The Caucasian. (Clinton, N.C.) 188?-1913, 1893-09-21
FROM The PULPIT.
Two ofNew York. Christina Disciples Talk
Plainly Upon . Barning Question

Two OF New fork. CArass.sa Disciple. Talk
raainiy Upon = Barntng oa~stion-
Rev. Thomas Dxoa. Jr., has been
preaching q series Of sS-uons upon the
wickedness Of New York at the Young
Mems Christian association rooms IN
New York city. The general title Of the
sermons was The Gates Of He'll In Mod
ern Babylon" The theme for the sev-
NTH sermon was The Curse Of Poverty
In the Modern City" Among other things
be said:
The poverty Of the city il an open ass.r 10 tho
deepest he'll, and through IL daily crowd count
less thousands, bscAo~1 poverty IA the city
means lo>s OF = home There II DO home life
among the poor OF the great city. The word
home 10 stricken from the language OF man
The poor live IN n den They exist In q tene-
ment. and the tenement life with It's attendant
horrors Is constantly On the increase tn our
great cities In New York city IL has swallowed
up ali the other life practically. The tenement
has, like a huge monster, devoured the home
One million three hundred thousand people
In this city exist ia second and third class ten
erents This constitutes the people. To every
so called house in the city Of New York there
Is an average Of 10 dwellers- London averages
seven In what Is known as the teaenent
house district there are no fewer THAI .76,0p
families packed together. In this Quarter IL
goes without saying that the death rate reaches
Its most horrible height, and public morality
touches depth Of degradation before which
philanthropists and Christians and evangelists
stand aghast. Poverty and disease and crime
are the portion of these people.
How hundreds and thousands OF people In
the cities, with their wages, can keep from
stealing is a miracle. People are entitled to
bread A man Is certainly entitled to exist
snce. He Is entitled to bread TO eat. He is en-
titled to enough clothes TO keep him from freez-
ing. He Is entitled 10 a house TO cover his head
and he has right TO work, But these things
are denied hundreds and thousands of people
today In the city. A woman was discovered
the other day who had starved TO death. Men
commit crime daily that they may get the COM
forts Of penitentiary, the luxury OF a stay on
Blackweli's island,
Our statisticians tell US that 5000 children
work In the great city of New York, but those
who know the facts tell Us that in the great
city Of New York alone there arc 10000 little
pinched forms that work for daily bread and
are glad to get woodwork at the period when
children must grow or die. Their little faces
are pinched and shriveled and wrinkled until
they are an army of little old men and women
to look into whose pinched faces Is enough to
draw the tears from a heart of q stone. What
wonderful little creatures many of them are!
They never cOmplai1-they take it as a matter
of course,
Such poverty is necessarily the mother of de-
spair-despair grim and sullen and Supplying
Tho man who fights with hunger becomes an
animal. Is 1T not better to die man than to
die brute? Shall these desperate people rea-
son? Suicide becomes luxury. The death of
q child under such conditions is Joy, not a
sorrow. They are gathered to the potter's field,
but they rest
On q recent Sunday morning Father
Thomas j, Ducey Of st. Leo's Roman
Catholic church. New York. took for his
subject these words: mo murderer shall
enter the kingdom of heaven" He COM
pared capitalists who force their en-
ployees to work for small wages to muir
derers and said that the contribution of
their blood money for charitable pur-
poses could not compensate for the wick
edness Of grinding down the poor. Con-
tinuing he said:
There Is no place in heaven for those million
aires who have no compassion for their fellow
men in starvation. The vanity of women and
the thirst of men for wealth have created the
conditions of the present age, and a revolution
Is imminent. Justice cannot be much longer
delayed. The human race is dying out today
on account of the vanity of women and the
pride of men. They fear to see their families
grow too large lest they might thereby lose
some Of their power and prestige. and the great
est of social sins is daily growing to be more
common. What can be murder more foul than
this, and declare to you that no murderers
shall enter into the kingdom of heaven.
Not only Ia this sin being daily committed.
but poor, struggling women are being constantly
ground into state of poverty by INSCRIPTIONS
and designing millionaires that they may be
forced into the great army of dissolute women.
We cannot serve God, no matter to what re-
ligious denomination we belong, If we do not
have justice, and there can be no justice where
grasping, grinding capital takes advantage of
distress and poverty to make the labor of mil
lions contribute still more to the piling up of
wealth in the hands Of few. 1t Is murderl
The wealthy man who disregards the distress
Of his brother commits more than the individ-
ual murderer. He commits crime against So
ciety. Such man may be a true husband and
faithful father. but he cannot hope to enter into
heaven.
Many millionaire in our city employs men
at 81 a week and expects them to support
family on the pittance. Yet that millionaire
expects to enter heaven. 1t is living lieI 1t is
the murder Of our brethren, and mo murderer
shall enter the kingdom of heaven"