The Wellington enterprise. [volume] (Wellington, Ohio) 1867-188?, 1880-11-18
The same paper elsewhere remarks:
By Their Right Names.

We have nothing to retract in speaking
of Sara Bemhardt, the actress, as "that
shameless creature" If there is any one
thing more than another that makes the
English speaking world superior to other
nations, it is in the greater regard these
people have for the Christian religion,
their reverence for the Bible, and the
sacredness they attach to the marriage re-
lation. The severity Of moral statutes has
always been the annoyance of profligates;
but so much depends upon an accepted
and well adhered to high standard of mo-
rality, that no foreign innovation of loose
ness should receive encouragement here.
If New England had been peopled with
women with ideas like this French actress,
not all her talents would have made it
other than Sodom, and our country
would never have been the nation it is to-
day. We cannot compromise the sanctity
of our Sabbath by making it a day of
carousal, of Incorporate eating and drink
ing, without direct injury to the national
life; nor can we soften the rigidity of the
marriage law without endangering the
stability of that characteristic of our nation
which is its chief pride and joy-the CON-
fort and happiness of its homes, and the
purity and intelligence of its women. 1t
is either right and best to obey Gods law
or it il not. The experience of all ages
proves that il is not only almost but alto
gether best, even for secular reasons, to
fear God and keep his commandments; for
whenever men and women have made q
law unto themselves to suit their own
tickle impulses and evil propensities, the
end of 1t has been destruction of body as
well as soul, and has wrought infinite con-
fCsion and misery to others. The law of
aad opposed to human happiness, like
murder and theft. 1t is an outrage upon
the rights of child to give it life branded
with shame. 1t is an insult to all good
wives and mothers if harlot, glorying in
her adulteries, can have just the same So
cial recognition as the purest among them.
This French woman may be as virtuous as
the average person of her profession, but
any attempt to rank her with honorable
women on either continent or in any sta
tion in life, is move to make her iniqui-
quities fashionable, to condone the greatest
crime of womanhood, and to excuse her
wickedness on the slender ground Of the
multitude of her destinations, when the
facts are that a woman who knows so
much knows enough to do better, and is
less excusable than her ignorant sister who
trusts and sins and is an outcast forever
after. There is no comparison between
the harm done by the obscure woman who
has no one but herself to ruin, and this
other one who, by the prominence of her
sins and the efrontery with which she adj
vertises herself by them, pollutes all who,
dazed and blinded by her attractions, are
lured into forbidden paths strengthened
by her example. Anything that gives to
the young an impression that glitter is just
as good as gold; that beauty or accom-
plishments can gloss over immoralities,
and talent make amends for shame, does
incalculable mischief Seifrespecting vir-
tuous people in this country can, by their
patronage of this woman or Withholding
IL, say to all countries looking on, that as