though they be as a party-and of the Nihilists. Every other interest is, with the Czar, of secondary importance.

Besides this condition, it is necessary for Russia to obtain from France assurances that the foreign policy of the latter will be pacific, prudent, measured, in conformity with that which has constituted the greatest glory of Alexander III. The journey of Mr. de Giers seems intended to promote such a policy. He is likely to have tried to dissipate "suspicion and distrust" between France and Italy, in order to consolidate peace.

However this may be, it is certain that of late the relations between Italy and France have improved, and that among our French neighbors have been manifested a tendency to judge of our affairs more calmly and a greater respect for our country.

From these new sympathies between various Powers will new alliances be born? Will Russia and France conclude a treaty which will compel England to lay aside her reserve and change the Triple into a Quadruple Alliance? That will depend more on circumstances than on the will of man. For the present, the Russian policy ought to produce, as said the Marquis di Rudini, at Milan, a feeling “of security and peace,” and the excited condition and nervousness of public opinion in Europe are not justified. All the same, Russia has taken the first step towards France and awaits the results of that step with the patience which is one of the great elements of her strength. We are still far from the last word and no one can say when the hour for war, so anxiously awaited at Paris, will strike. Yet it is certain, that all those in Europe who honestly desire and invoke peace, will endeavor with all their might—and, perhaps, not fruitlessly-to postpone as long as possible the striking of that hour.

THEM

THE RUSSIANS ON THE PAMIRS.

Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, December.

HE Russian advance towards India has been compared to the opening of parallels against a besieged city. The first parallel, a line of observation, was the old Caspian and Orenburg frontier of half a century ago. The second, from the South of the Caspian along the Persian and Afghan frontier to the headwaters of the Oxus-a line of menace. A third parallel is now being attempted from the northeast corner of Afghanistan, along the North of the Indian empire-a line intended to cut off communications and check a rally of the garrisons. Such are the strategical aims we assign to the recent display of restless activity by Russia on the Pamirs and in the direction of Eastern Turkestan.

A brief survey of the present position of Central Asia will help to an understanding of the opportune nature of Russia's movements. Obtaining her own way along the Russo-Persian frontier, she has as yet failed to make any impression save one of hostility, upon Afghanistan. Ameer Abdurrahman Khan has jealously guarded the new boundary, and with a firm hand restrained his lawless subjects from affording any pretext for Russian interference. Thus repulsed all along the line from the Zulfikar Pass to Koraja Salar on the Oxus, the superfluous activity of the Russian adventurers has been driven to find an outlet in another direction, even in so futile a direction as the Pamirs. But there are other reasons why Russia should, at present, cast her eye eastward from Khokand and Samarkand. Her keen perception has not failed to notice the growing troubles of China and the possibility of her embroiling herself with the Great Powers of Europe and America. In the interchange of diplomatic views, Russia has carefully held aloof from any project for coercing the Chinese. Russia has her own card to play, and there can be little question that, as soon as China finds her hands full elsewhere, Russia will endeavor to make herself mistress of Eastern Turkestan. Russia has had her eye on Yarkand-Kashgar ever since Karopotkine's work pointed to the importance of the country; but the death of Yakoob Beg, the reconquest of Kashgar by China, and the check admin

istered to Russia over Kuldja, compelled the Russians to reserve the execution of their designs for a more favorable opportunity. China's growing embarrassments promise to afford this opportunity.

But what, it may be asked, has all this to do with the Pamirs? Well, the Pamirs question, like most other questions, has two sides to it, and Kashgar-Yarkand is one side; Badakshan is the other, and a very important side this latter is; but in the first place let us bestow a little consideration to the Pamirs themselves and Russia's relation to them.

The Pamirs have been made the subject of discussion between Russia and England since 1865, but no binding agreements were entered into, and Russia has shown an utter disregard of her pacts with Lord Granville, then and in 1873; she has pushed forward her posts, and practically Russia has been left with a free hand on the Pamirs, and there is nothing to restrain her energy in that direction until she reaches the Hindoo Kush.

But the English have not been caught napping. If the Prjevalskys, the Pevtsoffs, and the Grombchevtskis have been active so have the Younghusbands, the Davidsons, and others, not omitting those unobtrusive but valuable men, the native officials of the Indian Survey. We know quite as much about the debatable ground as Russia does, and are quite in a position to discuss with her, disputable points in Central Asian geography. We have, moreover, turned our knowledge to practical account by pushing forward our posts to Gilghit, and doing all that is immediately necessary to close the southern mouths of the passes leading from the Pamirs to Kashmir, and seal them against Russian explorers.

The report that extensive annexations have already been made by Russia, amounting almost to the whole of the plateau between the Altai range and the Hindoo Kush are, probably, premature. If, as is alleged, Captain Younghusband and Lieutenant Davidson have been excluded by the Russians from the Little Pamir, this would imply a claim of ownership; but we cannot doubt that, when brought to book, Russia will be prepared with quite another explanation, as she has often previously been under other circumstances. We know that Russia has already come into collision with the Chinese officials on the Alichur and Rang Kul Pamirs, and the attitude of the Chinese renders it unmistakable that China as well as England will have to be consulted before these so-called annexations can be regarded as un fait accompli.

With regard to the presence of Russia on the Pamirs themselves, she might stay there and welcome. On the Roof of the World her presence is as harmless to others as it is useless to herself; but what she wants is the command of the passes leading down from it, and this is what neither China, Affghanistan, nor Great Britain will permit her to have. It, therefore, becomes necessary to compel her to indicate clearly her political interest, to fix upon a definite boundary, and confine herself for the future behind it.

When Russia conquered Khokand, England conceded her rights to that section of the Pamirs to which Khokand had always laid claim, but, unfortunately, the proposal in 1872 of the Upper Oxus as the Russian limit and its acceptance by her, led to an uncertainty as to which head of the Oxus was to be understood. This left Russia considerable latitude which she is now abusing by endeavoring to make out a claim for the whole region.

There are two main sources of the Oxus, the Ak Su and the Panjah. The former is the longer, but Russia wants to make the Panjah the boundary. This river runs through the States of Wakhan, Shuguan, Roshan, and Darwaz, cutting each of them in two, and Russia wants the parts on the Bokhara side; but she formally waived all her pretensions to Wakhan and Badakshan in 1875, practically as the price of our acquiescence in her conquest of Khiva, but she has never ceased intriguing to establish a footing in these countries. We can

scarcely be deceived in supposing that to raise the question of the possession of Badakshan and Wakhan and to have her formal renunciation of them canceled by a fresh delimitation, is one of the main objects of her demonstrations on the Pamirs, and this explanation serves also to explain her surprising readiness to join in a convention for delimiting the frontier in the region of the Upper Oxus.

China's interests compel her to coöperate with us in resisting a Russian advance in the direction of the Baroghil pass and the Karakoram, but it needs no prescience to forsee that should anything occur to impair the Chinese power of resistance in Central Asia, Russia will turn the Northeastern corner of our Indian Empire before the next century is out of its teens.

HUM

lem.

A WORLD-WIDE REPUBLIC.

E. P. Powell.

Arena, Boston, January.

UMAN fraternity and universal good-will is no longer a dream of enthusiasts, But a practical and solvable probRepublicanism is a proved success, and a long stride ahead of monarchy as a matter of governmental and social evolution. The drift and purpose alike of our age is toward liberty and fraternity. There is a code of international law that governs three-fourths of the globe; I mean all the high seas so we may say it is only on the land that either feudalism or monarchy is tolerated. We have one Continent practically democratic. It will take our Southern neighbors many years and more struggles to construct their democratic sentiments into republican law and order; but there is no sign of a backward movement.

The recent session of the Committee of Three Hundred, having in charge the calling of a Congress of all enlightened nations, to meet in America in conjunction with the Columbian Exposition, in 1893, was in line with natural evolution, and a notable event. The first meeting, held in New York in 1890, assembled in Faunce's Tavern, the headquarters of Washington a century before; the second was held in Washington. At this early stage there were engaged in the movement such men in this country as stand foremost in Church and State. Best of all, there was no lack of affiliation on account of party or creed. John Boyle O'Reilly, just before his death, said, with the language of a poet as well as a statesman, “The nineteenth century could not close with a nobler work." General Sherman wrote, "The whole world turns to us to find the result of our experiment."

and miscellaneous discussion, seven or eight nationalities being represented among the speakers. A remarkable paper, eloquent and considerate, was presented by Yung Wing, LL.D., of China, at one time Minister Plenipotentiary from that country. Edward Everett Hale, Mrs. Wittenmeyer, Dr. Persifer Frazer, Lucy Stone, Dr. David C. Kelley, and others, joined in the debates. The next meeting of the Committee will be held at Omaha, in April, where cheerful and cordial welcome will be given to sincere workers, desirous of coöperating in the purposes of the Committee, and of the Human Freedom League. It does not need to be said that mere agitators and professional revolutionists have their vocation elsewhere.

The meeting in Philadelphia indicated gathering strength and enthusiasm; and was full of promise to the purpose of closing our century with a forward movement of republicanism. The social evolution of the future will be more and more cosmopolitan. The National idea is flowing into the broader idea of internationalism. The aim of this movement is to decrease the hindrances to human happiness, and increase the power of hope and love. The work laid out for the Congress is broad and humanitarian. The general scope is to consider the general welfare, and promote the spread over all the world of free institutions. The work will, however, concentre in a grand effort to lessen the power of 'both individual potentates and races to tyrannize over the weaker, to promote the sentiment of peace over war, and to exalt arbitration over battle; to create, in fine, a reign of intelligence and moral purpose over brute force.

Mr. Carnegie has eloquently amplified the idea of a league of English-speaking peoples. The scheme is broad, rational, and forward-looking; but it is clumsy as compared to a fraternization of adjacent peoples without regard to race or even form of government. Such a federation might hold a common court of adjudicature on international questions, even while a part of the States included remained locally monarchical. Nor is there any reason why there might not be a Legislative Council as well as a Court of Arbitration, holding fast, however, to the conceded principle that such a Congress and Court shall be concerned only with matters international. It is not a mere chimera that they are following, when many of the most enlightened minds of the world seek to promote a federation of all enlightened peoples, and a World-Wide Republic.

THE COMMERCIAL TREATIES.
Die Nation, Berlin, December.

E have now at hand three commercial treaties which

WE a

The third meeting was held in Philadelphia on the 12th and 13th of October, in Independence Hall. The specific purpose was to issue an Address to the Nations," and to organize a "Human Freedom League." The adoption of an “ Address to Nations" proved to be a difficulty at the second meeting, in Washington; it was not wholly relieved of its delicacy at Philadelphia. Proposed addresses had been requested from Edward Everett Hale, D.D.; Professor Burgess, of Yale College; Col. H. C. Parsons, of Virginia; John Clark Ridpath, LL.D., of Indiana; E. P. Powell, of Clinton, N. Y.; and Col. Ethan Allen, of New York. These were referred to a committee, of which Professor Goode, of the Smithsonian Institute, is chairman. There is naturally some difference of opinion as to how far this address shall commit those issuing it to an aggressive tone. It seems to be generally considered wise to speak only as brothers to brothers.

The formation of a Human Freedom League was attended with no differences of opinion. William O. McDowell, of Newark, N. J., was elected president, and communication was opened with similar leagues forming in Europe. A mass-meeting in the Opera House in the evening was addressed by ex-Governor Hoyt, of Wyoming, and other able speakers, who carried the movement cautiously and wisely forward. After the opening address of Tuesday, a poem was read by Ella Wheeler Wilcox, and the day was devoted to fraternization

unions with Austro-Hungary, with Italy, and with Belgium. The treaty with Switzerland has also been concluded but not yet submitted to the Reichstag. These treaties are further complemented by an exchange of notes with the United States, designed to clear up the politico-commercial relations between Germany and that country, and bring about a more friendly rapprochement. Not only is the prohibition against the importation of American hogs, pork, and sausages removed, but the consular notes afford confirmation of the view that the agricultural products of the United States are to be subject only to the same tariff duties as provided for in the treaties with Austria, Italy, and other States. In other words, the United States has been placed on the most favored nation plane in respect of her agricultural products. In return the President of the United States declares that, under the discretion conferred on him, he renounces all those repressive measures against German commerce which the McKinley Bill calls for. The reduction of the revenue on American wheat, will be compensated by placing Germany on the most favored nation plane, in respect of her sugar.

It appears hardly probable that a politico-commercial treaty embodying all these terms has been definitely brought to a close. It may not perhaps be true, as is stated, that Spain,

Portugal, and the States of the Balkan Peninsula have already taken the first steps tending to their reception into the commercial union, or at least to enter into commercial treaties with Germany. These unconfirmed reports may not yet rest on facts, but they show what anticipations are entertained, and they indicate clearly the new trend of public opinion on politico-trade problems.

The change is no less clearly indicated in the judgments pronounced on the treaties in England and France. No important expressions of opinion have been received from Russia, and indeed, in the immediate abnormal condition of that country, and the present exclusive policy of the Czar's government, such opinions would hardly carry great weight with them. On the other hand, the most prominent English papers express the view that these treaties indicate a considerable advance in the direction of a sounder commercial policy, and are calculated to cement the Middle-European Alliance. Tallying with this view, we have the declarations of the more far-seeing of the French Press, that a further development of France's protective system will inevitably result in her fatul

isolation.

From all sides, then, it appears that these treaties characterize the inauguration of a new era. If the reactionary commercial policy of Germany tempted united Europe to participate with her, the new unions pave the way to a return to a wiser and broader régime; these unions awaken the enemies of commercial freedom everywhere to a consciousness of their position, and they will positively constrain the French people to exert themselves more than ever in opposition to the selfish cupidity of their own protectionists. This general change of sentiment, this general rise of new and sounder views, cannot but react favorably on the future of the new commercial treaties.

The significance of the change has not escaped the notice of the supporters of the previous commercial policy, but there is scarcely a word of serious hostility to the treaties in the Press. The German people are, in fact, tired of supporting the Bismarckian policy, and have no energy for a return to it. There is evidence enough in the repeal of the Socialist laws and in the second ballot, which are both indications of popular sentiment, and it is further shown in the commercial treaties, that the Bismarckian policy which appeared so firmly rooted in the German people, was practically already eradicated, even before it had wrought any evil.

SOCIOLOGICAL.

ETHICAL ASPECTS OF THE PAPAL ENCYCLICAL. BROTHER AZARIAS.

International Journal of Ethics, Philadelphia, January, I.

widow and the orphan, the wealth that is coined out of the sweat and the blood the pains and the aches and the groans of the ill-paid and ill-fed workman, or, mayhap, of the poor girl, whose starving life is ground into it, that wealth can bring with it neither happiness nor the prosperity that is a blessing to the land. Such injustice carries with it its own curse.

The vital problem of the day is twofold: the amelioration of the condition of the poor and the workingman, and the proper adjustment of labor and capital.

"All agree, and there can be no question whatever, that some remedy must be found, and quickly found, for the misery and wretchedness which press so heavily at this moment on the large majority of the very poor. By degrees it has come to pass that workingmen have been given over, isolated and defenseless, to the callousness of employers and the greed of unrestrained competition. The evil has been increased by rapacious usury. .. And to this

must be added the custom of working by contract, and the concentration of so many branches of trade in the hands of a few individuals, so that a small number of very rich men have been able to lay upon the masses of the poor a yoke little better than slavery itself." Encycl., § 3.)

We may diminish the evil by a sympathizing activity exercised in a spirit of Christ-like charity towards the suffering; to attempt to eradicate it were Utopian. The Holy Father indulges in no such dream. He takes a practical view of things. He finds in the antagonism between labor and capital the source of many evils. The remedy he conceives to lie in the proper adjustment of labor and capital. But there enter into the adjustments of labor and capital many elements arising from the relative responsibilities assumed by the employer and the employed upon entering into a contract.

The Holy Father is outspoken with the workingman, and cautions him against the delusive arguments of demagogues"crafty agitators" who "constantly make use of these disputes to pervert men's judgments, and to stir up the people to sedi. tion." (Encycl., § 2.) He impresses upon the workingman a sense of obligation and responsibility towards the employer. The laborer may have grievances, but he does not better his position by leaving his work in an unfinished state, or by damaging or destroying property. Two wrongs cannot make a right. This reformation of the workingman does not and cannot come from without; it must come from within himself. It is this kind of reformation that the Holy Father seeks to bring about in the present Encyclical. Therefore it is that he appeals so strongly to the workman's sense of duty.

But the Pope no less forcibly recognizes his rights.

1. He has the right to live; therefore he is entitled to food and shelter.

2. He has the right to remuneration for his labor.

3. He has the right to hold property. But the Holy Father condemns all proposals for communism in land or any other

receive more profound consideration than

did this magnificent Encyclical [on the Labor question].

Speaking with all the authority of the Church, the Holy Father bears to the workingman, the poor, and the indigent a message of hope and comfort and prudent counsel as regards their temporal welfare. He holds that while the mission of the Church is primarily that of saving souls, her solicitude none the less extends with sincere concern to the well-being of the body.

In pointing out tne way by which men may seek first the kingdom of God and His justice, the Church is also leading towards the further promise that all things else shall be added thereto. Certainly, the experience of all time is that virtuous living is the only road to real personal happiness, and not infrequently the safest road to material prosperity. And the prosperity so attained is the most abiding. The wealth that is accumulated rapidly by forcing the weaker competitor to ruin and starvation, the wealth that is made at the expense of the

rob the lawful possessor, bring the State into a sphere not its own, and cause complete confusion." (Encycl., § 4.) The mission of the Church has ever been to infuse into existing social institutions the principles of justice and charity, and to reform those institutions so far as they would be reformed, but not to overthrow them by any sudden revolution.

4. He has the right to live in the state of celibacy or to marry. The Holy Father puts the axe to the root of that Malthusian tree of political doctrine which has misled so many writers on political economy. To stunt or cut off the growth of population is a crime against the natural law. It traverses God's design in creating the human race. Any theory of life that would limit the number of children in a family would be in its very nature unjust and immoral. Doctrinaires are at sea in determining the number of people that a country can support. A slender population living in waste, unthrift, lack of forethought, will thrive less prosperously than many times the same population upon the same territory, living in self-restraint,

decency, economy, and prudent calculation of the future. Malthusianism, in its accepted sense, is false in its premises, immoral in its application, and misleading in its conclusions.

5. The workingman possesses the right to support his family becomingly and decently. Mere existence, however much it may suit the brute creation, does not fulfill the whole meaning of man's presence on earth. He and his are here for a higher purpose, and that purpose can, at least in a civilized community, be efficiently attained only by a becoming living. Therefore, any system, be it social or be it of the State, that would hinder, or render impossible, the exercise of this right on the part of the head of the family to provide a becoming and decent living for those dependent on him, according to custom and locality, would in itself be radically wrong, and would require reform.

6. The workman has the right to guard and preserve his soul intact, and cultivate in it the virtues of his station, and look after its spiritual wants even as he looks after his bodily

wants.

7. The workingman has the right to combine. It is a right that he holds in fee-simple. The State, in interfering with this right, when the object of combining is good, just, and in no wise a danger to the public weal, is transgressing its natural bounds.

Particular societies, although they exist within the State, and are each a part of the State, nevertheless cannot be prohibited by the State absolutely as such. For to enter into society' of this kind is the natural right of man, and the State must protect natural rights, not destroy them; and if it forbids its citizens to form associations, it contradicts the very principle of its own existence; for both they and it exist in virtue of the same principle-viz., the natural propensity of man to live in society." Encycl., § 55.)

(Concluded next week.)

SHOULD MARRIAGES BE INDISSOLUBLE?
THOMAS STOUGHTON POTWIN.

New Englander and Yale Review, New Haven, January.
N discussing this question, it is customary to assume that

IN disus Christ, in what he said regarding it, designed to

cover the whole question of divorce for the Christian ages. But whether He did so or not, we regard as a most important preliminary question.

There frequently appears an utter forgetfulness or ignoring of the circumstances of the times in which Christ spoke, and of the immediate occasion which led to His words: in fact, of inquiring how He must have been understood by those who listened to Him. But to gain this point of view is the first step toward gaining a correct understanding of our Lord.

Among the Jews, as among the Greeks and Romans of that day, divorce was entirely a personal matter. Subsequently to what Mommsen calls the "Emancipation of Woman in the Roman Empire" this ancient custom of arbitrary divorce began to be called in question. In no part of the empire, perhaps, was this discussion more ripe than among the Jews, as it existed between the schools of Shammai and Hillel. Whitby, among commentators, and Edersheim in his “Life and Times of Jesus, the Messiah," see Christ's words in their true historical setting. Whitby also speaks of Moses's law of divorce as a permission from the same authority as originated marriage, and says that God may now also authorize putting away the wife for cruelty

and other mischief."

But the two schools were at one regarding the absolute personal right of divorce; they only differed as to the occasions of putting this right in execution.

With these circumstances in mind the passages in the Gospels, touching the subject, are easily understood.

First in Matt. v.: 31 and 32, we find Christ annulling the Mosaic permission of divorce except in the one case of fornication. Christ speaks here only from the point of view of the It He says nothing of the moral status of the man.

woman.

is as though the guilt of the husband were self-evident and beneath contempt. But he had already covered the ground of the husband's guilt in the 27th and 28th verses preceding: "But I say unto you that whosoever looketh after a woman to lust after her, has committed adultery with her already in his heart." An innocent wife was always put away with the desire for another woman. Christ thus covers the whole subject and sweeps away the Jewish custom of the divorce of innocent wives, and divorces from lustful or selfish desires.

When we come to Matt. xix.: 3-12, we have Christ answering a specific question which springs out of the current discussions to which I have referred. The Pharisees put to Christ a test question: "Is it lawful for a man to put away his wife for every cause ? In reply Christ again takes occasion to withdraw the liberty of personal divorce which Moses had granted, except for the one cause of fornication.

Mark (x.: 2-9) and Luke (XVI.: 18) make Christ cut up the power of personal divorce, root and branch, without regard even to the guilt of the wife.

This apparent discrepancy between Matthew and the other two evangelists has been a real perplexity to interpreters. If it was Christ's design to set forth the whole matter of divorce as a rule for Christian ages, there seems to be no satisfactory explanation. But if it was Christ's design simply to answer the particular question of the Pharisees, whether a man might put away his wife for any cause, the specification which we find in Matthew becomes an incidental matter. There can be no doubt that Christ intended to abolish personal divorce even in cases of marital unfaithfulness, as we now can see He has done in the Christian world.

This position is confirmed by what we consider the correct rendering of Matt. xix.: 6, viz: What therefore God joined together, let not a man, i. e. the husband, put asunder." A proposition which interpreters have enlarged into: "What God hath joined together let no human power put asunder."

Jerome, as quoted by Wordsworth, shows a correct understanding of the passage when he says: A man puts asunder what God hath joined together when he puts away a wife to marry another."

The rendering I have given is required by the absence of the article before άvoporos. A noun used generically requires the article. The evangelists always conformed to the custom where the race is meant.

If, then, these passages in the gospels relate only to the question of the Pharisees and the current discussions of the day regarding personal divorce, they have no bearing on the broader question of divorce by constituted authority.

The Scriptures do not lay down any law by which man and wife are to be united. It must be done by some earthly power representing God. It is a matter left entirely to human judgment and wisdom. And marriage being left to human wisdom, the right of divorce would be impliedly so left also. The Old Testament sanctioned divorce “according to the law," as we find in Exodus xxi.: 4, and in Ezra, which is a very different matter from arbitrary divorce; and as Christ uttered no protest against the procedure of Ezra, but only against the personal divorce sanctioned, we have further evidence that Christ referred only to the personal separations which were effected under the lustful desire of new marriages.

Now the Bible says that the powers that be, are ordained of God. If, then, God joins together in marriage by the powers that be, is not the sundering of the tie by the same “powers" the act of God also?

It may be claimed that the dissolution of marriage must be exempted from the authority of the State for the reason that marriage is not reversible; that it results in the birth of new human beings, who cannot be remanded to non-existence, and for whose care the continued union of the parents is required. It is true, that here we strike upon the real sacredness of marriage. But it is a matter for the wisdom of observation and

experience, whether the children of unfortunate marriages are best trained under a union of bitterness and compulsion, or by the severed parents, where it can be done in peace and gentleness. Indeed, no valid objection can be made on the ground of the children to having the question submitted to the advice and arbitration of those who represent the wisdom of the people and the authority of God.

Paul lays down the law making marriage indissoluble except for fornication, and this law must be considered as binding on the Christian conscience. But when we consider what laws should be enacted in regard to those desiring divorce, we must remember that mankind very largely refuse or fail to submit their conduct to the law of the Christian conscience.

It is

for such chiefly that laws are made, and the laws must be adapted to their needs. They can see no reason for not being allowed a release from what is violent and wrong, and permission to form a normal and happy alliance if opportunity offers. The deliverance and the new opportunity which they crave seems to them much more like the work of a merciful God, who ever keeps open a door for repentance and amendment, than the holding them in bonds which have become odious.

Legislation does not make marriage, it only confirms it, and prescribes certain forms for its acknowledgment. What it does it can undo. It does not thereby touch the moral obligations of the married. It simply withdraws the sanctions which it had bestowed on the erroneous supposition that a proper union was being made.

THE

THE CREED OF THE OLD SOUTH. BASIL L. GILDERSLEEVE.

Atlantic Monthly, Boston, January.

66

HE war began, the war went on-this politicians' conspiracy, this slaveholders' rebellion, as it was variously called by those who sought its source, now in the disappointed ambition of the Southern leaders, now in the desperate determination of a slaveholding oligarchy to perpetuate their power, and to secure forever their proprietorship in their human chattels." On this theory the Southern people were but puppets in the hands of political wirepullers, or blind followers of hectoring "patricians." To those who know the Southern people nothing can be more absurd; to those who know the personal independence, the deep interest they have always taken in politics, the keen interest with which they have ever followed the questions of the day. There was no such system of rotten boroughs, no such domination of a landed aristocracy throughout the South as has been imagined, and venality, the disgrace of current politics, was practically unknown. The men who represented the Southern people in Washington came from the people, and not from a ring. Northern writers who have ascribed the firm control in Congress of the National Government, held so long by the South, to the superior character, ability, and experience of its representatives do not seem to be aware that the choice of such representatives and their prolonged tenure show that in politics, at least, the education of the Southerner had not been neglected. The rank and file then were not swayed simply by blind passion or duped by the representations of political gamesters. Nor did the lump need the leavening of the large percentage of men of the upper classes who served as privates, some of them from the beginning to the end of the war. The rank and file were, to begin with, in full accord with the great principles of the war, and were sustained by the abiding conviction of the justice of the cause; and it is worthy of note that few of the poorest and most ignorant could be induced to forswear the cause, and purchase release from the sufferings of imprisonment by the simple process of taking the oath.

There is such a thing as fighting for a principle, an idea; but principle and idea must be incarnate, and the principle of States' rights was incarnate in the life of the Southern people.

Of the thirteen original States, Virginia, North Carolina. South Carolina, and Georgia were openly and officially upon the side of the South. Maryland as a State was bound hand and foot, but we counted her as ours. Each of these States had a history, an individuality.

Regarding this individuality, nothing more is claimed for Virginia and South Carolina than would be conceded to Massachusetts or Connecticut. The brandished sword would have shown what manner of placida quies would have ensued, if demands had been made on Massachusetts at all commensurate with the Federal demands on Virginia. These older Southern States were proud of their history. Take away this local patriotism and you take out all the color that is left in American life.

The example of State pride set by the older States was not lost on the younger Southern States, and the Alabamian and the Missippian lived in the same faith as did the stock from which they sprang; and the community of views and interests soon made a larger unit, and paved the way for a true nationality, and with it a great conflict. There were family and social ties that served to connect the people of the South from Virginia to Texas. Many Southerners were educated in the colleges of the North, and as a result there may have been a certain broadening of views, but there was no weakening of home ties. West Point made fewer converts to this side and to that than did the Northern wives of Southern husbands, the Southern wives of Northern husbands. All that I vouch for is the feeling; the simple fact that, right or wrong, we were fully persuaded in our minds, that there was no lurking suspicion of any moral weakness in our cause. Nothing could be holier than the cause, nothing more imperative than the duty of upholding it. There were those in the South who, when they saw the issue of the war, gave up their faith in God, but not their faith in the cause.

There exists a mental or moral color-blindness, with which it is not worth while to argue. Read in the October Atlantic the sketch of General Thomas, whom many Southern military men consider the ablest of all the Federal generals. He was a Virginian. Says the writer of that article:

His severance from family and State was a keen trial, but his duty was clear from the beginning. To his vision there was but one country-the United States of America. He could serve under no flag except that which he had pledged his honor to uphold.

Passing over the quiet assumption that the North was the United States, which sufficiently characterizes the view of the writer, let us turn to the contrast. A greater than Thomas decided the same question at the same time. To Lee's vision there was but one course open to a Virginian, and the pledge that he had given when Virginia was one of the United States of America had ceased to bind him, when Virginia withdrew from the compact. His duty was clear from the hour when to remain in the army was to draw his sword against a people. to whom he was "indissolubly bound."

So far as I have reproduced the perspective of the past for myself, it has been a revival of sorrows such as this generation cannot understand; it has recalled the hours when it gave me a passion for death, a shame of life, to read our bulletins. And how could I hope to reproduce that perspective for others who belong to another generation and another region, when so many men who lived the same life and fought on the same side, have themselves lost the point of view not only of the beginning of the war, but also of the end of the war, not only of the inexpressible exaltation, but of the unutterable degradation? They have forgotten what a strange world the survivors of the conflict had to face. The generous policy which would have restored the State and made a new union possible, which would have disentwined much of the passionate clinging to the past, was crossed by the death of the only man who could have carried it through, if even he could have done it; and years of trouble had to pass before the current of national life ran freely through the Southern States.

That the cause we fought for and our brothers died for, was the cause of civil liberty and not the cause of human slavery, is a thesis which we feel ourselves bound to maintain whenever our motives are challenged or misunderstood, if only for our children's sake.