Another journalist, David Lawrence, has written what he calls The True Story of Woodrow Wilson. Either the adjective should have been deleted from that title, or the indefinite article should have been substituted for the definite.
Mr. Lawrence was the correspondent of the Associated Press at Princeton from 1906 to 1910, the closing years of Wilson’s pedagogical life and the opening years of his political career. For the past fifteen years, he has done journalistic work in Washington which has brought him in close contact with the pattern makers of our national destiny. He has had therefore unusual opportunity to observe, and he is a trained and trusted interpreter of events. Small wonder that his book is readable, interesting and instructive. Were he as trustworthy an interpreter of souls as he is of events, his book would deserve high rating.
The satisfactory life of Wilson must be written from his letters, messages, memoranda and books after the disappearance of the emotional states engendered by his presence and personality, which are prejudicial to correct estimation and inimical to sound judgment. Such states of popular feeling never disappear in one generation. It is only now that we begin to realise the majesty of Lincoln’s mind, the harmony of his soul.
Mr. Lawrence’s opening sentence is “Woodrow Wilson died as he lived—unexplained and unrevealed.” He was more “explained” than any man of his time, and neither Mr. Baruch nor Mr. Bridges would, I fancy, admit that he was unrevealed. He may have been improperly explained, and insufficiently revealed, but there are thousands who saw and met him who will not believe it.
Mr. Lawrence states that his purpose was to put on record a dispassionate narrative of the man who, equipped only with the qualities of personal magnetism and intellectual power, made the unparalleled ascent from College Professor to Moral Leader of the world. Every unprejudiced reader must admit that success crowned his effort.
When Admiral Grayson shall publish his diary; when the archives of Colonel House’s mind are accessible; when all Walter Page’s letters are available, and when Mr. Robert Bridges, Mr. Norman Davis, and Mr. Bernard Baruch shall testify the qualities that the world denied him—qualities of heart—we shall be in position to estimate Woodrow Wilson and to assess his career. Had Mr. William Jennings Bryan shifted the focus of his mind from fundamentalism to fact, and told us of his intimacy with Woodrow Wilson, it would have served a useful purpose.
It was said of Brigham Young that he was a Cromwell in daring, a Machiavelli in intrigue, a Moses in executive force, and a Bonaparte in ruthlessness and unscrupulousness; and William H. Seward said that America has produced few greater statesmen. These testimonials and the universal admission that he gave Mormonism whatever permanency it has, and that he was the parent of its material prosperity prove that he was a man of uncommon personality.
Personality analysis and portrayal are the Elysian field of the biographer. Here is a man who was to the system of polytheism called Mormonism what Paul was to Christianity: preacher, organiser, administrator. A farmer lad without background or education, he supported himself by painting and glazing until he undertook the dissemination and direction of the doctrines revealed by God to Joseph Smith, Jr., who devoted all the succeeding days of his life, until his neighbours killed him, to their promulgation. Religion took the place of education in Brigham Young and aroused his latent qualities and power. It led him to the Governorship of Utah and to the Presidency of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints; and before he died nearly a half a million people were convinced that he, like Christ and Mohammed, partook of divinity.
He has only recently been called to his reward; fifty years ago, he was a power in the land; for more than a quarter of a century every word that he said that was fit to print was printed and archived; his life is thoroughly documented. He should be a fascinating subject for a biographer. It would be fulsome praise to say that M. R. Werner has written a satisfactory or a successful biography of him. It reveals neither diligent research nor careful reflection; it is neither skilfully composed nor effectively told; there is scant evidence in it that the most important source of such a biography, The Journal of Discourses, has been deeply studied or adequately transcribed. But its most serious shortcoming as a biography is a possession, not a lack, and that possession is the engulfing, overwhelming background. Mr. Werner says it is impossible to write the life of Brigham Young without also writing the history of Mormonism, and it is impossible to write the history of Mormonism without writing the life of Joseph Smith, Jr. I fancy few will agree with him. I should go so far even as to say that no one can write the history of Mormonism and the lives of its author and proprietor and of its administrator and perpetuator, simultaneously. To do the first of these alone would be an interminable task. It would require a discussion of the religious instinct, explaining why this instinct is so rarely appeased by what the wisdom of God and the ingenuity of man have to offer. And a detailed, specific statement of the system of polytheism which the Book of Mormon professes to teach and the Book of Doctrine seeks to justify, would require examination of the status of prophecy, of miracles, of the imminent approach of the end of the world, of personal contact with God through sight or hearing at the present day, of liberty of private judgment in religious matter, and of scores of other tenets of the Mormon creed. Moreover, it would require an explicit statement of the Mormon hierarchy, an extremely complicated structure, and a summary of the Mormon’s form of government. No biographer, however facile, could interpret Joseph Smith, Jr., who is not familiar with the psychopathology and experienced in the ways of the psychic deviate. Concerning Mr. Werner’s apology regarding the necessary scope of this book, it would be just as legitimate to say that the life of Francis of Assisi could not be written without writing at the same time the history of the Catholic Church and the story of the life of Ignatius Loyola.