The power of Japan as a nation lies in the racial strength of her people. That comes largely from the physical vigor and endurance developed by the daily labor of the gardeners who till the soil. They have the land to cultivate because the devotion of the people to the good of all has led them to preserve their forests and water supplies. Where would they be to-day if the same spirit of selfish individualism, and apathy and indifference to the national welfare, and to the preservation of the nation's resources, had dominated Japan, that has dominated China for centuries, and that now dominates the United States of America? In "The Valor of Ignorance," the author, Homer Lea, most truly says: "No national ideals could be more antithetic than are the ethical and civic ideals of Japan to those existent in this Republic. One nation is a militant paternalism, where aught that belongs to man is first for the use of the State, the other an individualistic emporium where aught that belongs to man is for sale. In one is the complete subordination of the individual, in the other his supremacy." The author might with equal truth have added that from the standpoint of the intrenched interests which control capital in the United States, and undertake to control legislation, Humanity and Mother Earth exist only for exploitation for private profit, and that the campaign to preserve and perpetuate our natural resources and regulate our rivers and build waterways and stop the ravages of Nature's devastating forces has not as yet succeeded only because it proposes to put the general welfare above speculation and exploitation. This condition will continue until the mass of the people of the United States have a great patriotic awakening and take hold of the duty of perpetuating the country's natural resources, with the same patriotic enthusiasm that they would fight a foreign invader. Let us not deceive ourselves. The majority of the people of the United States are as apathetic and indifferent to the great national questions involved in the preservation of our forests and water supplies, and of the fertility of our fields,--in the protection of our river valleys from floods,--in the defense of the whole Western half of the United States against the inroads of the desert,--in the protection of the mountain ridges of the Eastern half of the United States from deforestation,--and in the protection of our valleys from the fate which has befallen the valleys of China, as were the Chinese through the long centuries during which the grinding, destructive forces of Nature were devastating their country and bringing famine and ruin to millions of the people.