verted imaginations have never failed to see the stealthy diplomacy of that government thwarting our purposes in even the most trivial enterprises at home or abroad. According to their view, no policy could possibly be right or beneficial to us if Great Britain was supposed to approve it, and no policy could possibly be wrong or injurious to us if Great Britain was supposed to disapprove it.

The sympathy manifested for us in the present war by the government and people of the mother-country is just what was expected by intelligent Americans who had not allowed themselves to be influenced by the reckless statements and inflammatory appeals of small politicians in and out of office, but it is none the less significant or gratifying for that reason. It will bring the two countries still closer together, and awaken in each a pride of race, a sense of power, and a spirit of moderation and justice in all matters of difference between themselves which will contribute far more to their mutual security and to the promotion of peace with other nations than any mere conventional alliance. When it is understood that there are to be no more wars between people of the Anglo-Saxon race, that all their differences not amicably adjusted by diplomacy will be permanently settled by arbitration, that they are thoroughly united by the ties of blood and a common heritage of free institutions, not for conquest or aggression of any kind, but for the promotion of peace and civilization, and that their combined influence will be exerted for these purposes only, all other nations will realize that a new force has been developed which cannot prudently be ignored. in their schemes of aggrandizement in any part of the globe.

CHAPTER XXXII.

LOVE OF COUNTRY.

BY BISHOP SPALDING.

Love of country, like all love, springs from a desire for life, for wider and richer life. Life is possible only through communion with what nourishes it, with what is not itself. We see ourselves in the image reflected from the world on which we look, as by a mirror. We are what we are by virtue of the thousand influences which have acted upon us-our minds have been fashioned and colored by sun and moon and stars, by the vestures with which earth clothes herself as the seasons change, by rivers, oceans and mountains, by books we have read, by work we have done, by games we have played, by the good and the evil which have befallen us, by the men and women we have known, admired and loved, or feared and hated. All that we have seen, felt, suffered and done has helped to make us what we are. For good and for ill we are bound to the universe, and apart from it we can neither know nor love nor enjoy. Stars whose light no human eye has beheld help to hold us where we are; grasses and trees that flourished before man ever trod the earth, from the soil by which we are fed, the coal by which we are warmed and ministered to in a hundred ways. Nothing exists or lives in isolation, and as insight increases, the perception that all things are in union and inter-communion with one another grows clearer. It is only in

the lowest stage of thought that objects seem to stand out in separateness, apart from their relations. When we look a little deeper we see that certain relations at least enter as essential elements into all ideas of the objective world, and that all things are interdependent, are a system of forces moving and acting in unison. When we look still more profoundly we perceive within and beyond the world of relative things, the independent being who is life and mind, the absolute and eternal, creative energy, God, in whom and by whom the universe exists, who is Himself self-determined and self-active.

Hence the radical impulse in the craving for richer and wider life is a godward impulse. What we really long for, whether consciously or not, is divine life, immortal life; and we need no other proof of this than the unsatisfactoriness of all, even the highest, achievement. Nothing, once attained, corresponds to the dream which lured us to the pursuit, whether it be wealth, or power, or fame, or pleasure. When we seek ourselves through all the mazes of matter, we may end weary and satiated, but not satisfied. God alone is the infinite Other whom we need to fill and complete our lives. Hence religion is and has been the inexhaustible fountainhead of self-devotion-of the self-devotion of patriots and heroes, of saints and artists, of wives and mothers; for whoever loves truth or justice or beauty or goodness with a surpassing love, with a love which endures all things, renounces all things, if only it may attain its end, cannot but be inspired, strengthened and upheld by an enthusiasm which must be called religious. By such men barbarous tribes have been led to higher planes, states have been founded, just laws decreed, tyrants overthrown, and the arts and sciences created. For

this reason epochs of religious earnestness are epochs of advancing life; epochs of religious skepticism and indifference, epochs of decadence. There may still be, indeed, a gloss, a glitter, a polish, a material prosperity by which the frivolous and thoughtless are misléd; but the power of heart and hope whereby man lives and is strong, is failing. Will is enfeebled, character is undermined, and there is a general falling away in thought, in language, in manners, in conduct, even though it be so gradual as to be imperceptible to the careless eye.

There is a higher love than love of country-the love of truth, the love of justice, the love of righteousness; and he alone is a patriot who is willing to suffer obloquy and the loss of money and friends, rather than betray the cause of truth, justice and righteousness, for only by being faithful to this can he rightly serve his country. Moral causes govern the standing and the falling of states as of individuals; and conquering armies move forward in vain, in vain the fleeting fabric of trade is spread, if a mortal taint within slowly moulder all. The national life is at fault if it be not in harmony with the eternal principles on which all right human life rests. The greatest and the noblest men when they meet rise into regions. where all merely national distinctions are forgotten. and transcended. In studying the works of a philosopher, a poet or a man of science we give little heed to what country he was born and lived in, so eager are we to learn the truth and beauty which he reveals— truth and beauty which are of no country,' which are wide and all-embracing as the universe. In the presence of heroic virtue also, the national limitations disappear, that the god-like man, who belongs to all countries and ages, may stand forth in his proper light.