United States Military Academy West Point - Howitzer Yearbook (West Point, NY)

Page 14 text:

in Holy Scripture. Therefore. enter upon the career to which you are called, and for which you have served a hard apprenticeship, with pride in your high vocation and the devotion to it of the best that is in you; exalting in your lives the ideal of the soldier and the citizen, and striving ever for the welfare of your fellow-men. Repudiating sordid motives in your ambition, be faithful to the motto of your Alma Mater; and translate into action those finely tempered principles of clean integrity and right living which have made Her famous and her sons respected throughout the earth. Then, wherever duty calls you. unafraid you shall face the issue with tranquillity and a clear conscience, faithful to your God, your Country and yourselves— “So when the Angel of the darker Drink At last shall find you by the river-brink And, offering his Cup. invite your soul . ... Forth to your Lips to quaff you shall not shrink. 8

Page 13 text:

persistence and their recognition by the political world as a force to be reckoned with and respectfully considered. It seems to me that no man who loves his kind can refuse the movement his co-operation and sympathy; no man who considers human destiny as more than a struggle for existence can fail to enlist under its banner. But approval of efforts to enlarge the sphere of arbitration and to forward the cause of peace is one thing; while assent to the claim that war can be eliminated speedily from human affairs by exhortation and co-operative national agreement, and sympathy with the reprobation of military preparation and the soldier, are quite another matter. The fallacy of the anti-militarist contention lies in mistaking the effect for the cause. War is a symptom, not a disease; the eruption, not the fever; the ulcer, not the corrupt blood; the violence of delirium, not the deranged brain tissue. The diseases of the social order bring about war. Selfishness, greed, pride, and ambition are the irritants that inflame the blood of nations to battle. It is peace that generates war. not soldiers and the military spirit. Reform human nature and war will cease to l e; and so will law and judges and sheriffs and police. As well attempt to extinguish crime by abolishing all these last as to hope to stop war by disbanding armies and preaching peace. In the meanwhile be well assured that your profession is a noble one; that the upright, educated soldier belongs to the highest type of man and citizen, and is approved by Scripture and honored in History. The greatest characters of the Old Testament were both soldiers and law-givers; and in the New, the three laymen most distinguished by Divine approval, without the slightest reprobation of their calling, were captains of Infantry in the regular Roman army. Brotherhood and solidarity are ultimate, but not yet; arbitration and peace are their issues, but not now. An expectation of universal peace based upon disarmament and an appeal to argument has no warrant in existing conditions; and an attack upon the Army, the soldier and military preparation prompted by such expectations has no foundation in logic nor warrant 7

Page 15 text:

 TMt DEPARJMENTJ ir n ft Jv