Politics & Power Quote by Josiah Strong

Strong writes like a man wrapping conquest in a hymn. The sentence is a forecast dressed up as a moral inevitability: a "powerful race" will "move down" and "out" and "over", a geography of expansion rendered as natural motion, like weather. That verb choice matters. People don’t invade; they "move". Whole regions become directions on a map, not homes with histories. The rhetoric quietly evacuates agency from the victims and responsibility from the aggressor.

The tell is the question at the end. "Can any one doubt...?" isn’t an invitation to debate; it’s a pressure tactic, the genteel version of "be serious". By invoking "survival of the fittest" (a Social Darwinist slogan already circulating beyond science into politics), Strong borrows the prestige of nature to sanctify policy. If it’s survival, it can’t be theft. If it’s fitness, domination becomes proof of virtue.

Context sharpens the blade. Strong was a Protestant clergyman writing in an era when American industrial power, missionary ambition, and imperial competition were fusing into a single story about destiny. His "competition of races" frames empire as a tournament, not a choice. The spiritual subtext is especially chilling: a religious leader adopting evolutionary language to rationalize racial hierarchy, turning the Great Commission into a land-grab with a halo.

What works, rhetorically, is the seamless blend of prophecy and permission. He doesn’t merely predict expansion; he makes resistance seem futile and doubt seem foolish, laundering an imperial agenda through the calm voice of inevitability.