The Progress., 1893-05-13
THE SCARLET WOMAN
REV. DR.. DIXON ON THE GATES OF
HELL IN MODERN BABYLON.

The Various So Called Remedies and
Regulations
New YORK, May :. Rev. Thomas
Dixon, Jr., delivered this morning to the
usual throng able to gain admittance
to the hall the third sermon of the
series on The Shadows of the City. "
The sermon was devoted to the discus
sion of the social evil The text chosen
was Proverbs III, 3, The lips of a
strange woman drop honey. but her feet
go down to death; her steps take hold
on hell.
The subject of the social evil is one
upon which our teachers of morals have
maintained strange silence through the
past century There has been an effort
to ignore apparently the existence of this
tremendous evil There has been in
fact "A conspiracy of silence that has been
the opportunity of the devil Miss
Frances Willard in n recent article on
this subject Expresses herself most vigor-
ously upon this pcint. She says most
truly: "A conspiracy of silence. whether
conducted 10y boys i'll the pantry or men
in society, is almost always Il conspiracy
of sin. IL is pretty sure to bc at the cx.
pense of something precious to the home
keeper The hush policy has had ample
time in which to disport its failures.
and it has miserably failed. Bad men
would have good women think that n
culture like that which separated Lazarus
p,
women no worse than the very men whu
inculcate this shameful hcrcsy. Bad
men would have us believe that to be
virtuous we must be ignorant. and that
the least contact with such women that
they hold themselves free to cOnsort with
would be 70 us "A proclamation"
: Not only has society suffered from this
conspiracy of silence. but the moment
the silence has been broken by some bold
reformer. some prophet of righteousness
and truth. who has dared to draw the
sword and challenge the enemy, that mo-
ment there is raised the cry of sympathy
and of pity for the SO called Magdalene OF
society Tins cry usually comes from
set of hypocrites who are themselves the
contributors to the very evil over which
they mourn They tell rs at once of the
pity and the mercy of Jesus. They have
always scorned the life and the example
of the Christ, whom they now quote
with so much JUNCTION. II ever an incl
dent in the life of Jesus has been per-
verted and caricatured by interpreters.
this incident of woman taken in adul-
terry is surely an example The truth
which Jesus taught is SO simple that
wayfaring man, though fool. need not
err therein He did not teach that the
woman who thus sinned against society
was deserving only of tenderness and
sympathy and love.
The acts of Jesus must be taken in
their setting of time and place to be un-
derstood The circumstances were sim.
pie A crowd of hypocritical pharisce3
and scribes, desiring to tempt Jesus and
to entrap him in his words in some vio-
lation of the Mosaic law. dragged thil
covering woman before him. and though
they themselves were lecherous wretchcs
ther whined before him, asking if the
woina an should be stoned. Jesus. turning
upon them in the righteous disgust 81
his pure soul, knowing their own i'm
purity and villainy. said to them. "HG
that is without sin among You, let him
first cast stone mt her." And when
all skunk away and none remained 10
stand the test of standard of purity
and of truth Jesus said to the woman
Neither do condemn thee; go thy way;
from henceforth sin no more" He did
not say go back TO your life of shame
His answer TO these impure pharisces
was the great truth that there is but ono
standard of purity, and that it applies
equally to man as to woman. This was
news to the pharasaic world. 1t was an
arraignment of the imperfection of tho
Mosaic law
There is no truth delivered by Jesus
that so cuts to the very heart of the fall
lacies Of those who would excuse thiI
sin and those who would build false
system of tolerance upon it, in which
men are excused and even cared for in
their excesses by law, as does this deliv-
erance from Christ 60 the pharisee and
the woman. There Is no common ground
on which the modern Magdalene and her
hypocritical supporters and the woman
of the New Testament and Christ can
possibly stand. The modern Magdalene
is "A different creature from the woman
TO whom Jesus spoke. She Iaaintains an
establishment which is itselfhn violation
of the laws of society. an establishment
whose motive is gain who'e methods
are the methods of the pirate and the
smuggler. and around whose evil resort.
run in defiance of every law of society
cluster hundred kindred crimes.
When the cry of these hypocrites who
were whining the example of Christ,
whose name they had only spoken be-
fore to profane. was recently filling the
ears of the public in a certain great city.
through the public prints, a working
woman, rorsed to indignation by the
maudlin sympathy Of these men for her