The Impending Crisis. Basil A. Bouroff

When a heavy mass of clouds suddenly rises in a clear sky, every one thinks that a terrific storm is to follow, displaying a great store of pent up forces. And many people |SIGNS OF THE TIMES.| never make a single mistake in predicting from so ominous a summer sky what is going to take place. Some similar forecasting is now going on within the consciousness of the people. For nearly every one more or less clearly feels that he is heavily pressed upon by some portent in the national life. And every one whose mental horizon is clear enough and wide enough sees, beyond the outward appearance, that something dangerous is stored in the nation. It may be something so unusually great in its force, something so explosive, something so combustible, that with the new century it may terribly shake the world.

It was quite recently when the “North American” of Philadelphia asked the question, “What has the Nineteenth Century in store for Philadelphia?” And by its own admission the replies received were amazing. In summing them up, before spreading them at large before its readers, it said:

“Substantial business men, whose names are almost household words, solemnly affirm that with opinions of the new century will come revolution and bloodshed. Leading lawyers |OPINIONS OF BUSINESS MEN.| say the tendency will be toward socialism. Bankers join with labor leaders in forecasting the triumph of the single-tax theory and the consequent overthrow of existing social conditions. That such a tremendous undercurrent of dissatisfaction and unrest exists in this city will undoubtedly come as a shock to thousands of conservative citizens. The opinions given are not those of labor agitators or anarchists. They are the careful expressions of men of wealth and of broad education. The revolutionary suggestions were not shouted upon the street in time of riot and excitement, but were given deliberately while the speakers sat in their well furnished offices, surrounded by comforts and evidences of prosperity.^[1]” So then the Nineteenth Century has stored up in the social organism of the nation enough material to produce revolution and bloodshed in the Twentieth Century.

And Mr. Louis Post says in “The Public” of Chicago: “Our leisurely friends of Philadelphia, who are to be envied, by the way, and not sneered at, for being philosophical enough and sensible enough to keep so much unwholesome hustle out of their lives—these slow and sober people must have been ‘startled’ by the above ‘revelations’ of the Philadelphia North American, that ancient landmark, now in its 128th year.^[2] It was undoubtedly an amazing surprise in view of its age that the answer of its readers was, as you see, ‘revolution and bloodshed.’

If similar questions were presented to the thinking public of the various cities of the United States, we might have thousands of like opinions and all of them would be conditioned by sufficient reasons.

One of the most prominent thinkers of the city of Chicago^[3] also quite recently said that “the Twentieth Century will bring to us the bloodiest revolution that human |OPINIONS OF LEARNED MEN.| history ever witnessed.” And his assertion was not less amazing than was the affirmation of the substantial business men of Philadelphia. If it were honest and right to expose the names of men whose confidential conversations led to the same or similar assertions, I alone could make a long list of these names.

They all admit that the nation, as an organism, has long been diseased; its nerves have long been abnormally strained. But, like the friends of Philadelphia, they speak about revolution and bloodshed which is but the last and most convulsive stage of any nation’s serious disease. And it is true that, when this stage is reached, it is impossible to avoid the

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