LOOKING FACTS IN THE FACE.

"I yield neither to Senator Borah not to any other man in admiration of the Farewell Address; ..... but I believe that the greatness of Washington was due to his looking the facts of the day in the face, and determining his conduct thereby, instead of by utterances, however wise, of a hundred and fifty years before." These words, written by President Lowell in answer to Senator Borah's attack on him of his lack of reverence for Washington's last official words, are irrefutable. Looking the facts in the face is what the whole world must do unless it desires to slip back into the dark ages. Although the present is built on doctrines and theories of the past, many of the latter are obsolete now. The whole organization of society has changed. New means of transportation has greatly decreased, whether we willed it or not, that isolation of this nation which Washington urged. By our entrance into the World War, we gave up formally our position apart from the affairs of the world. We are in them now; we cannot withdraw. The progress of science and the development of a humanitarian feeling for the rest of mankind has placed us irrevocably on the side of world politics.

We should like to ask Mr. Borah whom he regards as an ultimate authority on statesmanship. He once declared that if the Savior should reappear on earth and support the league, he would nevertheless vote against it. And yet this illustrious senator terms President Lowell a traitor to the past because he does not apply the words of Washington, uttered more than a century ago, to the events of today. Surely the senator from Idaho is oddly inconsistent.