The Emporia news. [volume] (Emporia, Kan.) 1859-1881, 1874-06-05
TIE MORAL POWER OF WOMEN

has more nObly illustrated the
moral power of women, than the
past and current crusade agains
the vice of drinking, and the traf
fic upon which it feeds. The ex
hibition and demonstration o.
this power arc SO full of sugges
ton and instruction, both to mer
and women, that they demand
more than passing consideration,
especially in their bearing upon
some of the most stirring ques,
tions of the time.
Why is it that the hardened
rum-seller who, behind his bar,
has dealt ont the liquid death to
his victims for years, quails before
band Of praying, beseeching
women-women who, coming from
their comfortable retirement,
brave wind and storm and LIud-
brave obloquy and misreprcsenta-
tions and curses, and all the harsh
obstacles that brutality can throw
in their path, to compass a reform
that shall keep their natural sup
porters andS protectors pure and
prosperous? Why is it that men
looking on form new resolutions
of sobriety, and reform the vicious
habits of their lives? Why is it
that changes which involve the
destruction of brutal business,
and of habits to which hundreds
of thousands are welded with all
the power of burning appetite,
awake no more violence than they
doI Why is it that SO many good
men, whose souls protest against
the sacrifice of ease and privacy
which these women make, bow to
the movement as something su-
premely Christian, and, therefore,
veritably divine?
First, of course, because there
is no man, however brutal, who
does not know that the women are
right-that whisky is Q curse, not
only to those who drink it, but to
the unof'ending who do not drink
it. Every man feels that the &C
ton of the women is an embodi-
ment and expression of the die
tates of his own conscience. APP
preached in a way which disarms
all violent opposition. with an ap-
peal to God and to all the manli-
ness which he possesses, the vilest
pandeier to the debased appetite
trembles not only before the pure
embodied conscience without, but
before the answering conscience
within. He hears Gods voice in
the souls which approach him, and
the same voice in his own soul.
There is something terrible in
this. A mob which would tear
his house down, q descent of the
officers of the law, the threats of
outraged fathers and brothers,
would only stimulate his opposi-
ton, and give him an apology for
continuing his crime; but this
quiet appeal to his conscience, by
those whose consciences he knows
to be pure, is awful to him.
Second, the mind of man is so
constituted as to- feel most sensi-
lively the praise and the blame of
women. 1t Is hard for any man
to feel that he rests under the
censuIe of all the good women by
whom lie is surrounded. The
harshest words that have been
spoken against the crusaders have
been spoken by the women whom
they have found behind the bars
they have visited; and these poor
creatures were speaking to win
the approval OF the brutal men
they loved. A man who has not
some woman, somewhere, who be-
lievcs in him, trusts him and loves
him, has reached n point where
self-respect is gone. All men,
who deserve the name of men, de-
sire the respect of women; and
when man finds himself in 4
business which fixes upon him the
disapproval of a whole community
of women, a power is brought to
bear upon him which he certainly
cannot ignore, and which he finds
it difficult to resist. The power
of woman, simply as woman, has
had too many illustrations in his
tory TO need further discussion
here. A mans self-respect can
only be nursed to its best estate
in the approval of the finer sense
and quicker conscience of the
women who know him.
The third reason is that the end
which these women seek is purely
and beneficently 4 moral one.
They are not after money, they do
not pursue revenge, they do not
seek political power or preferment,
they work in the interest of NO
party. All they desire, and all
they labor for, is the reform and
safety of their husbands, brothers
fathers and sons, and the eXtinc
ton of those temptations anG
sources of temptation which en-
danger them. They bear no il
will to the ram-scllcr, but tho
moment he relinquishes his traffic
they cover him with their kind
ness and sympathy. They mo-
only do not have the sympathy o
party men, as such, but they are
denied the sympathy of portions
of the Christian Church. They
pursue 4 much desired moral enc
by purely moral means. Thel
seek nothing for themselves, bu
everything for the men they love
and for the men that other womer
love. The clement of self-sacri
flee is in it all. They 60 from
peaceful home pursuits, from tn
retirement which is most con
genial to them, from prayer
where they have begged for tn
blessing of heaven upon their en-
terprise, into the street, into fou
dens of debauchery, into privat
expostulations with brutal mel
. into atmospheres reeking wit
ribaldry, and all to save Others
No man with a spark of manlines
in him-which, after all, is onl
r goodness expressed in huma
, character-can regard such a spec
, tacle without being moved to aC
miratioA and reverence.-Dr. j. {
: Holland, in Scribner's Month
? for June.
|. NECESSARY UNlTY.-To be 4 G
f MUS, one must also be a lahore
;. Alexander Hamilton once said
/. an intimate friend: "Men Gil
# me some credit for genius. A
o the genius that 1 have lies just
i this, when l have a subject
d hand, / study 1t profoundly. d.
Y and night it is before me. l c
: plore it in all its bearings. \
q mind becomes perYaded with