Christian Conference was similar to that of the Northfield Student Conferences, though the work was more largely in the hands of the students, with fewer outside speakers. There are now nearly five hundred Chinese students in this country, more having come to the United States than to any other country except Japan. A hundred more are expected in December of this year, to be sent by the Chinese Government, under the arrangement made last year by Tang-Shao-Yi, China's special representative.

The importance, there

fore, of these conferences, in which the men and women who are to have a part in molding the new China come together to become acquainted and to discuss Chinese problems, is likely to be greatly increased from year to year.

AMERICA AND THE FAR EAST

The interest felt by the American people in the rapidly changing conditions in the Far East, and especially in China, is becoming more widespread and intense. There are good reasons for this-commercial as well as educational and political. It is an evidence of this increasing interest that a quite unusually complete and varied programme has been arranged for a conference to be held next week at Clark University, in Worcester. Both the Japanese Ambassador and the Chinese Minister are interested in the matter, and had expected to take part, but both are just now out of the country. The programme, however, is such a remarkable one and contains the names of so many men eminent for knowledge of Eastern affairs that somewhat contrary

to

our usual custom-we mention in advance the principal speakers and their topics, noting that these topics themselves form a sort of summary of live questions relating to the United States and the East. Dr. George H. Blakeslee, of Clark University, whose name will be remembered by our readers as that of a contributor to The Outlook, will speak of "The Significance to the Far East of America's Experiment in the Philippines," while other aspects of our Philippine problems and policies will be taken up by Judge L. R. Wilfley, formerly AttorneyGeneral of the Philippines, Dr. W. S.

Washburn, recently director of the Philippine Civil Service, and others. Korea will be discussed by our former Minister to Korea, the Hon. Horace N. Allen, Professor Ladd, of Yale, and others. India, and especially English rule in India, will have two sessions devoted to it. Japan and its relations to the United States will be the subject of talks by eminent Japanese scholars. China, as the principal subject, will have several sessions devoted to it, and we are sure that our readers will recognize as high authorities on Chinese matters, and in several cases also as contributors to The Outlook, the names of Dr. F. W. Williams, Professor of Modern Oriental History at Yale; Dr. Amos P. Wilder, Consul-General at Hongkong; the Hon. Chester Holcombe (subject "The Real Chinaman "); Judge L. R. Wilfley ("America's Opportunity in China "); Mr. John Foord, of the American Asiatic Association ("America's Trade Relations with China "); Professor J. W. Jenks, of Cornell ("Chinese Financial Conditions "); Dr. Asakawa, of Yale ("Japan's Relations to China '') ; Mr. T. F. Millard, author of "The New Far East" ("The Need of a Distinctive American Policy in China "); Dr. I. T. Headland, of Peking University ("The Present Political Situation in China"); Dr. Hamilton Wright ("A Historical Review of the Opium Problem"); and the Hon. John W. Foster, ex-Secretary of State of the United States. This is only a partial list, but it is enough to show that this conference is likely to do for Eastern problems what the Mohonk conferences have done for the Indian, Negro, and Arbitration questions. It will go far, we are sure, to aid in bringing about a sympathetic appreciation of the new conditions of the awakened East.

the plowshare, international brotherhood, and government by love instead of force. No one can question the beauty of the ideal, but the methods of this prophet of peace are infantile and are inspired by a mad belief in the instant coming of the Prince of Peace to carry on the work he has himself begun. Natu

rally, the White Prophet, when he moves on Cairo with an immense multitude of unarmed peasants, is led by others to do things quite contrary to his original purpose, and the reader only wonders that the British authorities, who have, at the first, unjustly treated the Prophet and his hearers, are so lenient to him at the end. The aim is to depict a Christlike man inspired by high motive, but the fact that his exaltation really passes into delusion affects his actions more than Mr. Caine himself seems to realize. It hardly needed six hundred and more pages to show that the British in Egypt should be more than good administrators, that they should have sympathy and brotherly feeling for the Egyptians, and should try to make the natives fit to rule themselves. But apart from this—and its application to world-wide problems of the same kind Mr. Caine's teaching seems vague and uncertain. There is no form of preaching more futile than that which tries to show what Christ, if he were on earth, would do to-day in a given specified case in dispute. Mr. Caine's constantly suggested comparison between his peaceful Mahdi and Christ's teaching is not irreverent, but it leads nowhere. It may be only fair to add Mr. Caine's own statement of his purpose, made in reply to critics since the book appeared in England: "My object in writing the novel was to show the corrupting influence of the greed of wealth and the lust of empire, with the repaganization of the Christian world, which in the hourly increase of armaments is (as Sir Edward Grey has finely said) threatening to submerge society." As a novel this is a typical Hall Caine book, and in its own way the appearance of a Hall Caine book is a literary event. His publishers say that half a million copies of each of his stories is demanded by a world-wide reading public, and in from six to ten different languages. So much for popularity. The critics, on the other

hand, find the author's style and method self-conscious, nervously and almost hysterically intense, and loosely hortatory. In this story the action and movement are at first rapid and strong, but by the middle one begins to weary of the artificial excitement and to long for a little plain, common-sense realism. The author knows the need of this, but he is not altogether happy when he tries that vein.

THE NEW FARMING

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An old Boston seafaring man, when asked by a gentleman how, having never studied navigation, he managed to get about, replied, "I know 'nough navegation to git out o' Bostin harbor, and then I ken go where I dum please." The same spirit is not uncommon among American farmers. Having "farmed it all their lives, they think they know all there is to know about farming. That there is a great deal that the average farmer may learn to his advantage is being tactfully but impressively shown by the scientists of the United States Department of Agriculture through the agency of the Farmers' Cooperative Demonstration Work, which has been organized under the Bureau of Plant Industry. The working forces now consist of one director with assistants, ten State agents, and one hundred and eightyeight local and district agents. The local agents are practical farmers who have been thoroughly instructed in their duties by the State and district agents. The work is begun in October by calling public meetings in each district to be worked, at which is pointed out the advantage of increasing the crop yield two, three, or four fold, and how it may be done. It is not difficult to persuade the farmers of the desirability of increased crops, but it is difficult to persuade them that it can be done. Finally, one or more farmers in each district are persuaded to work a few acres in accordance with " use as directed.' The demonstration farmer must do all the actual work himself. Therein lies the force of the argument. What he can do his neighbors will believe they can do.

Each month specific instructions are sent to each demonstrating farmer. Each month, too, a local agent visits him and gives word-of-mouth instructions. Notice

CONTROVERSY

"field school." In these discussions it has been found with pathetic frequency that many small farmers had never fully complied with any of the essential rudiments of successful farming. Year after year they had gone on charging their perfectly avoidable failures to the land or the elements. One of the converts to the new farming.thus frankly expressed himself at a public meeting in Alabama last year: "I was born in a cotton-field and worked cotton on my farm for more than forty years. I thought no one could tell me anything about raising cotton. I had usually raised one-half a bale on my thin soil, and I thought that was all the cotton there was in it in one season. The demonstration agent came along and wanted me to try his plan on two acres. Not to be contrary, I agreed, but I did not believe what he told me. However, I tried my best to do as he said, and at the end of the year I had a bale and a half to the acre on the two acres worked his way, and

little over a third of a bale on the land worked my way. You could have

knocked me down with a feather. This year I have a bale and a half to the acre on my whole farm. If you do not believe it, I invite you to go down and see. Yes, sir; as a good cotton planter I am just one year old." This man not only raised three times as big a crop, but he became three times as big a man. There can be no real reform in farm life unless the farmer grows as well as his crop. He can grow only by achievement-by accomplishing something of which he may justly be proud. As soon as he begins to achieve and to grow he will become healthfully discontented with his unnecessary hardships and limitations. He will

want a better house in which to live, a better school for his children, better public roads, and more modern conveniences. And with the larger bank account which must follow his larger crop he will satisfy his wants. No wonder the General Education Board has added to the Government appropriations over $75,000 a year for the extension of such new farming as leads to these things.

It is somewhat unfortunate that the discussion of the use of benzoate of soda as a so-called preservative of food products has ceased to be a scientific one and has become a popular and commercial one. There is considerable danger, that the real issues involved may become confused in the minds of the users of canned and preserved food products-and that means practically every man, woman, and child in the United States.

When the National Pure Food Law was passed, packers and preservers of fruit were forbidden to use any noxious or deleterious substances in manufacturing their food products, under penalty of criminal prosecution; certain Government officials, including Dr. Wiley, the Chief Chemist of the Department of Agriculture, were to define what substances were noxious and deleterious under the law; Dr. Wiley and his associates defined benzoate of soda as a noxious substance, and therefore food packers and preservers using benzoate of soda would have been subject to criminal prosecution without some modification of Dr. Wiley's decision; the matter was brought to Mr. Roosevelt, then President, and he referred the question to the so-called Referee Board of distinguished scientists, including President Remsen, of Johns Hopkins, and Professor Chittenden, of Yale; pending the decision of the Referee Board, food manufacturers who chose to do so were permitted to continue the use of benzoate of soda, provided they stated the fact and the quantity employed on their labels ; and, finally, the Referee Board has now decided that benzoate of soda used in reasonable amounts is not noxious in its physiological effects. Thus we have as the actual situation to-day that the manufacturers who use benzoate of soda must continue to state that fact on their labels, until the officials of the Government accept the recommendation of the Referee Board and expunge benzoate of soda from the list of deleterious substances the use of which is forbidden by the National Pure Food Law.

In the meantime those canners and preservers who introduce benzoate of soda

into their products are making a great campaign to create a public opinion favorable to benzoate of soda. They claim that the opinion of President Remsen, one of the greatest of living chemists, and of Professor Chittenden, one of the greatest of living physiologists, removes all distrust of benzoate of soda in food products; they say that benzoate of soda is found in natural fruits; and they assert that it cannot be used by unscrupulous manufacturers as a preserver of cheap dirty, or decayed materials.

The last assertion is one still open to discussion, and, in our judgment, the burden of proof still rests with the users of benzoate of soda. No one questions the authority of President Remsen and Professor Chittenden and their associates as scientists or their integrity as men, but they have not undertaken nor have they been called upon to investigate the cheap preserving factories of the country in order to discover whether benzoate of soda is employed for the purpose of concealing inferior material. The food consumers of this country have suffered in the past, not at all from limitations placed upon chemical preservatives, but from their unscrupulous use. The enactment of the National Pure Food Law was a great step in advance for the protection of the consumers of manufactured food of all sorts. It is true that benzoate of soda is used in some food products of a high grade, not to conceal bad material, but because the manufacturers believe that they can best maintain the natural flavor in this way. But, in view of the past, no one can complain if chemical preservatives are looked upon with suspicion, and, considering the prevailing commercial standards in this country, it appears to us that there is more danger of giving food manufacturers too much latitude than there is of restricting them too much. The controversy over benzoate of soda will at least have served one good purpose if it arouses the country to the need of the most rigorous kind of inspection and regulation of every class of food-producing establishment. In some way the country will insist that only wholesome materials are used, and that hygienic methods of preparing those materials are followed.

And, finally, the manufacturers who believe sincerely in the right and propriety of their use of benzoate of soda are not really doing their cause good by some of their methods of creating public opinion. An organization bearing the high-sounding title of the National Association for the Promotion of Public Health, and purporting to be a philanthropic and publicspirited society, is really maintained as an advertising or press agency by some at least of the manufacturing group which use benzoate of soda. This press agency recently submitted to The Outlook for publication an article by a physician which, under the guise of a charitable appeal for poor children suffering from infantile paralysis, was a thinly disguised advocacy of the use of benzoate of soda in preserved foods. The Outlook of course declined the article, and it can hardly be said that its confidence in the commercial advocates of benzoate of soda was greatly increased by the incident.

THE MUNICIPAL PROBLEM THE CITY AND THE LAW

As The Outlook stated last week, all municipal questions fall into two categories. In the one are questions concerning the source of authority, in the other are questions concerning the function and forms of government. Of these two sets of questions the first is the more important because it is fundamental. One reason why many attempts at reform in city administration have failed is because they have been directed toward changing the forms or the activities of the city government without ascertaining the authority under which the city government should act. This has been exemplified in the method by which cities have undertaken to enforce the law.

An illustration may make this clear. The liquor excise law under which the people of New York City live is an enactment of the State Legislature; but its enforcement has heretofore been dependent chiefly upon the police and the magistrates of New York City. It is notorious that this law has largely failed of its purpose except as a revenue measure. It has not prevented the spread of

disorder and vice, and it has not secured the closing of bar-rooms at the times specifically provided in the law. Repeated efforts have been made to see that the law is enforced. There have been appeals to the police authorities. There have been cases repeatedly brought before the magistrates. There have been societies organized to give officials weapons with which to fight the lawless or to supply them with a fear of consequences of failure. In spite of all, this law is not observed; on the contrary, it has afforded dealers in vice and corrupt officials opportunity to form profitable partnerships. What is the reason for this continued evil? It is the same reason as that for the continuance of many other municipal evils. Reformers have been attempting to change the activities of the government without undertaking to see that that government rests upon a sound principle of authority.

The power which enacts a law ought to be the power intrusted with the duty of enforcing the law. If a State enacts an excise law, it is the State and not the city that ought to be held responsible for the enforcement of that excise law. It is neither wise nor just to expect a political organism which does not, or may not, approve of a statute to see that that statute is enforced. If a city is expected to enforce a law, it should have the liberty of determining what that law is to be. Under a democracy the law is the expressed will of a community. It is not to be expected that a portion of that community will necessarily hold the same views as the whole community. It ought to be the whole community whose will is expressed that sees to the carrying out of that will. The State should enact only those laws which the State can enforce, and should leave to the city the enactment of laws that the city is expected to enforce. This is a sound principle of self-government.

It is not easy always to apply this principle practically, but it is possible to apply it approximately, as is nct now done. There are many cases, for example, in which the city must act as agent of the State. In such cases the authorities within the city who are held responsible for a line of action should be held responsible to those administrative officials of the State whose

duties are concerned with that particular line of action. For example, the city Department of Health, in so far as it acts as an agent of the State, should be accountable not to the Legislature but to the State Department of Health. This is in accord with the principle we have enunciated, that the power which enacts a law should be held responsible for enforcing that law. At the same time, it avoids legislative interference with local matters, and insures approximation to the rule that an agent should be accountable to his principal.

The consequences of the adoption of this principle, that the law-maker should be the law-enforcer, must be far-reaching. On the one hand, it would mean that the administrative and executive branches of the State government would have to be strengthened in order that the State might assume the responsibility that rests upon it for the enforcement of its own laws. On the other hand, the legislative branches of the city government would rise in power and in dignity, for they would be called upon to make many regulations and laws for the people of the city which are now made by the State.

WHY HE VEILS HIMSELF

In

Carlyle's cry, uttered more than once in great perplexity of mind and anguish of spirit, "If God would only speak again !" is repeated, generation after gen eration, by hosts of the most earnest men and women. It is the cry of the human spirit for light; for the assurance that the things it believes are true; for that immovable foundation of certainty which cannot be shaken, and will stand evident, tangible, and indisputably real among the mutations and uncertainties of life. the thought of Carlyle when he uttered that cry there was a fundamental historical defect. He was accepting the direct Divine inspiration of great spirits in the past, but denying it in the present. He was permitting himself to be a victim of that illusion of time which makes the past beautiful by erasing its ugly features and the echo of it harmonious by eliminating its discords. If God has ever spoken in the world, he speaks to-day. It is incredible that, in a distant past, the human