Pullman herald. [volume] (Pullman, W.T. [Wash.]) 1888-1989, 1888-12-29
SOciety's Responsibility.

We hear it on all sides and from all
classes" tbs world is growing worse
and society is degenerating and the
mourners multiply and wax loud in
their lamentations. Looking at the rec
ords of our courts, here and abroad, the
charges seem to be well-founded. Lady
So-and-So, we read in English papers,
elopes to the continent with some OF
nobility's rakes; and the divorce SUITS
give proof that his Lordship, and even
royalty itself, may sin openly and shame
lessly with utter disregard for morality
or decency. The minister who is ar
raigned for discipline in England or
America for undue familiarity with fair
young parishioners, doubtless consoles
himself with the correct reflection that
there are, in the ministerial ranks, I'M
discovered sinners as guilty as he. In
the United States developments of this
character would appear to be on the in
crease, and they are not confined to the
clerical party by any means. Society"
from its many classes, furnishes its
quota, from divorce down to the baser
order of Scandals quota already too
full. And thus, as We read the collec-
lions of the daily press, the cry of
"modern degeneracy" goes up.
This is mistake. The world is not
growing worse, nor men more con-
scienceless, or wives more faithless. HUI
man nature has not changed much with
the lapse of years. The scandal of to-
day that is read with eagerness, and
groaned over, and lamented over, is but
reflection of uglier things which hap
pened in ages gone by. Sacred or pro-
fame history, meagre though they both
are as chronicles of fact, tell us tales of
lords and danes and classic maidens of
yore which put to blush the happenings
of our day. The difference is, that the
wickedness we read and know Of now
impresses us more wildly than those
we hear or read of as happening thous-
and years ago among somebody's ances-
tors. Society now rails out at some
modern Abraham, and cites the ancient
patriarch as one of Heavens chosen
children. The David Of to-day is impris-
oned and put on trial by his church for
adultery; the original David is revered
as an inspired psalmist. There are
those who mourn over Mary Magdalene,
but turn up their noses and gather up
their garments at sight of poor, weak
woman soul who, in our times, goes es-
tray as she did. There is no forgiveness
by modern women, as rule, for sis
ter's sin, as there was in Galilee. Wo-
men who sinned like Mary Magdalene
were not considered, in former days, as
marked with the indeible brand of the
totally depraved, or as outcasts for
which there was no assistance, no hope;
and, though those days were more cor
rupt than these, there were nevertheless
crowns of martyrdom for even the worst
creatures whose mortal steps had been
in sinful pathways.
For this discrimination and injustice
of our time society is directly response
BILE. In uncharitableness, hypocrisy,
and the pretense of virtue among those
who have it not, our modern days are in
deed worse than the days of our fathers.
There is an utter erroneousness in the
modern Judgment on the sins and frail-
ties of women. Girls are every day the
victims Of scoundrels whose dress is that
OF gentlemen, whose tongues are as
smooth and treacherous as Satan's.
Through lack of knowledge they fall
into the snare-through lack of charity
and the helping hand they "go to the
bad" Society taboos them, in the first
instance; it ostracises and calls them
hard names, in the second. But modern
SOC1CbJ dI1OMS d lIldu W dlulOSG
anything he pleases is responsible for
the ruin he achieves, and is most cruel
and unjust in its demeanor toward his
victims. 1t fails in its duty toward
girls when they are innocent, and then
visits severity of condemnation on
those who, through weakness or ignor-
ance, go astray, for which there is no
precedent. In uncharitableness and the
affectation of invulnerable morality our
modern days are worse than the old
ones; but in respect to the prevalence
of the social evil, and of loose morals
among those in high station, it is GER
tain there is no degeneracy. The sons
and daughters are no worse than their
ancestors.
[Continued from End page.
Look out for the eclipse on Jan. LIST,