The Madison daily leader. [volume] (Madison, S.D.) 1890-current, 1894-12-15
FODDER AND FOOD.

Crackers and water will sustain life
Nevertheless crackers aud water are
poor diet. The stomach is capable OF
digesting more substantial food, and life
is capable of something more than being
sustained. B~eefsteak, fruit and angels
food are also good. Sustaining life and
strengthening life are two things. For
one, crackers and water Will suffice; for
the other, all things are ours. The first
is our necessity; the second is our right
and duty. When right and duty are
neglected, necessity leaps into the saddle
and digs the spurs OF hunger and want
into our ribs. When duty holds the
reins, our rights enjoy the driving and
necessity lags behind, on foot.
The struggle for existence is not the
struggle out of which comes much Im-
proyement, either to individual or the
the race. That is not the struggle to
which man, as man. is called. 1t is the
struggle into which man, as animal, is In
danger of falling. When he thinks that
the sole object OF eating is to keep body
and soul together; that to keep from
dying is why we strive to live; man be-
comes like the beasts that perish. He
fancies himself one In a group OF snails,
and is content with crawling and breath
ing; or one among a pack of wolves, and
wants everything in sight. His god is
then his belly; and his motto, dog eat
dog. He sees nothing in politics but the
spolls OF office; nothing in business but
grab; and, in those institutions which
make for righteousness, nothing at all.
For him both the snail and the wolf are
patterns, for both accomplish the ST.
preme object; they both exist, the one
sufficiently, the other ra~venously. OF
growing and improving he has no con-
ception.
But. to grow is better than TO exist: to
stagnate is worse than to die. 1t were
better TO be a live chicken on a small
farm, than a weakly rat in a big town.
Better to be where the ROSTERS crow,
the geese quack, the hogs grunt, the
mules cray and the birds sing, than
where, when the humdrum wheels of
trade go slowly, men have not, or having
care not for, other resources than street
lounglng and gossip.
Madison need not cease 10 grow be-
cause for the time being no new houses
are built, no increase in population oc.
ours and her merchants are denied the
chance OF gaining in stocks and bonds.
There Is other aud better growth than
all OF these, if she will have it. Let us
not make light Of these trying times, nor
quake with fear because of them. We
shall be trqer men if we face them de-
m md NJ, as we do of other phenomena,
their secret and their purpose. Possibly
1t is we ourselves more than the times,
VINO are out Of joint. Stocks and bonds
may, under some conditions, be but
other names for chains of slavery. There
may, after all, be some truth in what we
have heard; that man doth not live by
bread only; that the life is more than
meat, and the body than raiment; that a
mans life CONSISTENT not in the album
dance OF the things that he possesseth.
This ID worth consideration. Let us
close up our shops and study it out. Let
us close them tight at 7:30 p. m. and get
q taste at least OF home with wife and
children, before we open them again.
We may thus discover something else TO
live for and to live upon than dry goods,
groceries and cash Something better
to think about than the latest crime OF
scandal heralded from afar, as though
we must starve unless the whole worlds
supply Of such vile compounds oe not
brought daily to our doors. Something
more worth talking and reading OF than
'sdem- and pop. and rep" and "rep. and
dem. ana pop with the everlasting ring
ing OF the same changes on the SANE
political themes every item Of the sams
size and color and tone, and the sam