OCR Text |
Show War's Hatreds No Heritage of Americans To those who have observed wltb tboughtfui minds the changing character char-acter of the American celebrations of Armistice day there will coma today a deeper onderstandlng of our national na-tional Ideals and a more Illuminating conception of that essential spirit that baa set America apart. In Its alms and purposes, from all the nations of the Old world. When the news Oral broke upon a war-weary world eleven years ago that the day of peace had at . last dawned, it waa but natural that we should join wltb the other allied al-lied nations, our brothers la the great struggle in exultant manifestations of triumph over victory achieved as well as joy at the happy termination of the years of storm and struggle. But the wild exuberance of those Brst celebrations celebra-tions baa diminished with eacb recurrence recur-rence of the anniversary of Armistice day. It is no longer In America a day of victory exultation, but a day of tender memories and glorification of the heroic dead for whom the day of peace dawned In another world. The malice and the hatreds of war, the delirium of conquest and the vainglory of military triumph, have passed like Incidents of an evil hour. In their place have come the effluence of those beneficent aims and purposes whicb were the corner stones of the nation's foundations and which, tn every national crisis, have risen to assert themselves, as the true notional notion-al Ideals, above the shouts of victory or the transient glories of military successes. It Is In this spirit that America proclaims to the world the ringing truth that It is not a militaristic militaris-tic nation, but the world's arbiter of peace. Victories Not Celebrated. This note of charity and healing peace has been characteristic of the aftermaths of all our nation's great wars. Jena and Austerlltz, Trafalgar and Waterloo, are still names that commemorate military achievements abroad and monuments and arches of triumph and days of celebration still perpetuate victories of the past over there. It Is characteristic of the American spirit that we have not followed fol-lowed that custom. Our greatest monument attests heroic defeat- ever fought Lincoln In bis second Inaugural address voiced the earns message: "With malice toward none, wltb charity for all, wltb firmness In the right as God gives ns to sea tba right, let os strive on to finish tba work we are In, to bind op tba nation's na-tion's wounds, to care for nim who shall have borne tha battle and for his widow and bis orphan, to do all which may achieve and cherish a Just and lasting peace among ourselves and wltb all nations." It was the same thought that found poetic expression In Francis U. Finch's "The Blue and the Gray"! No more ahal tha war cry aavar Or tha winding rlvars run red. They banish our angar forarar. Whan thar laurel the gravas of our dead. Under the sod and the daw. Waiting tha Judgment day, Love and tears for tba blue. Tears and love for the gray. Soldiers' Heritage. And so, on this Armistice day, there comes back a voice from the dead the voice of a poet British born, but adopted by the world, who died on the field before tbe dawn of the day of peace to remind us that America's, Amer-ica's, as well as tbe world's, greatest gain from the war of the nations are the memories of the hero dead and not the selfish glories of victory: Blow out, you bugles, over the rlcb Dead! There's none of these so lonely and poor of old. But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold. These laid the world away; poured out the red Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be Of work and Joy, and that unhoped serene That men call age; and those wbo would have been Their sons, they gave their Immortality. Immortal-ity. ... Honor has come back, aa a king to earth, And paid his subjects with a royal wage; And Nobleness walks In our ways again, And we have come Into our heritage. It Is thoughts such as these, expressed ex-pressed by our own great statesmen and by this poet from across the seas, that should blend In tbe reflection of our hours of meditation today Into a torgetfulness of sll hatreds snd a renewal re-newal of hopes for that reign of Peace which America, as a nation, bas al- , ways symbolized. From the Kansas . City Star. . that of Bunker Hill. No national holiday holi-day has ever been set aside to commemorate com-memorate a military victory. York-town, York-town, New Orleans. Buena Vista, Gettysburg, Get-tysburg, tbe Appomattox campaign, Santiago and Manila Bay are still patriotic memories, but they are perpetuated per-petuated only in glorious history and not in days of exultation. America's policy and spirit have always been characterized by a charitable forget-fulness forget-fulness of the hatreds of war snd the extended band of renewed peace to the foe. Such was the last word that Washington Wash-ington left to the young republic still cherishing memories of the Revolutionary Revolu-tionary struggle: "It will be worthy of a free, enlightened and, at no distant dis-tant period, a great nation to give to mankind the magnanimous and too novel example of a people guided by an exalted Justice and benevolence. . . . In the execution of such a plan nothing Is more essential than that permanent Inveterate antipathies against particular nations snd passionate pas-sionate attachments for others, should be excluded and that in place of them Just and amicable feelings toward aJI should be cultivated." Lincoln's Great Message. Wltb tbe end of tbe great Civil war In sight one of the most bitter wars |