Heroism in the Philippines.
Here is a quotation from The Mindanao Herald, which is worth printing in large letters in every American newspaper, and placing before the children on the walls of every American schoolroom, and reading from the pulpit in every American church:
"The action of the Magay Moros who put out to Santa Cruz with cholera aboard rather than take chances on infecting this city should be published to every native on the island with suitable appreciation of the high-minded and heroic conduct of these men. To steer directly away from their homes and friends and from medical aid with their dead lying in their boats, for the sake of the city, reveals a measure of heroic self-sacrifice than which the most enlightened people can boast of no greater. These men should be given gold medals lettered in their own language that their fellows may know the esteem in which we hold such conduct. This episode furnishes an eloquent comment on the work of instruction that has been going on since the epidemic of 1902."
The Filipinos are not yet American citizens; but if such conduct, or the possibility of such conduct, is at all typical of them, they deserve that citizenship and would honor it. The forgetting of self, and the manly devotion to the welfare of others—of one's city, one's State, and one's nation—it is this that qualifies a man for true citizenship in a republic. Without this capacity and exhibition of self-sacrifice a man is no true citizen, though he pays taxes on ten million dollars' worth of property, can read five languages, and stands at the head of the political machine in his State. Those Filipinos in totally disregarding themselves for the sake of their city were American citizens of whom all America should be proud.