The Ibero-American race should seek to correct its vices without forsaking the framework of tradition which is proper to it. Without losing its originality as a nation, France is to-day triumphant in many departments of sport, and is spending her energy and inventive genius upon the conquest of the air without counting the cost; she has made her own victories which seemed to belong to the Anglo-Saxon. At the same time, if the American democracies are to acquire a practical spirit, a persistent activity, and a virile energy, they must do so without renouncing their language, their religion, and their history.
The defence of the Latin spirit has become a duty of primordial importance. Barrès, an impassioned ideologist, preaches the cult of self as a remedy for barbarism; no foreign tutelage must trouble the spontaneous internal revelation. The republics oversea, wending their way under hostile or indifferent eyes, _sous l'oeil des Barbares_, must cultivate their spiritual originality in the encounter with inimical forces.
The North American peril, the threat of Germany, the menace of Japan, surround the future of Latin America like those mysterious forces which, in the drama of Maeterlinck, dominate the human stage, and in silence prepare the way for the great human tragedies. To defend the traditions of the Latin continent, it is useful to measure the importance of the influences which threaten it.
German Imperialism and the Monroe doctrine--_Das Deutschtum_ and Southern Brazil--What the Brazilians think about it.
The Teutonic invasion is troubling our Ibero-American writers. The tutelary protection of the United States does not suffice to make them forget the European peril; memories of the Holy Alliance, of that crusade of religious absolutism and reconquest, are still lively in Latin America.
Three great nations--England, France, Germany--aspired to establish their supremacy oversea in a lasting manner. England, a colonising power in all parts of the world, thought to rule at Buenos-Ayres; the defence of that Spanish city by the Viceroy Liniers was, says Onésime Reclus, the Latin revenge for the taking of Quebec. France attacked Mexico, and forced a monarch upon her; England and a French monarch sent expeditions against the nationalist dictator Rosas, and Lord Salisbury, in a diplomatic duel with the North American Secretary of State, Mr. Olney, attempted to ignore the tutelary significance of the Monroe doctrine.