emise is inaccurate; it is a war we are in
duty bound to wage at any rate till order is restored--but let that
pass. Suppose it to be merely a war in defense of our own just rights
and interests. Since when did such a war become wrong? Is our national
motto to be, "Quixotic on the one hand, Chinese on the other"?

How much better it would have been, say others, to mind our own
business! No doubt; but if we were to begin crying over spilt milk in
that way, the place to begin was where the milk was spilled--in the
Congress that resolved upon war with Spain. Since that congressional
action we have been minding what it made our own business quite
diligently, and an essential part of our business now is the
responsibility for our own past acts, whether in Havana or Manila.

Some say that since we began the war for humanity, we are disgraced by
coming out of it with increased territory. Then a penalty must always
be imposed upon a victorious nation for presuming to do a good act. The
only nation to be exempt from such a penalty upon success is to be the
nation that was in the wrong! It is to have a premium, whether
successful or not; for it is thus relieved, even in defeat, from the
penalty which modern practice in the interest of civilization
requires--the payment of an indemnity for the cost of an unjust war.
Furthermore, the representatives of the nation that does a good act are
thus bound to reject any opportunity for lightening the national load
it entails. They must leave the full burden upon their country, to be
dealt with in due time by the individual taxpayer!

Again, we have superfine discussions of what the United States "stands
for." It does not stand, we are told, for foreign conquest, or for
colonies or dependencies, or other extensions of its power and
influence. It stands solely for the development of the individual man.
There is a germ of a great truth in this, but the development of the
truth is lost sight of. Individual initiative is a good thing, and our
institutions do develop it--and its consequences! There is a species of
individualism, too, about a bulldog. When he takes hold he holds on. It
may as well be noticed by the objectors that that is a characteristic
much appreciated by American people. They, too, hold on. They remember,
besides, a pregnant phrase of their fathers, who "ordained this
Constitution," among other things, "to promote the general welfare."
That is a thing for which "this Governm