Introducing the American SpiritSteiner, Edward Alfred
General
Introducing the American Spirit
Steiner, Edward Alfred
National characteristics, American; United States -- Social life and customs -- 1865-1918
The happy day was almost spoiled for me by the discovery that our trunks
had not arrived. The Herr Director worked himself into a frenzy and the
Frau Directorin had dire forebodings of having to spend the three days
in the same shirt-waist. Telegrams were sent in all directions, while
the Herr Director called our much boasted of baggage system hard names;
my "best laid schemes" seemed about to "gang agley" when much to my
relief the trunks arrived, and I felt once more assured of the divine
favor in my most strenuous efforts to "boost" my United States.
The Herr Director had come to this country to take part in the Mohonk
Conference, and being a prudent man, he submitted his address to me. It
was written with Teutonic thoroughness and as void of places of
refreshment as the Sahara Desert or the Walkill Range we had climbed.
I suggested a thorough revision, the cutting out of many statistics and
resting his case, not upon pure business, but upon the higher plane of
pure justice. He insisted upon retaining his statistics and also his
appeal to the selfish and materialistic side of his audience; for he
knew "something about Americans" and still doubted their idealism.
The next morning after breakfast we attended prayers, which is a part of
the daily program of this hostelry, and presided over by the host, who
usually reads the Scriptures, announces a hymn and then leads in prayer.
It is as impressive as it is simple and dignified, and the Herr Director
and his wife did their first singing in America when they joined in a
hymn whose tune is an old German folk-song.
The program which followed the prayer service was dominated by
specialists in International Law and they were dry and concise enough to
suit even the Herr Director; while the dreamers and agitators, whom he
expected to hear, were almost altogether unrepresented. In fact they
have grown less in this assembly each year, largely because it is
thought that the whole subject has reached the point when it is a
practical question to be discussed by men of affairs. No one knew better
than the Herr Director how inevitable was the next great war and how far
we were from the practical Court of International Arbitration.
The epilogue to that great world drama had been spoken in the Balkan,
and spoken with vehemence, passion and fierce cruelty, and he knew its
bearing upon the whole tense situation in Europe. Yet I am sure that
even he did not know how many nations would be involved, nor how costly
and deadly would be the conflict. He did foreshadow in his own
condemnation of England and of England's foreign policy the element of
hate between the two related nations, which was to play so important a
part in the present war.
The afternoon is playtime at Lake Mohonk, and most generous are the
provisions for recreation; but the Herr Director did not ride or drive,
nor play golf or tennis. He stayed in his room rewriting his paper,
having sensed something of the Spirit of Lake Mohonk.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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