The weekly clarion. [volume] (Jackson, Miss.) 1863-1882, 1873-01-23
Parents and Children.

1t is one of the imperative duties of
journalism ''to point a moral when OPP
pOrtunity offers. For the wretched muir
derer of Mr.. Putnam, oppressed, as he
must be, with remorse as he sits in his
solitary cell in the Tombs, we have no
immediate feeling save that OF sorrow
that man can become murderer and
that one who has received Christian nur-
ture should be compelled to contemplate
the possibility-nay, the probability-of
the gallows as his only pathway to flu
ture existence But from the meager
history Of his life, which his crime has
made public, the youth of great city
like New \ ork may draw a striking and
useful lesson.
Who and what was William Foster :?
The son of wealthy and highly re-
spected gentleman who has been long
and worthily known to and associated
with business men Of high standing, he
at an early age, cast off with brutal in
difference those sweet maternal influences
which are all powerful for good, and in
solently emancipated himself from the
paternal yoke.
He did only what thousands Of the
lads in New York are doing at this very
day. In every phase Of life, in every
class of society one hears the impatient
cry of the father and the patient cry of
the mother and sisters What can be
done with him !? What answer DO they
receive? Bills from exhorbitant trades
men, insults from foul associates and
lewd women, misery and sorrow in their
infinite forms and shapes The father
sees the hope of his old age a roue at
sixteen-the mother sees that her tavOrlte
son is no fit future protector tor her
daughters. And such are to be the hus-
bands of our sisters-the fathers Of fu
ture citizens! What, but luck, prevents
them from being what now William Eos
ter is-the inmate of the murderers cell
At school they learn Euclid and construe
Virgil, but in their play-hOurs they chew
tobacco, swear like a carman, and not
unfrequently drink the vilest whisky
Why is this? Why should the greatest
of Gods gifts to man-his children-be
the cause of so much tribulation?
This country boasts, and justly, of her
enlightenment, her progress, and, above
all, of her educational system; and yet i'll
no country which assumes to be her peer
children from parental control permitted
at so early an age. Children from their
infancy are not sent to bed at proper
hour; in many cases fathers take the If
morning drinks in the presence OF boy
of five or six years old, and bring curse
on themselves and the boys in 50 doing.
Boys and girls are alike educated to a
love of dress, finery and extravaganza !;
they are early indoctrinated with an eX-
travagant and injudicous love for the
theatre and everything that is injurious
to their childish minds, and they grow
up TO be, what ?-the terror Of their fam
lies. The girls, at sixteen, are ON the
lookout for an eligible marriage-not
one of love, they do not know what love
| is; the boys, at eighteen, for Il iiaisol
which shall give them a certain standing
in the world of fashionable crime. What
follows? Domestic misery and divorce
in one case; faro-banks, bar-roOms, debt,
| dishonor, and crime in the other.
This is no fanciful picture; it is one,
and terrible one, Of real life. Men
and women, no matter to what class Of
society they belong, have the remedy
for this fearful evil in their own hands,
! They can, they have a right to, and they
must exercise greater and NOSE lasting
control over their children. They must
be theirs parents and guardians till they
marry or settle in life. They have the
law on their side, and, if necessary, they
must invoke it. Better little worry, a
/ little more effort, or a little more home
detention than the powerless contempla-
ton of the gradual descent of child TO
perdition