Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1888-06-02
THE TENDENCY TO INsENsIBILITY.

plSoS, "Ouiu ueiSdt, UT at ieeSl leSeen the
probabilities of the capture of criminals
THE TENDENCY TO INSENsIBILITY.
Rev. DIR. Dix, of New York, has been
very roughly handled by good many of
the press, for the "Lenten Lecture" in
which he arraigned American society for
its drift towards the vulgar, and its popu-
larization of the impure. Comparatively,
only few journals have done him even
hand Justice in this matter. 1t is very true
that DR.. Dix drew shocking picture of
one side of the social organization, and
that he arraigned the people for liberation
and encouragement of evils, which, if not
checked and ultimately crushed, will, he
believes, bring us to the same woeful end
ing that was the fate of earlier nations for
similar causes. But DIR. Dix is not a
pessimist. He does not close his eyes to
the goodness of the age, nor ignore the
fact that there is great charity, great
benevolence, world of usefulness and
vast wealth of modesty, honesty and
sobriety among us. But because there is
80 much good and honor and trust and
worth, does not blind him to just as patent
truth concerning the evil.
We have read the "Lenten Lecture"
that brought such 4 storm of criticism and
protest about his ears, and fail to
find wherein he has grossly or to any
material extent unwarrantably drawn
American society as ill favored, or for what
he has merited the abuse that has been
showered upon him for speaking plainly
to his aristocratic congregation. If our
social conditions are as correct as the
Doctors critics would have their readers
believe and our evil tendencies so slight,
we cannot understand why his assaults
have created such a tumult of protest.
We prefer to draw the conclusion that the
preacher has made a center shot, ripped
up some ill-disguised sores, and turned
light upon public thought concerning
some serious evils.
DR.. Dix asks after reciting the adage.
"to the pure all things are pure'-what
of the defled? To such nothing is pure
Now what influence are these exerting
upon the morals of society? question
every thoughtful man has probably pro-
pounded to himself over and again. 1t is
undeniable, and no man who desires respect
for his opinion will venture to contradict
1t, that there is an almost unrestricted ten
dency towards apologizing for the vulgar,
lewd and suggestive. Whoever considers
the drift of the modern drama and the
exhibitions of the stage to-day, cannot es-
cape knowledge of the facts in that field,
nor fail to note how dramatists, many of
the press and largely the public excuse
these communicating influences, Hnder the
plea that the public taste demands them,
and so its perversion goes on with only
here and there spasmodic reproaches. The
truth is DR.. Dix does not nearly do the
question justice so far as the "drift"
towards unblushing lewdness is indicated
by the stage. His publishers quote in his
support many opinions, and among others,
that Of Manager 4. NJ. Palmer that the
bulk OF the performances on the stage are
degrading and pernicious" Mr. Daniel
Z. Bandmann, the tragedian who has had
twenty-nine years experience, and before
almost all nationalities, is quoted as say
ing: The Hindoo would turn with dis
gust at the exhibitions which are sought
after and applauded on the stage in
this country. Our shop windows are full
of and the walls covered with show cards
and posters which should he disgrace to
an enlightened country" And the veteran
actor, John Gilbert, referring to the indie
cency Of the stage, says: "Such exhibition
is disastrous to the morals of the COM
munity."
A hot defense was made in New York
recently of the display of nudity in pho
Biography, on the plea that it is the sun
picture of the works of great masters
whose achievements ages have not deemed
corrupting. But the truth is that these
lascivious pictures are but parts of grea
paintings, and become gross by removal
from the atmosphere and thought of the
art work.
The charge was made by the lenten lee
turer that men and women of American
society-his nearest field of observation
being the great metropolis-are becoming
hardened to vulgarity and indecency We
doubt if any judicial mind, after examin-
ing into the facts, could possibly arrive at
any other conclusion, if the ordinary
news ~ Of the day is to be put into the wit
ness-box. The San Francisco press, in the
Sharon-Hill trial, and later in the Nc
Donald divorce case, and in a score of
other recent records of nastiness, has given
undeniable proof of the truth that there is
an alarmingly enlarging taste for daily lit
erature of the kind that no pure woman
can read without humiliating shame, and
no developing youth can absorb and not be
contaminated, and suffer more or less of
paralysis of moral sensitiveness. There is
great good in the California metropolis;
a legion of workers in the cause of human
ity, pure and noble lives, and thousands of
domestic circles where the atmosphere is
unpolluted by vulgarity or grossness. But
the influence Of these combined is in
large degree negatiyed by such daily-press
literature as that referred to. Is the pro-
test of DR.. Dix unreasonable that these
filth conduits shall cease to discharge upon
the public mind He points out the I'M
questioned truth that the most striking
characteristics of the old system of pagan
ism was the licentiousness that was sex
allied into a cultus and called religion
and that was the embodiment of the OBJ
scene If pagan notions of morality are to
grow among us, we cannot fail to discern
the ultimate result, which DR.. Dix fore
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