The Dominion. SATURDAY, MAY 14. 1910. A REMARKABLE PERSONALITY

Dominion, Volume 3, Issue 817, 14 May 1910, Page 4

The Dominion. SATURDAY, MAY 14. 1910. A REMARKABLE PERSONALITY

Mb. Roosevelt is again m the public eye. The attention of the world cannot long withdraw itself from him. Wo all scanned our papers for news of him''while he was buried in the wilds of Africa, and the moment he broke cover he became the popular topic that has been his normal condition ever since he succeeded to the place of Mr. M'Kinlet. He .reached Egypt only to become something like a national issue. His approach to Germany was heralded by hostile warnings to him in the German press not to meddle with tie affairs of the' na-

tions. And now ho is being attacked by the Berlin Post and other journals with an hysterical venom that sets him, a private person, oh the level of King 3 and Emperors. Finally, the United States Government, apparently as a matter of course, has deputed him to represent his country at the funeral of King Edward. It must be remembered that the President of the United States, when ho lays down his office, becomes at once nothing more than one of the ninety million citizens whom he formerly governed. That, oven in this private status, Mb. Roosevelt still holds the popular imagination as a sort of superman, hardly inferior in his citizenship to the Sovereign Rulers in their majesty, is surely an l unexampled tribute to his greatness. We need'hot wonder that in America they, are talking of another Roosevelt Presidency. Although he stated that no attention should be paid to any reported interviews with him during

his European tour, there will be a i general belief in the genuineness of i the statement by Ranter's Rome cor- 1 respondent that he will seek a third i term as President. \ There are few men who have lived : a fuller life than Ml Roosevelt. : In every region of activity which he ; has entered he has cut a large fig- : ure—in politics, in journalism, in war, in Bport, and, as an American : friend adds, in being photographed. < His mariner has often, as the angry German papers declare, been very loud, but it has been the loudness of a vigorous personality that could not deaden the echoes of its workAs President of America he was untiring in calling, or, if one prefers it, in bawling attention to the fundamental issues before society. Yet ho was able, at the same time to keep a fatherly eye upon the world beyond the scope of the Monhoe Doctrine. His speciality, it has been said, is that of diagnosing the ills of nations and classes, and proscribing the appropriate remedy, and to this business he has brought an extraordinary equipment _ of rapid insight-and wide_ generalisation. No greater compliment to his power and weight can imagined than the solemn sincerity with which tho most weighty _ personages and newspapers have discussed the question of how best to turn to the world's advantage his post-Presiden-tial leisure. Tho London Spectator, some eighteen months ago, objected to his burial as associate-editor of the New York Outlook. In relegating him to tho ranks, the argument ran, America was losing a great asset. She should take advantago of his peculiar acquaintance with the problems of government. "He has acquired the habit," Baid the Spectator, "of treating great affairß in a largo spirit, and ho is not befogged by any complexity of detail. He is a true expert in statesmanship, and as such should be kept always on call." It was therefore suggested that ho should bo placed on halfpay and kept available "for arbitrations, homo or foreign, special commissions, confidential inquiries, or any other delicate and responsible non-party work which tho Executive may desire to trust to a man of ■ apodal authority, and Qsporionco."

The Chinese Government was recently considering the offer to him of the post of Adviser-General to the Chinese Empire. The New York Independent a few weeks ago urged that he should be made chairman of the American delegation to the coming Pan-American Conference in Buenos Ayres, and America's representative at Tho Hague Conference in 1915. Nowadays Americans are inclined to think very much of Emerson's dictum that "history _ is nothing but the record of the decline of war," and it is a very general opinion that if Me. Roosevelt could only be given scope'enough he would do what everyone else has failed to do. Americans believe that he could do more for the- establishment of arbitration as a means of settling international disputes than any number of living monarchs or peace experts. In his great work on The American Commonwealth, the Hon. James Beyce has a- chapter in discussion of the reason why "great men" are not chosen to fill the Presidency, "the greatest office in tho world, unless we except the Papacy." Sinco the days of Jefferson, Madisoh, and Adams, Mb. Beycb pointed out, only Graht and Lincoln displayed great and striking qualities. He gave various very good reasons in support of his theory that great men were not the rule in the Presidential chair, one of which was that "the methods and habits _of Congress, and indeed of political life generally, give fewer opportunities for personal distinction, fewer modes in which a man may commend himself to < his conntrymen_ by eminent capacity in thought, in speech, or in administration,, than _is % the case in tho free 'countries of Europo." It is no impugnment of Me. Bryce's generalisation, but «mply a testimony to the greatnesß of Me. Roosevelt, that the ex-Pre-sident has shown that the supreme office can bo brilliantly filled by the right man. Many .'people predicted that when he retired he would soon be forgotten, but bis own country and the outside world refuse to forget him. They refuse to give up watching him. They refuse to believe that he will not again play a great part in the history of the United States. The Republican party in America, which is just, now sadly weakened by a split between its' Conservative and Radical wings, must be pining for its strong man. Everything points to his repossession of tho office which, fn his two terms, to/ quote the London Times of a year back, he made "much more conspicuous, much more interesting, much more impressive in its influence on the world's affairs than any of his predecessors except the few who are already recognised and canonised by the world as great."