Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1893-08-24

A man in horse car In Boston was
informed that little man who sat at
the other end of the car was DR.. Oliver
Wendell Holmes. He was greatly
amazed at lis diminutive stature. Go
complete was his astoaishment that he
asked the doctor If he would allow him
to see his hat. The doctor smilingly
complied, and the man examined the hat
infinitely and exclaimed in further sur
prise that the hat was not as large IS
his. He had supposed that man like
DR.. Holmes would measure around the
skull so many inches. We have here the
difficulty in adjusting on your commu-
nistic basis the results of the work of
the architect and the hod carrier. The
nod carrier labors on the house. The
architect conceives the ideas. The other
does the work which a machine or
brute under some conditions could be
trained to perform. A system that re-
wards each alike for an hours labor is
system fundamentally unjust.
The richest elements of life are those
that elude such a material standard of
measurement.
We could not estimate the poets labor
by the same tick of the clock as we esti-
mate the man who paves the streets
The poet that wrought his immortal
song that thrilled thousand hearts and
gave them courage to do the tasks of the
world that made the anvil ring in a
thousand workshops; that gave inspira-
ton to millions of hearts-we cannot
pay for that poem in the same terms and
by the same standard as we pay the
printer who has set up the type and gave
it to the world.
The artist cannot be remunerated upon
the basis Of the house painter. The artist
whose creation inspired a thousand other
hearts cannot be equalized, cannot be
brought down to the level by any me
chanical process of the painter who
paints the exterior of the house by the
day and the hour.
The musician whose masterpiece thrills
the hearts of the ages cannot have his
work estimated by the square inch. To
bring the race down to the dead level of
the communistic idea is to eliminate the
heroics of life. Shall there be no indi-
viduality? If we are just, there must
be. Justice demands that each shall be
rewarded according to his deserts
Against the scheme of communism,
as scheme for the present social dis
order, | would protest in the name of
Gods word, in the name of nature, her
law of individuality, her law of brother
hood, fatherhood, sisterhood and moth
erhood, of all her forces that differen-
tiate us into separate beings, with sep
arate duties and several characters. In
the name of the spiritual and the divine
of man and of the elements that con-
stitute his higher life, would impeach
such a scheme.
Communism can give no answer, there
fore, to the social problem of this age
To each man we must give simple JUS
tice, and justice is the antithesis of the
communistic ideal.
If you answer in reply that the evil
play of antagonistlc forces as at present
we have them in society must then be
the only solution, and that the fittest
will survive in this free play of brute |
force, ask the simple question: Do the
fittest actually survive in your present
society? Are not those who are most de- |
serving crushed? Do not the unworthy |
succeed? Does not wrong triumph for
the time and injustice reign? The an
swer is not FAR 70 seek. We know these
are facts.
While communism holds no answer |
to the problem. SO long as we believe in
Christianity, so long will we hold that
there is an answer, full, rich, complete.