I Believe The Risks I

Air Power Is New To All Our Countries. It Brings Advantages To Some And Weakens Others; It Calls For Readjustment Everywhere.

How Long Can Men Thrive Between Walls Of Brick, Walking On Asphalt Pavements, Breathing The Fumes Of Coal And Of Oil, Growing, Working, Dying, With Hardly A Thought Of Wind, And Sky, And Fields Of Grain, Seeing Only Machine-made Beauty, The Mineral-like Quality Of Life?

Democracy Can Only Spring From Within A Nation Itself, Only From The Hearts And Minds Of Its People.

What Freedom Lies In Flying, What Godlike Power It Gives To Men . . . I Lose All Consciousness In This Strong Unmortal Space Crowded With Beauty, Pierced With Danger.

By Day, Or On A Cloudless Night, A Pilot May Drink The Wine Of The Gods, But It Has An Earthly Taste; He's A God Of The Earth, Like One Of The Grecian Deities Who Lives On Worldly Mountains And Descended For Intercourse With Men. But At Night, Over A Stratus Layer, All Sense Of The Planet May Disappear. You Know That Down Below, Beneath That Heavenly Blanket Is The Earth, Factual And Hard. But It's An Intellectual Knowledge; It's A Knowledge Tucked Away In The Mind; Not A Feeling That Penetrates The Body.