Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1881-02-13
HOW no BEGIN REFoRMS.


The greatest fault that can be found
with the reforms of the present Gay is
that they begin at the wrong end. In
nine cases out of ten they are directed
towards saving those who are already
lost beyond hope of redemption, rather
than towards preventive measures. A
great deal of effort is expended and much
paper wasted in the attempt to make
good citizens of those already stepped in
crime, and apparently little in the direc-
ton of measures calculated to prevent
the young from falling into evilpractices.
There is no truer proverb than the
familiar saying: GAS the twig is bent, so
is the tree inclined" a child taught in
a good school-the school of piety and
morality goes astray, but
grows to be man honored and
respected by all around him. But
left to himself he falls into bad
company, forms pernicious habits, and
enters upon career of vice that ends in
degradation and shame. A little effort
expended in his earlier days might have
turned his life into a different channel,
and made him an ornament to society,
but after he has once started on down.
ward course nothing short of a miracle
can save him.
The home is the proper place for re-
forms to begin; the mothers knee the
Of Of, of nj in
precepts and practice of morality. Here
the BOY can be taught to despise all that
is unclean or pernlcious. He will learn
to honor temperance, virtue, truth and
all the attributes that go to make up a
perfect man, and to abhor dissipation in
all its forms, falsehood, double-dealing
and hypocrisy, and become imbued with
principles that enable him to resist temp
tation and to so live as to afford an ex-
ample of probity and integrity that will
prove wholesome to all around him. If
left to obtain his moral education in the
streets he learns to practice deceit, to con-
tract habits that soon become chronic, to
lie, blaspheme, and to practice debauchery
and sometimes crime. Improperly trained
at home he can hold his head erect among
the best of men and defy condemnation
from any source.
There are many Christian parents who
devote far more time and care to an effort
to reclaim the lost sheep of the world
than they do to the proper instruction of
their own offspring. While they are at
tending meetings for the reformation of
Magdalens or drunkards their sons are
standing before the gilded bars of the
fashionable saloons or are carousing with
these very Magdalens, while their daugh-
tiers are submitting to the lascivious en-
braces of lot of roues at some fashion
able ball or promiscuous dance. In their
young days the children have been left to
themselves and are following their
natural bent by furnishing criminals and
debauchees for their parents to reform.
Women throng the legislative halls ask
ing that the liquor traffic be abolished,
and yet their own sons are patrons of the
vice by means of their neglect
to inculcate O knowledge of its
evils-of the woes that are sure
to follow an indulgence in strong drink.
They seem to think that the children of
others need their watchful care, but that
their own will naturally follow the right
path and grow up to be men and women
who will be an honor to the community.
The fallacy of such supposition is shown
by the fact that hundreds of young men,
the children of Christian parents,
are spending their evenings in riot and
debauchery, They fill the gambling hells,
contribute to the support of the saloons,
and are found nightly in the brothels of
the city. "Respectable'' young men are
the patrons most sought after by those
who conduct these resorts of vice. When
they cease to be respectable" as they
certainly will in time, they are no longer
welcomed, but are turned into the streets
OF compelled to resort to some low dog
gerry, where filth and sin in its most re-
voting forms, runs riot.
Too little attention is paid to home Gull
ture Half the reformatories in the
world would be unnecessary if the
Christian parents would but do their
duty towards their children at home.
The young are left too much to them
selves-are thrown upon their own re-
sources for entertainment. Their homes
are cherries, often forbidding, and
they look elsewhere for means by which
the tedium of the long evenings may be
relieved. Naturally they gravitate to
places where all the senses are pleased
by the elegance of the surroundings-the
tinsel and glamor Of the drinking palace,
the music and the fragrace of the ball
room, the destinations of the gambling
resorts Occasional visits resulting in no
dire consequences, they become habitues,
and from that time their downward ca
reer is rapid. A majority of these young
men would remain at home if those
homes were rendered cheerful and
inviting, and learn to love the
the domestic circle as the place above all
others where happiness can be found.