browed intellectuals striving to realize at once "the federation of the world" by the renunciation of their nationalities—these are weak things where great strength is required.
The most powerful instruments yet existing in the world for the destruction of international order are the nations; yet they are still the most powerful instruments for creating it. The most powerful agents for the corruption of the world's civilization are corrupt national civilizations; yet they are still the most powerful redemptive agents. Power is the good which the world craves. We cannot afford to waste it or to turn away from it. The friends of Humanity will make less progress by attempting to destroy the national spirit than by criticizing it and purifying it, and by seizing upon and fostering those elements in it which are truly humane. With this program in mind no wise student of the national past will be an indiscriminating upholder of traditions. While seeking to conserve their vital energy, he will steadily subject their direction to a critical scrutiny in the best light of his own time.
The studies in this book, though originally published separately as occasion offered, all had their origin in a fresh interest in American life and letters, which has strengthened side by side with a strengthening interest in the cause of those young men to whom the war brought a new vision of the
