Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1879-12-28

strong cocktail to stimulate an appetite for
breakfast, and fashion requires that he
should not drink alone, but invite whoever
of his friends he may chance to meet to join
him. His courtesy is appreciated and
reciprocated, and the chances are that
gent doses of strong liquor when
he wanted but one, and would not have
needed even that if it had not become the
fashion. The same fashion is repeated day
after day-and sometimes many times dur
ing the day, and the result il headache in
the morning and necessity for another
cocktail or two. Mental, physical and finan-
cial ruin are not far off from those who have
fallen slaves to this fashion.
The fashion in amusements is becoming
most pronounced of late. A certain class
regard the German as the correct thing, with
an occasional indulgence in the opera. In
st. Paul especially has the opera become
fashionable. No matter how lacking in
merit company may be, it is certain to be
greeted with crowded houses provided it is
fashionable. There is another set that seems
to think that negro minstrelsy is just the
thing, and pack the houses night after night
to listen to and applaud the stale jokes and
the everlastingly stupid songs and dances
of the burnt cork artists. There are. others
who affect literary and dramatic entertain
ments, but in St. Paul this class is so insig-
nifcant as to dissipate any hope or prospect
a truly excellent company may have of pay
ing for their gas bills.
There is fashion in religion that per-
vades thousands of our people. Their choice
of church depends upon what quality of
clothes they can afford to wear. If they can
dress richly, the most fashionable churches
may be sure of their attendance; if they are
in moderate circumstances they go to a
church that makes less pretense of display;
if they are poor, they seek out the humblest
church or else stay at home.
If one doubts that there is fashion in
reading let him visit the public library and
examine the condition of the books upon its
shelves. He will find the trashy works of
Mrs. Holmes, Miss Braddon, Ouida. and
others of like character, we'll thumbed and
worn, with frequent penciled annotations on
| the margin expressive of the delight of
readers at some peculiarly sickly senti-
ment. He will find the standard novels
of Dickens, Thackeray, Fseade and
Collins but little used, while the works OF
Carlyle, Tyndall, Spencer and others are as
clean as when they first came from the
hands Of the bookmakers save for the ac-
emulation of dust that has enveloped them
through long years of waiting on the
shelves. This fashion is not ono that fills
one with hope for the mental superiority OF
the rising generation, yet it is the fashion
for people to read the most silly grade Of
novels rather than that pabulum that might
fit them for the several duties of life.
And so it goes. We are slaves to fashion
in almost every detail of life. Fashion die
tates what we shall eat, drink and wear
what religion we shall embrace, what class
| of amusenents shall indulge in, anc
what books we shall read. While some O.
these fashions are comparatively harmless
others are productive of physical distress
mental incapacity and moral ruin. It wculi
be we'll for moral philosophers to conside,
this question Of fashions little more Sc
riously than it has yet been considered, anG
devise remedies for those habits that ar,
proved to be injurious.