Page:The Collected Works of Theodore Parker Slavery volume 5 .djvu/93

Rh general; famine but rare. The arts advance, the useful, the beautiful, with rapid steps. Machines begin to dispense with human drudgery. Comfort gets distributed through their influence, more widely than ancient benefactors dared to dream. What were luxuries to our fathers, attainable only by the rich, now find their way to the humble home. War—the old demon which once possessed each strong nation, making it deaf and blind, but yet exceeding fierce, so that no feebler one could pass near and be safe—war is losing his hold of the human race, the devil getting cast out by the finger of God. The day of peace begins to dawn upon mankind, wandering so long in darkness, and watching for that happy star. Science, letters, religion, break down the barriers betwixt man and man, ’twixt class and class. The obstacles which severed nations once now join them. Trade mediates between land and land—the gold entering where steel could never force its way. New powers are developed to hasten the humanizing work; they post o’er land and ocean without rest, or serve our bidding while they stand and wait. The very lightning comes down, is caught, and made the errand-boy of the nations. Steamships are shooting across the ocean, weaving East and West in one united web. The soldier yields to the merchant. The man-child of the old world, young but strong, carries bread to his father in the hour of need. The ambassadors of science, letters and the arts, come from the old world to reside near the court of the new, telling truth for the common welfare of all. The genius of America sends also its first-fruits and a scion of its own green tree, a token of future blessings, to the parent land. These things help the great synthesis of the human race, the reign of peace on earth, of good-will amongst all men.

Everywhere in the old world the poor, the ignorant, and the oppressed, get looked after as never before. The hero of force is falling behind the times; the hero of thought, of love, is felt to deserve the homage of mankind. The Pope of Rome himself essays the reformation of Italy; the King of Denmark sets free the slaves in his dominions. East and West; the Russian Emperor liberates his serfs from the milder bondage of the Sclavonian race; his brother monarch of Turkey will have no slave-market in the Mahometan metropolis, no shambles there for human