The Wichita daily eagle., 1894-03-14
AFTER TIE EAGLE.
The City Council Pro oosing to Save the People
From Sin.

The EAGLE by arrangements made with
the art publishing houses of the country.
has been enabled, for nominal sum, TO
furnish its readers with several different
series OF publications, among them Two
that reproduce the art and architecture OF
the Columbian Worlds fair. Ode dear
little piece of preciseness. who never had
child of her own, and with little prospects
of any so far as appearances go, was terri
bly, shocked over the display OF some OF
those pictures on the plate glass
front of the business Office, she first re-
quested the removal in the interest OF
morality and then threatening the law.
The unaccountable thing to US Is
that her prime bighness must
have seen every one OF those pictures IN
the art building on the worlds fair
grounds. We notice that a sentiment has
beeu worked up touching the affair, and
the matter has been carried before the
city council, in connection with obJrc-
tions to theatrical bill boards. The
EAGLES pictures are Innocent represents.
tions. without single suggestion OF val
garity. The refined and educated Of tue
world enjoy them. and they will be sup
the protests of the fiuicky or any action of
tue city coun:il to the contrary. Only
short time since the proprietor OF an art
store in this city was notified by COM
mittee of women TO take IL certain picture
out Of his window or they would bring
suit against him. It was reproduc-
lion of classic figure from the frescO
of one of the historic churches of
Europe. The vulgarity WAS alone in the
minds of those who threatened the prose-
cutiol, who no doubt in the dark recesses
OF those same minds yet criticize the
author of all life and beauty for not having
provided the human form Divine with d
thick coat Of sLakgy hair or some coarse
fustian. Modesty is beautiful and pure,
is innocency itself. and the pure and the
beaut ful, in either picture or marble, can
not shock modesty. Prudery IS always
suggesting, therefore vulgar. 1t Is the
prude that is disturbed by the sight of a
naked child, not the innocent mother OF
the child. '.Iudeceat" and "obscene" are
merely relative terms, but neither can be
made to apply to any fignre that is not
made to assume vulgar or suggestive at
I'll ude. As for the show bills hung
up in Wichita they are horrible travesfies,
but they are the same that are hung
up ia every town and city of respectable
size or importance in the Uni ell States.
They are intended to represent what is
produced on the stage. Tbey are about
as far removed from art as from vnlSarly,
They are neither, being only cheap dtmipg
red daubs intended to catch the attention
the british in man, let alone shock innO
c-ncv, aud weak would be the man whose
mud could be disturbed by them. aud
silly the woman WHO should take the
other side of the square for fear OF con-
tamination. AS for children they are all
Innocent and Will remain SO unlrss mis-
taught, viciously Influenced, or lefs in ig-
porance.
Wichita is not an Eden Of purity, a
paradise Of extra exalted virtue, but the
people of Wichita are just rs in
telligent, refined and gooi as are the
people of any OF hero city in this or any other
state. Tn-y are not witch burners nor
aesthetically pedantic prigm ttical or un-
commonly loose, wicked and undegenerate e
that they must be j,cked up 10y unusually
stringent ordinances or that moral guard
ianships must I've instituted for their safe
ty and salvation. As for anyt hing further
there are he United States statutes and
legislative euactments covering any and
every possible lapse Of decency. with both
federal and state courts convenient Let
those WHO DO GOT fad Wichita up to their
ideas proceed under sucn laws. and in said
courts, against the supposed criminals who
have off endtd