Show DUTY TO COUNTRY the writer has lately perused a letter written by the mother of three stalwart young men who are now studying to complete their education yet who have been strongly inclined to enlist one of them was determined to do so and was only prevented by circumstances cum stances beyond his control or that of his parents and should there be another call for volunteers he may break over all restraint and become a recruit this mother is racked with anxiety upon the subject she is an american through and through is descended on both sides from generations of new england ancestors and her patriotism cannot be questioned but then there is the mothers love for her offspring it is the same old question and the same old struggle that mothers have had to grapple with and engage in ever since the sons of men began to oppress each other what la Is the mothers duty how shall she train herself to feel and how shall she counsel her son shall she cling to him and keep him at home that he may be preserved from wounds and deather de athor shall she smother her instincts stifle her hearts desires and tell him to go at his count rys call there is a light in which any mother can view these questions so as to remove the mists from her mind and the fears from her heart let her remember that life here is short a moment merely but that hereafter it is jong ions an eternity that the direction given to the soul during its momentary stay here determines its destiny throughout the endless future and that the only true happiness sentient beings can experience in this life or the next springs from doing right when these things are remembered the question of enlistment becomes merely a question as to the side upon which the weight of duty lies if there rest upon a young man obligations of a high sacred and binding character which he cannot honorably disregard yet which would be violated were he to enlist let him show his hie patriotism in some other w way ay than by going to the front but if no such restraints stra ints are upon him or if his coun arys call is so urgent as to outweigh them it is not right that ties of kinship even those of a mother for her son should keep him at home when hla his country needs him all progress pro grea Is achieved by means of sacrifice and when human beings refuse to make sacrifice they begin to sink in the scale of being it Is better to go to battle and suffer privation and be wounded and even mutilated than it to Is to shrink from the call of plain and sacred duty it is better to be a dead patriot than a living coward then let every mother who has a son of age and physique suitable for a soldier consider his responsibilities and judge from them and not from her own heart whether or not he should enlist and if the preponderance of moral obligation Is in favor of obedience to a call to arms let her make a cheerful sacrifice and give a free consent it is only when young men have mothers such as this that they can become a race to ei either therwin win or deserve man kinds respect only such women can bring heroes into the world A people that shrinks from war because it la Is harsh cruel or deadly notwithstanding that duty demands that they engage in it will dwindle away and sink into oblivion covered with the contempt of all mankind |