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THE times are critical, not here alone, but all over the world. Prospering in purely material interests, as I fully believe the people at large have never done before, the elements to bring on the gravest moral changes are simultaneously at work everywhere. The problems now lavishly presented for agitation touch the very foundation of religious faith, of moral philosophy, of civil government, and even of human society. New forms of power are developing themselves, seriously menacing the solidity of all established institutions. Even that great conviction, ever cherished as the apple of your eye, and which really is the rock upon which our political edifice rests, the durability of representative government, bids fair to be sooner or later drawn into question on solid grounds. The collision between the forces of associated capital and those of associated labor is likely to make itself felt throughout the wide extent of human civilization.—Charles Francis Adams.

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— April And May, 1884 —