The Universalist. [volume] (Chicago [Ill.]) 1884-1897, 1894-12-29
From the Author of "The Man without


a Country"
Whoever asks if the political fu-
ture is to be better or worse, really
asks if men and women are to be bet
ter or worse. The fountain rises as
high as it's source, but it rises no
higher. Whether men and women
are improving is an open question
The statistics cannot be relied upon
any more than in other questions.
For there are questions of the spirit
involved which no statistics can meas
sure. But it can be proved:
/. That the bodies of men and
women are, on the whole, more tit for
the work required of them than they
were fifty years since. They are better
clothed, better warmed, better housed,
better fed. In consequence the death
rate is less. They can run faster, can
lift more than they could, on the aver
age. They can draw, and write, and
sing better on the average. So much
has been gained on the physical side.
2. It is even more certain, on the
mental side, that men and women in
America are better instructed than
they were fifty years ago. More peo-
pie can read and they have more
books to read. More people can sing,
as has been said, and they can hear
better music. There are more schools
and colleges, and they are better than
they were. There are large, popular
institutions such as the Chautauqua
and Columbia reading circles, which
direct the reading of large bodies of
people all over the land and improve
it. So far as the education of the
mind and the improvement of mental
power depends on books and teach
ers, there is certainly improvement.
1t is hard to say whether on the
whole the average man has more
mental power. But a comparison te'
tween the debates in Congress IN
1910 and 1894, between the books
and newspapers of the same periods,
seems to intimate that there has been
some improvement on these lines.
1t is impossible to speak with GER
tainty.
The essential question is as to moral
or spiritual advance. Are the men
and women of America more manly
or womanly7 Are they less selfish
and more determined to live for the
common good9 The statistics are
misleading, because they cannot show
much but the record of convicted
crime. Now the first result of an i'm
provement in the moral tone OF
community would be a more careful
and complete administration OF Grim
inal law. OF such an improvement,
the sign in the statistics would be
simply an enlargement in the num-
Der of criminals convicted. The exile
from Europe of large numbers OF
criminals, ends in the confusion OF
our statistics as to convictions and
imprisonments.
1t is certain, however, that there is
less Juvenile crime in the city of New
York than there was fifty years ago in
proportion to the population. 1t is
certain that the gifts for charities for
the improvement of towns and vii
lagos, are very much larger than the
increase of population. 1t is prob
able that the intemperance of 1894 is
less in proportion than that OF 1910.
Churches do not find failure of in
terest in religion; philanthropists lind
ready recruits for any well favored
enterprise of improvement or reform.
All these are Ineligible indications
of advance. But no person not far
gone in Pharisaism, asks in such dis
cussions, for visible or tangible signs
of the times. EDWARD Z. HALE.
BOSTON, MASS.
From the President of Amherst College.