Wilson, the island would now be trampled into bloody mire, as Belgium has been trampled. If Germany had followed such advice--or rather no advice-during the last ten years, she would now have been wholly unable so much as to assert her rights anywhere. Let us immediately make our navy thoroughly efficient; and this can only be done by reversing the policy that President Wilson has followed for twenty-two months. Recently Secretary Daniels has said, as quoted by the press, that he intends to provide for the safety of both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts by dividing our war fleet between the two oceans. Such division of the fleet, having in view the disaster which exactly similar action brought on Russia ten years ago, would be literally a crime against the nation. Neither our foreign affairs nor our naval affairs can be satisfactorily managed when the President is willing to put in their respective departments gentlemen like Messrs. Bryan and Daniels. President Wilson would not have ventured to make either of these men head of the Treasury Department, because he would thereby have offended the concrete interests of American business men. But as Secretary of State and Secretary of the Navy the harm they do is to the country as a whole. No concrete interest is immediately affected; and, as it is only our own common welfare in the future, only the welfare of our children, only the honor and interest of the United States through the generations that are concerned, it is deemed safe to disregard this welfare and to take chances with our national honor and interest. CHAPTER XII SUMMING UP “Blessed are the peacemakers,” not merely the peace lovers; for action is what makes thought operative and valuable. Above all, the peace prattlers are in no way blessed. On the contrary, only mischief has sprung from the activities of the professional peace prattlers, the ultrapacificists, who, with the shrill clamor of eunuchs, preach the gospel of the milk and water of virtue and scream that belief in the efficacy of diluted moral mush is essential to salvation.