The daily press. (Cincinnati [Ohio) 1859-1859, 1859-05-16
" In Adams fall
We sinned, ALL"

"In Adams fall
We sinned, all,
and who, therefore, looks upon every man
woman and child as proper subject for
the saving influences of a reformatory in
stitution, appeared Saturday in nice new
leader in favor Of an 1nebriate Asylum" "
The argument, in brief, amounts to this :
There are SO many drunken men, so many
drunken women, and SO many drunken
children in the world; by means of proper
institutions they can be reformed; there
fore such institutions should be provided
at the public expense. The argument is
taking one both broad and easy, and
general By it we can prove great va
riety of important propositions, and set
government up in a very extensive line Of
business. 20.
Let US give another example: All men,
women and children are in the gall of
bitterness and under the bondage Of in
iquity -" liable" according to the West
minister Catechism, ITO all the miseries Of
this life, the wrath of God, and the pains
of hell forever" By means of proper
outlay in churches, preaching, psalm-sing-
ing and exhortation, they can be relieved
from this parlous condition; therefore it
is the duty of the government to provide
suficiency of these reformatory instru-
mentalitieB.
There is Just rs much sense in the one
application as in the other. Everybody
is bad 10 the proof of which see the
aforesaid catechism. The difference be-
tween one and another is in degree and
not in kind. The chances to reform the
moderately bad are much greater than to
reform the very bad. Let us therefore
save those who have lapsed but a little
ways, and shut up first the least contami
mated. When they are set perfectly right
we can try it on the others.
1t would be interesting to see an exper
iment, say upon dozen Third-street
bankers, q dozen Pearlstreet jobbers, o
dozen Fourth-street or Fifth-street retail.
ers. This having terminated satisfacto-
rily, we might extend the process into the
regions of the foundry and the pork mar
ket, and, at length to Baker street and the
boulevard de sausage. o, you sinners
youl There shall be institutions for you
all; and when you are oil confned-each
in his or her proper asylum, then will the
millennium arrive.
The moral robustitude that is the pro-
duct of the institutional process, is simi
lar to vital strength Of the vegetation that
grows up in darkness and confinement
that is to say, it is worthless. If there
could be pointed out one human being in
the world who had been wholesomely and
permanently made better by such estab-
lishments, there might be some real en-
couragement to the outlay; but there is
no such case. The processes pursued ore
not, in their character reformatory, and
therefore never were efficacious, and never
will be-
We are conscious that in saying this
we are flying in the face of notions which
the non-thinking that is to say, the
largest-portion of mankind regard to b.
not only true, but religiously SO. Mucf
of our penal legislation, and our institu
tions, educational, reformatory and puni
tory are founded upon the idea that mel
may be made moral by coercion that
person can be put upon the right tracl
and held there for space of time b
force, he will, when let go, by the powe
of habit, continue to run in the same d
rection. The theory is sublime but tn
facts are stubborn, and will not bend t
its demands. Habits can not be taugh
by constraint; nor is morality thing {
custom. Nature and will copspire to cor
stitute the virtuous in human conduc
and neither Of these can be cultivated b
constraint- taught dogmatically.
a..A