little sordidness of motive or conduct. In such a giant
struggle, where across the warp of so many interests is shot the woof
of so many purposes, dark strands and bright, strands sombre and
brilliant, are always intertwined; inevitably there was corruption
here and there in the Civil War; but all the leaders on both sides,
and the great majority of the enormous masses of fighting men, wholly
disregarded, and were wholly uninfluenced by, pecuniary
considerations. There were of course foreigners who came over to serve
as soldiers of fortune for money or for love of adventure; but the
foreign-born citizens served in much the same proportion, and from the
same motives, as the native-born. Taken as a whole, it was, even more
than the Revolutionary War, a true citizens' fight, and the armies of
Grant and Lee were as emphatically citizen armies as Athenian, Theban,
or Spartan armies in the great age of Greece, or as a Roman army in
the days of the Republic.

Another striking contrast in the course of modern civilization as
compared with the later stages of the Graeco-Roman or classic
civilization is to be found in the relations of wealth and politics.
In classic times, as the civilization advanced toward its zenith,
politics became a recognized means of accumulating great wealth. Caesar
was again and again on the verge of bankruptcy; he spent an enormous
fortune; and he recouped himself by the money which he made out of
his political-military career. Augustus established Imperial Rome on
firm foundations by the use he made of the huge fortune he had
acquired by plunder. What a contrast is offered by the careers of
Washington and Lincoln! There were a few exceptions in ancient days;
but the immense majority of the Greeks and the Romans, as their
civilizations culminated, accepted money-making on a large scale as
one of the incidents of a successful public career. Now all of this is
in sharp contrast to what has happened within the last two or three
centuries. During this time there has been a steady growth away from
the theory that money-making is permissible in an honorable public
career. In this respect the standard has been constantly elevated, and
things which statesmen had no hesitation in doing three centuries or
two centuries ago, and which did not seriously hurt a public career
even a century ago, are now utterly impossible. Wealthy men still
exercise a large, and sometimes an improper, influence in politics,
but it i