The Orangeburg news. [volume] (Orangeburg, S.C.) 1867-1875, 1871-10-28
4 Terrlblel Retribution.

i,,fi sSrsgTin ~ eno " esty ID now heap OF
mouldeTing ruins, Perhaps no city on
the American continent was 80 devoid
/. Of high-toned society, and so given to
immortality as the once proud city of
Chicago. The character of its people,
H We are to judge from the the popular
verdict, was very loose, and posse. .sed
ae'one trait to commend it to the respect
and confidence of an; enlightened public
/. sentiment. Men and women there weso
truly actors and actresses on one vast
stage of proaigacy and extrayagance.
..,lRae Religion was a mockary with them, and
every iustinctof morality was tost in tho
u, great whirlpool of social reckiessuess
!apd tnrpitude; it was modern Sodom
and Gomorrah, and truly 1t mas met the
;, A.e of its ancient prototype.
Tho magnitude of the evils which af-
aieted that city, can never be- properly
estimated until tho full measure Of its
Hickedness is brought to light; aud no
human can tell the utter absence of NOR
atty from its habits and customs until
,tthe whole truth Is known. We have
been accustomed to'regard that city, in
o, social sad moral point Of view, as
stigma upon, all the teachers of that
good Book, which foretold long years
ago. its destruction, and the destruction
ofall it's like and kind. The marriage
tie, the most sacred of all human obli.
cations, was no more regarded in Chi
cago than the demoniac walls of . forest
brute, or the wild sobs of a Gagged lioness
The men were, almost without exception,
ahiass of libertines, and the women in
the same proportion, a bcvy of fashion
able poems, whose careers were as furious
and aimsy as the pesrolenses Of Paris.
There were good men and women in
Chicago; but their examples and infu.
uences amounted to nothing. They
.leould no more arrest the mad tide Of
fashion and resaaessness, than pop
gun could batter down the Chinese wall;
they were merely the few stars that
,shone forth from amidst darkness SO
terrible that its blackness makes the
heart sick at its observation, anH almost
STILES the very air we breathe Human
chastity was base mockery, and the
-tbloodSs Of Chicago assailed it with tho
the most relentless cruelty, untAit sue
lcummed beneath the wild onslaught of
tha'ganing den, the assignation house
and base lueTe-. Indeed, SO fatal to, virtue
and moralitY had that city become that
it was sought by the reckless husband
and the "indiscreet" wife as the palla-
dun oftheir domestic troubles, and ffom
its confines, have such been turned loose
upon the bottomfass sea of remorse, with
svety bic Of the heart, severed, and no
hopes Of life save as outlaws and prosti-
'tutes.' It has been scourgeG may bo
shat henceforth Chicago will learn q
esson from the terrible owls which have
brought'aBout this Christening. It were
far better that those heaps of ruins
should remain forever as they are than
that another 'sfoul clement should be
reared over them, and another. curse
risa above the destroyed monsters of
vice and population
We have thes witnessed n ore brief
year TIE destruction of the two principal
cities Of vice-Paris in the East ard
Chicago in the West-and surely if men
and women can be made any better than
they are, these awful yetributions must
NEAR something towards the accomplish
'itieht' os sos desirable triumph. We
sympathize deeply with the innocent
people Of Chicago; would to Heaven
they could have been spared; but We
shallthope that the Chicago of hereafter
will be quite an. Improvement on the
Nhioaoo that has beon