."--_Living Age._
"Apart from its informative value, this is a book that no one can fail to enjoy."--_Philadelphia Press._
"A refreshingly frank narrative."--_New York Sun_.
With frontispiece. $1.10 _net_. Postage 9 cents.
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
* * * * *
THE CONFESSIONS OF A RAILROAD SIGNALMAN
By J.O. FAGAN
"Extremely well written and forcible."--_The Outlook._
"A terrible indictment of our railway management."--_New York Post._
"The literature of the day contains few things more interesting than these confessions. They relate to railroad accidents, and the confessor is manifestly a man not only of remarkable discernment, but likewise of rhetorical skill."--_Stone and Webster Public Service Journal._
"Throws much light on the frequency of railroad accidents and will stimulate serious thought on the part of readers."--_Troy Times._
"Remarkable and interesting."--_Boston Herald._
Illustrated from photographs. 12mo, $1.00 _net._
Postage 10 cents.
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
* * * * *
ROUTINE AND IDEALS
BY LE BARON R. BRIGGS, _President of Radcliffe College_.
16mo, $1.00, _net_. Postage 9 cents.
"Common sense enriched by culture describes everything which Dean, or, as he ought now to be called, President, Briggs says or writes. The genius of sanity, sound judgment, and high aim seems to preside over his thought, and he combines in an unusual degree the faculty of vision and the power of dealing with real things in a real way."--_The Outlook_, New York.
* * * * *
SCHOOL, COLLEGE, AND CHARACTER
BY THE AUTHOR OF "ROUTINE AND IDEALS."
16mo, $1.00, _net_. Postage 8 cents.
"With the soundest good sense and with frequent humorous flashes, Dean Briggs takes students and parents into his confidence, and shows them the solution of college problems from the point of view, not of the 'office' but of a very clear-thinking, whole-souled man _in_ the 'office'"--_The World's Work_, New York.
Houghton Mifflin Company, Publishers
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
* * * * *
JOHN PERCYFIELD
By C. HANFORD HENDERSON
"_John Percyfield_ is twisted of a double thread--delightful, wise, sunshiny talks on the lines laid down by the Autocrat, and an autobiographical love story. It is full of wisdom and of beauty, of delicate delineation, and of inspiring sentiment" _New York Times_.
"Its merits will rank it among the few sterling books of the day." _Boston Transcript_.
"A book of rare charm and unusual character ... fresh and sweet in tone and admirably written throughout." _The Outlook, New York_.
Crown 8vo, gilt top, $1.50
HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY
BOSTON AND NEW YORK
End of Project Gutenberg's Humanly Speaking, by Samuel McChord Crothers