The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas et Prevalebit. MONDAY, MAY 11, 1885. Dynamite.

Ashburton Guardian, Volume V, Issue 1537, 11 May 1885, Page 2

The Ashburton Guardian. Magna Est Veritas et Prevalebit. MONDAY, MAY 11, 1885. Dynamite.

The word dynamite has been staring us in the face to a greater or less extent for some years past, and the feeling which it conveys varies in different minds according as it has been regarded and understood by those who have noticed its use. There is one very hopeful and satisfactory view to take of the dynamite question as an element of warfare. If we go back a few hundred or a few thousand years, we will come to the time when people fought with clubs and spears, and other primitive instruments. Fighting was not a very serious business then, as people could be produced much, faster than they could be destroyed. Fighting was such slow business that the people had to devote nearly all their time to it, and there was none left for pursuing the arts of peace. There was no opportunity for the development of great inventors or great merchants or intelligent professional men. The profession then was one of muscle. The man who could wield the largest club or throw a spear the | farthest was a brilliant man; yet he was not a very promising subject to develop the agricultural resources of a country. After a time the implements of warfare became more elaborate and more destructive, and it did not occupy the same length of time to settle a dispute. The time that was left could be employed in caring for home affairs, working in the field, fishing or some other useful occupation. Then came gunpowder, which was a great advance and did a great deal of good for the world. Under former methods physical and brute strength were always triumphant. Gunpowder was a product of. intelligence, and could be best used by intelligence. The people could go out and fight, settle their disputes, return arid go to work, while, with the more barbarous implements of the former period, every man was a warrior, and had nearly all his time occupied by martial pursuits. With the help of gunpowder it was possible for a large portion of the men to remain at home and support themselves and those engaged fighting battles. We have not yet left the gunpowder epoch. We can point to the great standing armiesof Europe, and to the large amount of unproductive labor which is absorbed in this way. We can see and realise the burden that it is upon the people to support so many drones, made so by the imperfect civilisation and imperfect methods of warfare. There is dawning ripon us the product of a higher civilisation—dynamite—a great pacifier. With dynamite a few men can do the fighting of a nation. As people realise the destructive force of this material they will be less inclined to use their time in fighting. The chances of survival in warfare will be so slight that there will be no one on either side to contest, and instead of a destructive warfare, with the completest of all destructive influences we would have a great peace. Thus we have a perfected material of warfare, as the quality which may put an end to all fighting. The commercial benefits of this condition can hardly be realised. It amounts to the removal of a great blood tax. As they exist at present in Germany and some other European States, the horrors of this tax are most apparent. The regulations as to the standing armies take the young men at a time when they might be learning to do something, and devote them to several years of idleness or warfare. In the meanwhile the fathers and those at home are struggling in poverty, for the most part, to support the army and themselves. It is this system which brings about the dreadful condition of poverty among the peasants and laboring classes of many European countries. They not only have themselves to take care of, but they have to contribute more than a share towards the support of the large standing armies. It is in the condition of general peace that we may expect the abrogation of the blood tax, and as we have seen, and as history proves, it is possible that the greatest peace may exist at the time when we have the completest elements of destruction.