FIFTY MILLION STRONG 



to such an extent that complications follow. American diplo- 

 macy has been called " shirt-sleeve diplomacy " because its 

 chief characteristic is candor instead of intrigue. 



Candor is especially essential in all rural work, for the 

 reason that Rural America is now thoroughly awake and 

 ready for an advance along the whole front. The forces of 

 Rural America are full of vitality, energy, enthusiasm, opti- 

 mism, but progress must be slow pending the accumulation of 

 sufficient experience. So leadership has an arduous task in 

 holding in line the army of Rural America and seeing to it 

 that no step is taken and no move made for which there has 

 not been proper preparation. And this will require above 

 everything else candor. 



Dr. Henry van Dyke has expressed himself very forcefully 

 on this point : " Are we quite sure that the world needs us 

 to do this particular work which frets us so? There is such 

 a thing as taking ourselves and the world too seriously. Half 

 of the secular unrest and dismal, profane sadness of modern 

 society comes from the vain idea that every man is bound to 

 be a critic of life, and to let no day pass without rinding some 

 fault with the general order of things, or projecting some 

 plan for its improvement." The Wall Street Journal also 

 makes some interesting observations on this head. " One of 

 the things ailing this country at present is the activity in it of 

 too many people who belong to the professional uplifting 

 class. That old disciplinary order of training which aimed at 

 mental fiber, knowledge of fact and grasp of principles, has 

 given place to the study of ' problems/ and methods of in- 

 vestigating ' social conditions/ and the remedies for every sort 

 of ill man has been heir to in all the ages. The result is a 

 mass of half-baked measures in municipal, state and federal 

 legislatures. The sooner we get back to the primal fact in 

 human classification that the professional uplifter, in nine 

 cases out of ten, is a loafer, the better it will be for the heart 

 and the head as well as the purse of the country and its 

 taxpayers." 



A sixth essential of leadership is courage. One of the few 



