INTERNATIONAL COMPLICATIONS.
By T.
UNTIL within the past few weeks the United States has held herself aloof from the complications and quarrels of the nations of the Old World. Her policy has been to build up a great nation here—a nation that would possess all its needed supplies within its own borders—and let the Orient alone. This has been the policy of her statesmen from Washington on down, and no contrary doctrine could have been popularly advocated here at any time previous to May 1 of the present year. But no sooner had Admiral Dewey destroyed the Spanish squadron in Manila Bay than a different sentiment began to steal over the country. Leading men, who a few months ago were opposed to any kind of territorial expansion on the part of the United States, are now urgently advocating the idea that Spain must be stripped of all her colonies, and that this country must hold them. The change in sentiment is sudden and remarkable. What this new condition of things results in is also worthy of comment. Under the former policy the United States was only a spectator of the clamorous quarrels between the kings and emperors of the Old World. But now she has thrown herself into the troubled waters of international strife, and when Germany and France and Russia and England and all the rest are quarreling, this country must of necessity be in the broil. Thus the last one of the great nations of earth dashes herself into the arena of militarism, and she may not hope to be entirely free from war entanglements till the end of time. Her war with Spain may soon end, and she may not have another war on her hands at once, but she is sure to have complications in her attempt to hold the islands taken from Spain that will necessitate a great increase of both her navy and army. Leading statesmen see this, and a few of them are raising their voices against the policy. But there seems to be a sweeping majority who are enthusiastically in favor of this reversal of the United States’ policy, or, at best, indifferent to it. The few who are out and out against it seem to make no impression upon the in-rolling tide in favor of grasping all that can be torn from Spain. With the United States thus so fully in the stream of international strife, it becomes manifest that the peace of the world is gone, for while any one of the great nations held aloof from the contentions of the world there was hope for a prolongation of tranquillity; but when the very last one of the great powers of earth has buckled on her sword and dashed into the whirlpool of strife, there can be nothing but wars and ever-increasing rumors of wars until the Son of man comes to destroy this evil, and gather to Himself those who are ready to receive Him. True, there are those who are ever disposed to find a bright side to a dark picture, and they express the hope that out of all this strife and carnage into which the world is inevitably sweeping, there will come a higher and broader development of civilization. But that which is good can not “come out” of that which is entirely evil. The evil must be destroyed and the good planted in its stead by divine power. This will surely be done. But it will not come about in the way that so many are looking for it. There is no promise of a better condition of things until the Lord shall come. And to the promises and evidences of His coming all may turn with an assuring hope. The terribly unsettled condition of the world is one of the sure signs that His coming is very near. The Bible makes this point plain and strong. Are you ready to meet the Master when He comes? If so, hurry on to tell the good news to all the world. Let all be filled with the joy that the Friend of sinners and the Destroyer of sin is about to come. What a blessed hope it is! T.