THE EMPEROR-PRESIDENT” IN THE FOOT-PRINTS“OF JULIUS CÆSAR
By C. S. Longacre
#
THE EMPEROR-PRESIDENT” IN THE FOOT-PRINTS“OF JULIUS CÆSAR
[In Three Articles. This Is the Second.]
THIS epithet and sentiment, expressed in the Pittsburg Post of January 23, as noticed in a former article, is not simply a metaphorical expression but the prelude to a new order of things. It is the admission of truths and facts already established in principle. It is the herald of a new combination—a twin organization—an empire and republic.
This novel combination would have but one head or chief executive; in the republic he would act the part of a president; in the subject provinces or empire, the part of an emperor.
This seems to be the strong trend at the present, under the banner of imperialism. This was the exact policy of the Roman republic before the Roman Empire was reared upon its ruins. Julius Cæsar and Pompey were the champions of imperialism, and attached province after province to their chariot wheels of conquest, until the whole world lay prostrate and submissive at their feet, and Julius Cæsar, seated upon the dominant throne, was declared its first emperor. Tendencies now in operation in this present republic are precisely the same, and will in their course make an end again of republican institutions, and establish, if completed, a military empire at home and abroad. Free nations can not govern subject provinces and withhold from them the privileges enjoyed at home without forfeiting their own liberties. All may see this who are not deceived by empty names of a glorious past or affected with the selfish sight of greed to such an extent as to blind them to right purpose.
The very essence of imperialism is selfishness and greed—the love of power and gain. It aims at the destruction of individual liberty. It is an institution of favorites and cast-outs; an institution of partiality; an institution of exaltation for some, and abasement for others, in the application of its privileges and laws to its legal members. It is a germ principle, productive of oppression and discord. It is the announcement of the cessation of a republic and the renunciation of the fundamental principles and laws that contain the very essence and vitality of freedom.
No one will knowingly support such selfish, unjust, and liberty-destroying principles as are embodied in imperialism, except the politician who is bewitched with the love for power to domineer over his weaker brother, and the money king, who is filled with the spirit of greed. You will find these two exponents back of every such scheme throughout all past ages. The common people are made the slaves and tools of the politician, and are the unfortunate victims of the moneyed power. They are blindfolded through misrepresentations and invalid promises, and, being ignorant of the vital principle involved or the voice of history upon this subject, are thus led to seal their doom by their own voice. And all this is done under a sanctimonious garb and in the name of a “Christian nation,” and, professedly, for the advancement of its tenets. Look behind this disguising veil of lamblike appearance, and you will even now hear the voice and behold the full features of the apocalyptic dragon. Rev. 13:11, 12.
For more than thirty years the people who publish this paper, have been pointing out this departure from foundation principles, and its results. God’s sacred Book predicted it. By faith this people have been preaching it. The world for years mocked and derided the very idea, and asked for the sign. We had no sign to give but the prediction in the Word of God. But now suddenly the fact has flashed before the public gaze, and stands before us in all its verity. The public is stunned and perplexed, but to us as a people there is an anchor of hope let down deep into the prophetic Word of God, and we know that the anchor will hold, and that our hope is the Rock of Salvation.
All praise be to Him whose Word surveys the whole field of time, and sheds its light through the thick clouds of mystery and over abysses of infinite darkness to illuminate the scenes and events just before us. And thus is the divine obligation impressed upon the watchman on the walls of Zion to sound the trumpet of alarm loud and clear, warning the world of the impending danger. Well may the inhabitants of the land tremble, when God and man, earth and heaven, time and eternity, speak with one voice and teach the same truth. Well may the lonely pilgrim of earth, by these last landmarks of time, count his journey almost ended; he may lift up his head to behold his redemption drawing nigh; he may see the clear rays of light that illumine the few remaining dark hours of life, and that guide his footsteps on the way to that city for which Abraham looked, “which hath foundations, whose Builder and Maker is God.”
This republic has followed and is following the Roman republic in its history, so that to-day the president is pointed to as walking in the footprints of Julius Cæsar when he tried to maintain order among the inhabitants of the first and newly-acquired province of Gaul, and force upon them, without their consent, and against their will, the laws of a republic, through intimidation by the presence and influence of the sword. These were the last days of the Roman republic, and Cæsar himself assumed the purple robe as the first emperor of the new empire. Yet it was in the days of Julius Cæsar that the boast of the Roman people was that the republic would stand forever. It was then, when the republic had reached her golden era and was on the decline, that they thought they were still in their infancy of glory. They laughed at the very idea of the Roman republic going to pieces. The voice that sounded the danger-signal was hushed with the songs of a good time coming. They turned upon their couches of down as the honored children of Romulus. They measured the length of their statutes in their shadows of the setting sun. “A paradise of roses was prefigured, but a wilderness of thorns was found.” Thus they spoke, and so they slumbered and slept, unconscious of their fate so near at hand. They awoke too late, only to find themselves in the iron grasp of the iron monarchy of Rome. They killed their king, but the empire still remained. They killed the tyrant, but tyranny still survived.
This nation is singing the same false song of jubilee to-day. It too takes pride in the patriotism5and loyalty of ancestral glory, while in its own bosom is found only its prestige. Never was there such a feeling of security, never such a time of brilliant pretensions, boasting of progress, of achievements, and of a good time coming; but ere many to-morrows this people too will awake to find themselves in the iron grasp of a hideous monster of their own creation. Now is the time to foil the measures which will result in tyranny, and there will be no necessity to kill the tyrant. Now is the time to repudiate the tendencies and claim of empire, and set at liberty the subject provinces, and there will be no occasion to kill the emperor.
What will this nation have? Which will they choose? The prophecy of Revelation 13 has been divinely summarized in the declaration that this country shall repudiate every principle of its Constitution as a Protestant and republican government, and shall make provision for the propagation of papal falsehoods and delusions. Then will Satan work marvelously, and the end of all things is near.
Do we not now see already marked out the course which the nation is to take? Has it not taken already the initiative steps to maintain an imperial government instead of a republic?
The principles of the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence are repudiated, defamed, construed, revised, questioned, and phrases inserted in order to operate imperial rule in the face of a national document, strictly republican in principle and declaration. Listen to some of the words of infamy hurled against the Constitution and the Declaration of Independence by representative men in this land. It is said that governments derive their just powers from the consent of some of the governed. To-day there are those that wave the Declaration of Independence in our faces. . . . As to that hallowed document that declares that all governments derive their just powers from the consent of the governed, if that is to be literally construed, there never was a greater falsehood palmed off by the devil upon a credulous world.
That men must resist the crazy extension of the doctrine that government derives its just powers from the consent of the governed.
That the Declaration of Independence was a formal notice that the inhabitants of the colonies consented no longer to British rule.
That it was simply their manifesto to European powers, and is not law.
That a constitution, a national policy, adopted by thirteen half-consolidated, weak, rescued colonies, glad to be able to call their life their own, can not be expected to hamper the greatest nation in the world.
That government can be conducted without the Constitution.
That within the territory now owned by the United States, in spite of the thirteenth amendment and the war of the rebellion, slavery still exists, . . . and it is to be hoped that Congress, when it comes to act, will see the advisability of letting the present treaty stand as it is—at least for the present.
Have you read such expressions as the foregoing, and many more to the same intent? Do you not see tendency in every quarter to conduct all public affairs in accordance with this principle? Do you not even now see the apostasy and the repudiation of the Constitution and republican principles by this country? Do you not see the fact and recognize it?
A few years ago, when we told the people that this country would do this very thing, they laughed and ridiculed the idea of its possibility; but now they not only admit the fact of it being here, but, under false prophecies of manifest destiny, they condemn the very ones who stand opposed to such a course of action, and warn of its results. In Congress its opponents are branded with high treason.
Many seem ready to repudiate anything dear and sacred, and willing to compromise with craft and false principles if it has any pretense of pecuniary benefit for them, no matter what loss it brings to others or what its train of evil consequences will produce in the future. Money! money!! more money!!! is still the cry. It is the universal passion and the all-absorbing thought in the circles of greed—from the highest officer who buys his place to the poorest plebeian who sells his vote. For money, judges give unjust decrees, and juries render corrupt verdicts. Lawmakers go into office bankrupt, and, with a salary of from $5,000 to $10,000 a year, they return with hundreds of thousands of dollars. Where do they get it?
To call into question the present order of things would shake the very foundations of society. To obtain money by any means, lawful or unlawful, is the sole object of well-nigh universal aspiration. Individual rights, sacred truths, and republican principles are bleeding at the shrine of liberty, and on its bosom is reared instead the altar of oppression, error, and corruption. C. S. LONGACRE.