Daily globe. [volume] (St. Paul, Minn.) 1878-1884, 1882-12-02
Progress and HAPPINESS.

Indeed, the opportunities and advan.
tages of the age are SO immense, the in
ventions so prodigious, the convenience
SO universal and supreme, that the OBJ
server constantly looks to see il there is
a corresponding advance in human well
fare. The Arabian stories are outdone.
Ali Bahia and Aladdin are familiar he
roes. We own all the amulets. We
have mastered all the magic. But there
are those who reflected, as they read
those wonderful tales, that while it was
pleasant for FOrtunatus to have his purse,
and rapturous for the Prince to awake
the sleeping beauty, there was apparent
~ the same old sorrow and suffering on
every side. All the magic ended in in
dividual gain, and. although fairy power
haunted Bagdad, Bagdad was not fairy
land.
We know charming and venerable
lady who used to go to Albany in asloop,
and she has sometimes been week on
the way. We leave New York at half
past 10 and dine in the capital at 2. An
other old friend made her bridal tour to
Niagara sixty years ago. But her grand
daughters can make theirs to the Staub-
bach and TERM in a shorter time. We
know of the riot in Alexandria before it
is suppressed. Longfellow dies, Darwin,
Emerson, Garibaldi, and Oregon and
Naples know it simultaneously. Fifty
years ago, if early winter nightfall over
took Congress In session, q man toiletl
long and laboriously to make darkness
visible with Oil and candles; now one
touch floods the great hall with day. It
is symbol Of the sudden flooding of the
whole world with the news Of the mo-
naent. From his Office, his shop, his
home. a man with his telephone talks
with his friend, his lawyer, his grocer,
his doctor, miles away. No fancied con-
venience in his daily employment occurs
to him that is not already fact and wait
ing for him to buy. His newspaper, a
library for cents, is but type Of all.
It is the age of miracle.
Is it also the age Of greater happiness?
Is the blessing universal? Does the
magnificent and marvellous genius of in
vention bind men closer together? We
put a girdle round the earth in forty
minutes. Is the swift journey one OF
general blessing? Walking along the
street of palaces that leads to the beau
tiful metropolitan pleasure ground,
marking the elaborate workmanship, the
costly splendor of detail, catching
glimpses of rooms rich with the spoiis
of every zone, bright with exquisite
decoration, seeing the silken and laced
and jeweled figures that step from state.
~ carriages, and seem to float on all
Ike spangles on sunbeam, do we fee
that it is the purse of Fortunatus, good
for himself and his family alone, or that
all this splendor is but the flower of q
|. general prosperity, a universal content :
1t is momentous question, which sen.
timent, not political economy, must an
swer. Sentiment rules the world. 1t
is the sense of injustice, not demon.
stration of supply and demand, tina,
upheaves society. The golden age was
not that in which inventive genius
wrought miracles, and when the Alps. @
region of dazzling icy heights and cold
dark valleys, was the symbol Of human
society. It was prosperous, but it was
prosperity of mutual good will, of friend.
ly interest, of general cooperation. II
was a dream of pagans. But it was 6
Christian world in which they bore one
another's burdens. Telegraphs an6
electric lights and cheap periodicals
alone will not restore it. But the same
spirit, and only the same spirit, will win
Astraea back again. Editor's Eass
Chan" in Ho'pers Magazine.