THE DISINTEGRATION OF THE REPUBLIC.
THAT cynical writer, Ambrose Bierce, who, if occasion seems fitting, spares neither friend nor foe his caustic criticism, is withal a keen observer, and at times writes most sensibly. This is the case in his "Prattle" on the trend of affairs in this country, in the Examiner of December 31. After saying that a Republican form of government "is successful in Switzerland only," he speaks of the decay of republican sentiment in this country. In fact, sentiment has swung from hatred of kings to adulation of royalty and nobility. He pertinently asks:— Does all this represent no retrogression?—Is it not the backward movement of the shadow on the dial? Doubtless the republican idea has struck strong roots into the soil of the two Americas, but he who rightly considers the tendencies of things, the causes that bring them about, and the consequences that flow from them, will not be hot to affirm the perpetuity of republican institutions in the Western Hemisphere. Between their inception and their present stage of development there is scarcely the beat of a pendulum; and already, by almost universal corruption and lawlessness, the people of both continents, with all their diversities of race and character, have shown themselves about equally unfit. To become a nation of scoundrels all that any people need is opportunity, and what we are pleased to call by the impossible name of "self-government" supplies it. The capital defect of republican government is inability to repress internal forces tending to disintegration. One great defect in a republican form of government is that it opens the chief places of power and trust equally to the possible grasp of the most unprincipled men as well as the best; and it is frequently the case that the unprincipled has every advantage; for he will make effective for his advancement weapons and forces which the man of integrity would scorn to use. The very strength of a republic, composed of honest, high-souled patriots, becomes its greatest weakness when its people lose the sense of honor and integrity, and patriotism is sacrificed for place and power and pelf. Mr. Bierce again says:— For generations we have been charming ourselves with the magic of words. When menaced by some exceptionally monstrous form of the tyranny of numbers, we have closed our eyes and murmured, "Liberty." When armed Anarchists threaten to quench the fires of civilization in a sea of blood, we prate of the protective power of "free speech." If
> Girt about by friends or foes,
> A man may speak the thing he will,
we fondly fancy that the thing he will speak is harmless—that immunity disarms his tongue of his poison, his thought of its infection. With a fatuity that would be incredible without the testimony of observation, we hold that an Anarchist, free to go about making proselytes, free to purchase arms, free to drill and parade and encourage his dupes with a demonstration of their numbers and power, is less mischievous than an Anarchist with a shut mouth, a weaponless hand, and under surveillance of the police. The Anarchist is himself persuaded of the superiority of our plan of dealing with him; he likes it and comes over in quantity, impesting the political atmosphere with the "sweltered venom" engendered by centuries of oppression—comes over here, where he is not oppressed, and sets up as oppressor. His preferred field of malediction is the country that is most nearly Anarchical. He comes here, partly to better himself under our milder institutions, partly to secure immunity while conspiring to destroy them. There is thunder in Europe, but, if the storm ever break, it is in America that the lightning will fall. This is preëminently true as regards the relation of religion with the State. In the modern fancy there is complete separation of Church and State in America; in the solemn facts of the case there is union already formed, which will terminate in persecution worthy of the Dark Ages. America is leading back the nations of earth to the midnight of Roman tyranny. Happy indeed is he who looks at these things in the light of past history and the word of God. We are repeatedly warned in the word of God of these very days. Nearly twenty centuries ago was our republic predicted with a circumstantiality which meets all objections save that of prejudice or blindness. Its predicted career of glory is nearly run. Here religious liberty reached its highest earthly climax; here too its death knell is now sounding. The nation is needed no more, and Divine Providence is withdrawing its protecting hand.