But we may say that American enterprise will change all this. It will flow into Cuba when Cuba is free. It will clean up the cities, stamp out the fevers, build roads where the trails for mule-sleds are, and railroads where the current of traffic goes. It will make the pearl of the Antilles the fairest island on the face of the earth.

No doubt all this will come if we give a stable government. Whatever else we say or do we must give such a government. The nations of the world will hold us responsible for Cuba through the years to come. A virtual serfdom under American martial law is the fate of Cuba, though we may declare her free and independent.

Why then shall we not hold Cuba, if she becomes ours by right of conquest? Because that would be a cowardly thing to do. The justification of her capture is that we do not want her. If we want Cuba, common decency says that we must let her alone. Ours is a war of mercy, not of conquest. This we have plainly declared to all the nations. Perhaps we meant what we said, though the speeches in Congress do not make this clear. If we can trust the records, our chief motives were three: Desire for political capital, desire for revenge, and sympathy for humanity.

It was desire for political capital that forced the hand of the President. "The war," says Dr. Frank Drew, "did not begin as an honorable war. If it is to become such, it must be made honorable by other men than those whose votes committed us to it."

If we retire with clean hands, it will be because our hands are empty. To keep Cuba or the Philippines would be to follow the example of conquering nations. Doubtless England would do it in our place. The habit of domination makes men unscrupulous.

Professor Nicholson of Edinburgh has said: "There can be no question, in the light of history, that the political instinct of the English people-or to adopt the popular language of the moment, the original sin of the

nation-is to covet everything of its neighbors worth coveting, and it is not content until the sin is complete." No wonder England now pats us on the back. We are following her lead. We are giving to her methods the sanction of our respectability. Of all forms of flattery, imitation is the sincerest.

By a war of conquest fifty years ago we took from Mexico her fairest provinces. For the good of humanity we did it, no doubt, and along the lines of manifest destiny. Brave battles our soldiers fought, but for all that, the war itself was most inglorious. So it reads in history as we write it to-day. It is iniquitous in history as written in Mexico.

Shall then the war for Cuba Libre come to an inglorious end? If we make anything by it, it will be most inglorious. It will be without honor if its two millions a day are made good by conquered territory. Neither for conquest nor for revenge have we sent forth the army of the Republic. "Let us beware," says J. K. H. Burgwin, "of placing ourselves in the position of doing a noble and generous act and then demanding that a bankrupt and humbled enemy shall pay our expenses." If we are going to hold the prizes of war or to use them in thrifty trade we should never have set out on the errands of humanity.

The nations of Europe look with jealousy on our possibilities of strength. "If I only," some king may say"if I only had all these men, all this land, all these resources, I would eclipse the glory of Cæsar of Charlemagne, of Napoleon." If we turned everything into fighting, what a fight we could make. But we have gone about our business, a vast nation of common people, careless of European complications, indifferent to European glory, unconscious of our power.

For the end of government by the people is to fit the people to control their own affairs. The basis of our government is the town meeting. The people manage their local business, and send their wisest men as delegates to

look after the interests of the nation. This was the dream of the fathers. If there has been much change and some degeneration, yet in substance the thoughts of the fathers prevail. The liberties of the people are secure because they are everywhere in the people's hands. America is not a power among the nations. She is a nation among the powers. A "power" is a country which is concerned with affairs not her own and which develops the machinery to make such concern effective. A nation minds her own business.

The spirit of our foreign policy has been to avoid all display of power. It was set forth in Washington's farewell address, in these memorable words:

"The great rule of conduct for us in regard to foreign nations is, in extending our commercial relations, to have with them as little political connection as possible. * * * Europe has a set of primary interests which to us have none or a very remote relation. Hence she must be engaged in frequent controversies the causes of which are essentially foreign to our concerns. Hence, therefore, it must be unwise in us to implicate ourselves by artificial ties in the ordinary vicissitudes of her politics or the ordinary combinations and collisions of her friendships or enmities. Our detached and distant situation invites and enables us to pursue a different course. * * * Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own stand upon foreign grounds? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humor, or caprice? It is our true course to steer clear of permanent alliances with any portion of the foreign world."

The America of which Washington dreamed should grow strong within herself, should avoid entangling alliances with foreign nations, should keep out of all fights and all friendships that are not her own, should secure no territory that might not be self-governing, and should acquire no provinces that might not in time be numbered among the United States. To this policy his followers closely adhered. Even gratitude to France never made us her catspaw in her struggle against England. No outflow of sympathy has caused us to interfere in behalf of Ireland or Armenia or Greece.

But the world is smaller than in Washington's day. Steam and electricity have bound the world together. The interests of one nation are those of all nations. The interests of Armenia, Cape Colony and Ceylon are closer to us to-day than those of France and Germany were to our fathers. Traditions are worthy of respect only when they serve the real needs of the present. So it may be that with changed conditions the wise counsel of the past may be open to revision. Are times not already ripe for a change in national policy?

Let us look for a moment at the policy of England. The United States is great through minding her own business; England through minding the business of the world. In Norse mythology the Mitgard Serpent appears in the guise of a cat-a feeble creature to all appearance, but its body passes around the world, its tail growing down into its own throat and by its mighty strength it holds the world together. Such is England-the Mitgard Serpent of the nations, the assignee of bankrupt lands, the police force of disorderly ones. By the power of her will and brain she has made this an Anglo-Saxon planet.

No other agency of civilization has been so potent as England's enlightened selfishness. Her colonies are of three orders-friendly nations, subject nations and military posts. The larger colonies are little united states. They are republics and rule their own affairs. The subject nations and the military posts England rules by a rod of iron because no other rule is possible. Every year England seizes new posts, opens new ports and widens the stretch of her empire. But of all this Greater Britain, England herself is but a little part, the ruling head of a world-wide organism, "What does he know of England who only England knows." No doubt as Kipling says, England

"thinks her empire still

'Twixt the Strand and Holborn Hill,"

but the Strand would be half empty were it not that it leads outward to Cathay. The huge business interests of Greater Britain are the guaranty of her solidarity. All her parts must hold together.

In similar relation to the Mother Country, America must stand. Greater England holds over us the obligations of blood and thought and language and character. Only the Saxon understands the Saxon. Only the Saxon and the Goth know the meaning of freedom. "A sanction like that of religion," says John Hay, "enforces our partnership in all important affairs." Not that we should enter into formal alliance with Great Britain. We can get along well side by side, but never tied together. When England suggests a union for attack and defense, let us ask what she expects to gain from us. Never yet did England offer us the hand in open friendliness, in pure good faith, not hoping to get the best of the bargain. This is the English government, which never acts without interested motives. But the English people are our friends in every real crisis, and that without caring overmuch whether we be right or not. War with England should be forever impossible. The need of the common race is greater than the need of the nations. The AngloSaxon race must be at peace within itself. Nothing is so important to civilization as this. A war between England and America fought to the bitter end might submerge civilization. When the war should be over and the smoke cleared away there would be but one left, and that, Russia.

But though one in blood with England our course of political activities has not lain parallel with hers. We were estranged in the beginning, and we have had other affairs on our hands. We have turned our faces westward, and our work has made us strong. We have had our forests to clear, our prairies to break, our rivers to harness, our own problem of slavery to adjust. We have followed the spirit of Washington's address for a hundred years, until the movement of history has brought us to the