Clarksville weekly chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1873-1890, 1873-04-05
From the Ladies' Pearl.
~, ECCE CUSTOS.
THE s25 PRIZE ARTICLE.

4 A -iH
/ To say that the age, in which W
| live, is peculiar, is to utter q trusim
| for all ages are peculiar. History re
! cords no two situations in the affair
| of men precisely similar. There ha
been an s1ron Age.'r There is t
be Golden Age.u There is now
"Mercurial Age" 1t is sprightly
tickle, money-making and crafty. :
/ 1t is q material rather than a sestheti,
age; practical rather than abstract
analytic and formative rather thar
conservative. Money rules intellect
The flesh rules the spirit. Ambition
rules conscience. The Present despi
ses the Past, and aims TO rule the Flu
ture. We Americans of the age
are particularly wise in our own con.
ceit. We may be unusually inteili
gent. 1t would be false to say that
we are remarkably ignorant. But,
however Intelligent we may be, we
must as people be more intelligent,
and more enere etic in theu of oul
intelligence, before the perpetuity oI
our Republic is assured. This will be
shown that we are at this moment
threatened by dangers, which public
opinion treats with contempt or in
difference, a spirit, in which no ques-
ton which may effect the public
veal, is ever treated by thoroughly
intelligent governing power. -
The class of dangers most to be
dreaded, because eactuallyleast dread
ed are those which are concealed.
OF this class, certain formidable mo-
nopolies, the constantly swelling
freshets of foreign immigration, and
the woman suffrage agitation may
serve as examples. Without assert
ing that there II not another side to
these questions, L shall discuss only
the side of danger. ~ % 73eH 80
We Americans are proud of our
great monopolies, especially those
which are spanning our continent
with the iron girdle of trade. They
are the products and types of our
wonderful material prosperity. They
reveal the onward march of ciyiliza-
tioE. Our very pride in them and in
their achievements blinds US to the
fact that like all the representatives
of civilization they carry with them,
seeds of evil. The natural product Of
powerful monopolies is an aristocrat-
ic despotism. They already can and
do control, and often corrupt our leg
islatures; they dictate our laws, they
appropropriate the fruits of our in
dustry. They are quietly forming in
the midst Of us irresistible cOmbina-
tions, an inaperiun, in in,perio. In
time they will dictate its financial
policy to the government. AS a
child with advancing years will dis
card his baby toys, substituting for
the peg-top the football, so these
growing monopolies, when more ma
ture will despise their present play
things, will no longer spin individual
State Legislatures, but initiate and
drive our National Legislatures at
will. Unless the public is aroused to
a defense of its rights, battle and
the loss of liberty is certain. 1t will |
be capital against numbers. The |
against the people. If !
the guiding principle of the combina-
tons was unmixed virtue, they would |
yet be dangerous as enemies to the /
principles of Republic
But they are not nourished or even |
by virtue. They do not |
grasp at power for the sake of promot- |
ing the universal good. Capital ac-
luired and welded dishonesty, will |
become the most unmanageable of |
lespots. We have already natural /
zed the term railway kingn in our
We are rapidly con-
8tructing a railway kingdom" in So
Der earnest. If our money is liquifi-
ID into mythical railroad stocks, or
ives sacrificed to the God Manimon,
yet up by some reckless railway king
% preside over lightning trains, sped /
lpOn shaking bridges and spreading
racks, we must blame none but our.
elves. We could have foreseen the.
LANCER, and armed ourselves against
t.
The public refuses to grapple with
his complicated question, even our
legislatures decline to attempt a So
ution of the problem. Their timid
ction and the perplexity of the pub
ic mind constitute the first proof of
he assertion l desire to make, that
,ublic opinion in our country needs
N infusion, both of intelligence and
ourage. r
Under the nom de oestme of reform,
here is growing almost unheeded
mong US danger, which men laugh
t, but rarely dread-the Woman
outrage agitation. Sensible men
nd sensible women smile at the hys-
arical wailings of these croaking re-
a l.
utions will move on as serenely amid
heir chattering as did the moon, at
'hich the celebrated canine agitator
arked. Yet like painted braves
nese innovators braDdish the hatch
t and dance around US with the start
ng war-cry, "Woman is wronged.n
forsooth, because she is not /;
by the law of nature or of
ian to occupy two places, or to be |
Yo persons at the same time. Sup r
ose, that man should start out to- :
borrow with an eloquent lecture, :
that he was refused adj !,
lission to first-class female semi
ary, that the lucrative office of nur-
,ry maid was denied him by emil
emily respectable and philanthropic
.milies, that bis demand for the po-
tion of wife and mother in some
ristocratic household was ridiculed )
Y the community at large, that men .
fused to do homage to his celestial :
eauty, that women refused to cher a
h him as a sister, that he was in !
tort treated with no more reverence
ian mere man, that the heaven !
Drn and carefully guarded preroga- .
YES of women, were superciliously !
enied him by general consent? !
Would you dub him hero or a fool? 2
Would you hail him as sagacious !
nd unselfish reformer, or would you ;
leer at him as lunatic? Without !
pplying these epithets to the agita- ;
,rs in question, am simply medi- :
ting on the effects of counter ,
which may serve as an !;
Iustration of the sensible axiom, 4
lat man is not woman, nor woman !
ian, that the wrongs ofwomau con-
st of the lamentabie fact that she :
.nnot be man and woman at the :
Lme time.
No, it is not, because American !
omen are wrnnged, but because pro- J
reformers and sensational .
IS are out of employment that this :
sdlam intrudes itself upon our do ;
Iestic peace. tits not, because we Z
eed woman suffrage, but because :
lese winsome lecturers need money .
nd political capital. Say you that :
lere is no danger to be apprehended :
om these plausible and ambitious :
who are preaching revolu- :
onary doctrines to promote theirpr !
ate ends. Is there no danger that :
ley may succeed in substituting as )
basis of government, the unit of
lie individual, for the unit of the i
pnilyo