and Atlanta educated pastors and teachers.

"The pen is mightier than the sword." It would have seemed idle to
have said this at the mouth of the mountain pass at Thermopylae with
Leonidas and his immortal Spartan heroes all lying dead amid the wreck
made by the mighty host of Xerxes. A century afterward, at Cannae, one
sixth of the whole population of Rome lay dead on the battlefield by
the sword thrust. Where was the might of the pen to compare with this?
The might of the sword at Thermopylae, together with the concluding
events at Salamis, turned back the Persian hordes and thereby saved
the Greek civilization for Europe. Again, after the blood of Cannae, at
Zama, Hannibal was utterly broken and Carthage, with her attending
civilization, was doomed to everlasting death, while Rome, her mighty
adversary, with her eagles and short sword, carried her dominion and
her splendid civilization from England to India. One more great
movement in the world illustrating the power of the sword is too
tempting to pass by in this connection. From the deserts of Arabia a
fanatical dreamer came forth claiming a new revelation from God and as
a chosen prophet to give the world a new religion. His pretentions at
first caused his expulsion from Mecca, together with a small and
insignificant band of followers. Yet because of these it was not long
until there came from out the desert the sound of the marching of a
mighty host, heralding the approach of the Arab, the despising and
despised. Before these barbarous hordes the principalities of the East
were doomed to crumble and yield up their accumulated treasures of the
ages, and so triumphant were these invaders from the desert they
decided to appropriate for themselves the whole world, and from this
they were not _dissuaded_ until Charles Martel sent them back from
Tours and out of Europe, together with their hateful civilization. So
it would seem from these and all other mighty movements of races and
tribes, men and nations, the sword has ever been the arbiter. Yet over
all the mighty sweep of events and the _stupendous_ results of the
sword-thrust throughout the ages, comes this insinuating claim, "The
pen is mightier than the sword." And when we consider the whole of
accumulated philosophy, the onward march of science and human thought,
and the consequent development of the human race, the comparative
might of the sword becomes insignificant before the less demonstrative
power of