The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1891-03-13

of the postoffice to all honest business
and to all messages of charity, and
kindness and. affection, for all healthy
intercommunication, he did not mean
to make vice easy or to fill the mail bags
such leprosy.
1t ought not to be in the power Of
every bad man who can raise l cent
stamp for a circular or cent stamp
for letter, to blast q man or destroy a
home. The postal service of this coun-
try must be clean, must be kept clean.
and We must all understand that the
swift retributions of the United States
government hover over every violation
of the letter box.
How have so many of the news stands
Of our great cities been purified? How
has so much of this iniquity been
baked? BY moral suasion? Ono. You
might as well go into jungle of the
East Indies and pat a cobra on the neck,
and with profound argument try to per-
suade it that it is morally wrong to bite
and to sting and to poison anything.
The only answer to your argument
would be an uplifted head and q hiss.
and sharp reeking tooth struck into
YOUR arteries. The only argument for a
cobra is a shotgun, and the only argu-
ment for these dealers in impure litera-
ture is the clutch of the police and bean
soup in the penitentiary. The law! the
law! | invoke to consummate the work
so grandly begun!
Another way in which we are to drive
back this plague of Egyptian frogs is by
filling the minds OF our young people
with healthful literature. / do not mean
to say all the books and newspapers in
our families ought to be religious books
and newspapers. or that every song
ought to be sung to the tune of 'Old
Hundred | have no sympathy with
the attempt to make the young old.
would rather join in a crusade to keep
the young young. Boyhood and girl
hood must not be abbreviated. But
there are good books, good histories
good biographies, good works OF fiction,
good books of all styles with which we
are to fill the minds of the young, so
that there will be no more room for the
useless and the vicious than there is
room for the chaff in bushel measure
which is already filed with Michigan
wheat.
am not talking about what can not
be done. am talking now about what
is being done. A great many of the
printing presses that have given them
selves entirely to the publication of vile
literature have been stopped or have
gone into business less obnoxious.
What has thrown off, what has kept of
the rail trains of this country for some
time back nearly all the leprous peri
odicals? Those of us who have been on
the rail trains have noticed a great
change in the last few months and the
last year or two. Why have nearly all
those vile periodicals been kept off the
rail trains for some time back? Who
effected it? These societies for the
publication Of railroad literature gave
warning to the publishers and warning
to conductors and warning to railroad
companies, and warning to news boys
to keep the Internal stuff off the trains
| Why are 80 per cent of the criminal:
in the jails and penitentiaries of the
United States to-day under Il years o
age? Many of them under II, under Is
under Is, under IA, under Is? Wall
along one of the corridors of the Tombt
prison in New York and look for your
SclNCS. Ddu DOOhS, Uttu
witched them as soon as they got on
of the cradle. Beware of all of thOs'
stories which end wrong. Beware o
all those books which make the ROAD
that ends in perdition seem to end il
paradise. Do not glorify the dirk ant
the pistol. Do not call the desperad,
brave or the libertine gallant. Teacl
our young people that if they go dow
into the swamps and marshes to watcl
the jack-o'-lanterns dance on the deca,
and rottenness they will catch the ma
laria and death.
sop says some one, 81 am bushes
man and have no time to examine wha
my children read. have no time t,
inspect the books that come into m,
household" II your children wer
threatened with typhoid fever woult
you have time to go for the doctor
Would you have time to watch the pro
gress of the disease? Would you hav
time for the funeral? In the presenc
of my God warn you of the fact tina
your children are threatened with NOR
al and spiritual typhoid and that unles
the thing be stopped it will be to then
funeral of body, funeral Of mind, funer
al of soul. Three funerals in one day
My word is to the vast multitude o
young people: Do not touch, do no
borrow, do not buy corrupt book or
corrupt picture. A book will decide
mans destiny for good or for evil. Tn
book you read yesterday may have de
cided you for time and for eternity. o
it may be book that may come int
your possession tomorrow.
The assassin of Sir William Russell
declared that he got the inspiration TO
his crime by reading what was then
new and popular novel, "Jack Shep
pare" Homer's ''Iliad" made Alexan
der the warrior. Alexander said SO
The story of Alexander made Juliu
Cesar and Charles XII both men o
blood. Have you in your pocket or il
your trunk, or in your desk at bushes
a bad book, bad picture, bad pam
iphlet? In Gods name L warn you t,
destroy it.
But" you say, chow can I find GU
whether book is good or bad withou
reading it," There is always some
thing suspicious about bad book.
never knew an exception-something
suspicious in the index or style o
Illustration. This venomous reptile al
most always carries warning rattle.
The clock strikes midnight. A faiI
form bends over romance. The eye
flash fire. The breath is quick and ir
regular. Occasionally the color dashe:
to the cheek, and then dies out. The
hands trembles as though a guardian
spirit were trying to shake the deadl,
book out OF the grasp. Hot tears fall
She laughs with a shrlll voice that
drops dead at its own sound. The
sweat on her brow is the spray dashed
up from the river of death. The cloci
strikes and the rosy dawn soon aftel
begins to look through the lattice upor
the pale form that looks like detained
specter of the night Soon in a mad