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In reality it was by an appeal to such undeclared but powerful sentiments that our present socialistic condition was reached. Loud and noisy outcries were made to a forced, exaggerated, and unreal sentiment of gratitude in the case of pensions. National self-preservation was the plea in the matter of educational grants. The amelioration of the condition of the poor and general blessedness, without any experiences of suffering, are the professed ends of the Nationalists; and the single tax will not merely aid the poor, it will abolish poverty. All such arguments are made by men of the highest probity, but they are also the fleece in which the wolf disguises himself. So with the various responses to them. There are many ill-balanced enthusiasts who forget that if the ten commandments had never been promulgated amid the thunders of Sinai, both tables would still be valid to-day as the crystallization of human experience in society. But far more numerous are the thoughtless, would-be honest people who find human law a tangible standard and fail entirely to grasp either the nature or validity of ethical principles. An English chartist was told that if the wealth of all the Rothschilds were equally divided among all the men in England his share would be about seven shillings. "I ha' naught to do with it," said he, "I ha' six pun' in the bank myself."

Militant socialism finds unblushing and public support in two classes of organizations of differing degrees of respectability. One class acts under the mask of ostensible ends; the other manfully avows its purpose. The right of association is one of the most important in the history of free government, but there are so-called political societies which have neither political nor moral aims. They exist solely for the creation and distribution of spoils, that is, of taking by the machinery of the state large sums of money from the pockets of individuals which are not needed for good government and putting those sums into their own pockets. An even more scandalous procedure is perhaps the more common, that of taking for personal and private ends the money raised and needed for good government and leaving the duties of office unperformed. Scarcely a great city in America is without some such hall, ring, or machine, as it is variously called. Such socialism does not of course deserve so comparatively decent a name. It is adroit rascality taking advantage of the insufficiency of all human devices. Sometimes associations of the purest aims sink temporarily or permanently into similar practices.

When our armies were disbanded in 1865 the whole world looked on in delighted wonder as the men and officers returned to the duties of private life with the same ease and readiness with which they had taken up arms. There was no blustering, no lawlessness, no discontent. They were even better men in every walk in life than they had been before by reason of the severe discipline they had undergone. Gradually, however, as they watched with discontent the process of reconstruction, and misapprehended in some measure the temper of their gallant but defeated foes, their association became closer and their meetings more frequent. At last the Grand Army, theoretically organized for laudable purposes of sociability and the perpetuation of the most ennobling memories and sentiments, became more or less a political organization. It took new strength as a body with political aims, and for a time stood blameless even in the eyes of unsympathetic opponents. But in so doing it lost its moral force and hold on the nation as a disinterested band of war-worn veterans who had deserved well of their country. In its latest stage the question is asked whether it be even a legitimate political association. Its foes within its own household try to make it a machine with all the ear-marks of "bosses," "demands," and "workers." It has many honorable members who do not sympathize with its course, men who abhor dependent and service pensions as the devil's device to degrade the military profession into a huckstering trade. But so far the country has vainly waited for them to organize for the reform of their society from within or for a rupture and protest from without. The one great object of the war had been Union, to prevent present and future disintegration and avoid the disastrous example of Europe in the contiguity of States with discordant interests and therefore perpetual wars and enormous armaments, taxing every man, woman, and child for their unproductive support. But the brave defenders of this sound principle have helped in peace to bring about exactly what they fought to prevent by war, viz. unjust and unnecessary taxation. We spent for the war on the northern side thirty-five hundred millions between 1861-65, excluding the expenses of states, cities, and towns and the values destroyed by Confederate privateers. What the war cost the South can never be known. But since 1865 we have already disbursed in pensions one-third of the total expense of the national government for the war, and will probably on the present system spend as much more. If service pensions become the rule our outlay will far exceed the cost of our own war in its entirety, saddling us with a permanent annual expenditure sufficient to support the enormous armaments of France and Germany combined. At this moment the 62,000,000 people in the United States are annually paying $44,000,000 for a military establishment, $22,000,000 for a navy, and $160,000,000 for pensions including deficiencies -- a total of $226,000,000, which is 80 per cent, of what the combined 86,000,000 people of France and Germany together pay for their armaments. We bemoan their sad fate and the oppressive burdens under which the men, women and children of old Europe groan. But this is the pass to which we have come: 86,000,000 of French and Germans pay $265,000,000 for armaments and pensions -- 63,000,000 of Americans already pay $226,000,000. A simple sum in ratio. At our rate they would disburse $308,000,000, about $40,000,000 more than they actually do. And yet the appetite of some posts in the Grand Army whetted by the Disability Pension Bill is clamorous for more! This democratic land, neutral, industrial, and devoted to the arts of peace, is to be taxed for war reasons far beyond the dreams of the most ardent war-lord of Europe. Not long since you could scarcely open a newspaper without reading of the "demand" made by some post for a service pension.