Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1858-12-02
True Distinctions Of Society.

| VIC GILL ourselves repuollcanS---lS the tiue
nothing but an empty name? We talk of
equal rights, but after all estimate our ac-
quaintanoes by the streets they live in, the
hats and bonnets they wear, the pretensions
they make--the salaries they receive.
But" cries Mrs. Dash, her gay ribbons
Autterlng, IAN to put myself on a par
with my servants 2"
Not by any means, dear madam--though
it nay be your servants qualifications and
nobler essences of womanhood surpass your
own-but fear not. Your servant does not
pass all her time in the Kitchen. She some
times steps over the threshold Of your parlor
she sees your petty moneuyreipgs with
the guests you profess to meet heartily, but
load with abuse the instant they are gone.
She sees you at your table, and hears your
scandal gossip; she plunges deeper than mere
fashionable surface that meets the eyes Of
your acquaintance, and it is questionable, if
she be honest hearted, whether she would,
often, put heraef on par with the woman
she calls mistress
but there must be distinctions" cries
little Miss Pussy, sharply twitching apart the
strings of her reticule.
There are distinctions, and often very I'M
reasonable ones. You, dear readers, who do
us the honor to peruse what we have written,
can cast your minds eye on some poor, gifted
persons you have known in times past, with
the conscious and blushing reflection that you
would not like to meet them in the streets with
Their shabby clothes nor in brilliant assem-
blage with their awkward manners If to-
morrow those same poor but honest" etc.,
etc., were to come into possession of good
round million, and buy new clothes, would
not the blush Of modification change to one
of delight? Would you not with eagerness
60 to their new " stone 'front.'" whereas now
you cannot be induced to visit them in the
narrow street and the mean looking house?
Would you not proudly and eagerly speak Of
their near friendship or kin, while now you
would not like it to be known in certain cir
Giles that you had ever heard Of such people |?
Would their moral character, their mental
calibre, their social tastes undergo any mark
ed change? Not at all the solid difference
and merit would consist in their possession of
money, money-the god of this world-the
monster that avarice and cupidity, and crime
worship with slavish rites.
| And what distinction is that? The man
may be everything but an accounted murder
er; he may pull old men by their boards and
pour coarse fattery into the ears of the
shrinking and sensitive; he may have grown
grey under the dominion of his base passions
and foul with the opportunities of unbridled
license he may have dc6ed heaven with
disappearing tongue, and dishonored the dead
bones of his kindred he may have led life
of unblushing infamy, so that he sickons the
sweet air about him yet to know him is an
honor, forsooth. To receive bow from his
iniquitous head is pleasurable event to be
pondered over. To shake his pulled and pur-
Piled fpgers-to be complimented by his sen.
sual and degraded lips, is a joy quite Aatter-
ing, because the man is rich
And thus through the different strata of
society, runs this strange distinction-fainicr
only as it nears the foundation--blotting the
marble and disfguring the clay.
Distinctions there must be, We will allow.
The ignorant and vulgar cannot find pleasure,
accommodate their coarse tastes to those of
the refined and intellectual Vice cannot
raise itself to the level of virtue-mean-
choly cannot abide the sunshine of merry
heart, and the misanthropic shuns his social
kind. These never will, never can mingle,
! i l = 4 L. L..
not say to the foot, have no need of ,hee;
neither the body to the hand, have no need
of thee-so in the social frame, one fraction
has not the moral nor intellectual RIG hit to as
sumo the privilege of cutting off and totally
overlooking any member of the human fami-
ly. Those we cannot assimi.ate with, we
have no right to scorn; those who are cast
beyond our sympathies, by moral misdemean-
ors, We have no right to despise, and those
who by mere accident of birth Or position are
not lin those respects, merely our equals
is the height and depth of meanness, the
quintesscence of all niggardly attributes to
treat with superciliousness and scorn.
God looketh not thus upon his creatures.
What a thought that in His estimation riches,
wealth, honors, weigh not the thousandtE part
of grain of sand! How strange that even
the poor but Christian bod carrier--the pure
hearted wash-woman, may be preferred in
heaven over the man who has ruled nations
over the woman whom fashion and power
have made great in the worlds blinded eyes
Strange to our warped and twisted prejudices
but no less strange than true; for, God re-
gardeth not the outward man. With Hin
human distinctions go for nothing
aThe heart-the true and loyal heart!"
Our great ruler and our omnipotent kim
looks only at that.