ies of preaching leaves
mankind as we see it to-day--an armed camp, nation fighting nation,
class warring against class. The democratic movement about which we hear
so much is equally unsuccessful. After its brilliant promises it leaves
us helpless against the passion and stupidity of the mob. Popular
education adds to the tribulations of society. It rapidly increases the
number of the discontented. The half-educated are led astray by quacks
and demagogues who flourish mightily. The higher technical education
increases that intellectual proletariat which Bismarck saw to be a
peril. Science, which once was hailed as a deliverer, is now perceived
to bring only the disillusioning knowledge of our limitations. The
bankruptcy of Science follows closely upon the bankruptcy of Faith.
Mechanical inventions, instead of decreasing the friction of life,
enormously increase it. We are destined to be dragged along by our own
machines which are to go faster and faster. Philanthropy increases the
number of the unfit. The advances of medicine are only apparent, while
statistics show that tuberculosis, a disease of early life, decreases,
cancer and diseases of later life increase.

As for the general interest in social amelioration, that is the worst
sign of all. "Coming events cast their shadows before," and we may see
the shadow of the coming Revolution. Is there any symptom of decadence
more sure than when the moral temperature suddenly rises above normal?
Watch the clinical charts of Empire. In the period of national vigor the
blood is cool. But the time arrives when the period of growth has
passed. Then a boding sense comes on. The huge frame of the patient is
feverish. The social conscience is sensitive. All sorts of soft-hearted
proposals for helping the masses are proposed. The world rulers become
too tenderhearted for their business. Then comes the end.

Read again the history of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire. How
admirable were the efforts of the "good emperors," and how futile!
Consider again the oft-repeated story of the way the humanitarianism of
Rousseau ushered in the French Revolution and the Reign of Terror.

With such gloomy forebodings do the over-civilized thinkers and writers
try to discourage the half-civilized and half-educated workers, who are
trying to make things better. How shall we answer the prophets of ill?

Not by denying the existence of the evils they see, or the possibility
of the calamiti