The Scranton tribune. [volume] (Scranton, Pa.) 1891-1910, 1895-02-02

ping off the tops does not embarrass
the roots. There Is very little use in
doing anything unless you are prepared
to do the whole Spasms of virtue l
think are quite as raclking to the system
as chronic iniquity. ~-+< ~
THE inquiry put to you, therefore
is: Are YOU prepared to make a thor
ough job Of it? That is the: first ques-
ton you have to answer. Do you ask
how long 1t will take? We have only
begun yet in New York. All the car
toons of dead tigers with which our
illustrated journals. have fooled their
readers since the sixth of last. Novem-
Der are simply the product of an over
heated imagination. And even If the
tiger were killed, there Is a whole
menagerie full of other beasts which.
il more respectable, some Of them are
just as bloodthirsty and keep their
incisors in just as good trim.
After Another Municipal Beast.
"In fact, just at this moment, the
very men who were among the heart
lest and most chivalrous in our recent
tiger hunt have mounted horse again
and are off securing the jungle for
another municipal beast of prey who is
more decent than the tiger, but just as
hungry and ten times foxier. 1t is not
we'll to discourage people, but 1t Is al
ways Wholesome to face the entire sit
uation. To use an Illustration that
have used a great many times at home
in order to accomplish anything that is
really worth the pains 1t takes to ac-
complish it, you will have to regenerate
your city That word is quotation
from Presbyterian theology but an
swers the purpose well even If 1t is.
1t means more than reformation.
Reformation denotes a change of form
only. Regeneration means change of
heart, the Inauguration of a new quail
ity of municipal motives and impulses
If you say this is dealing with the ideal,
of course it is dealing with the ideal
You are not going to win except by the
pressure of a splendid enthusiasm. and
you will start no popular enthusiasm
by any effort that you make to achieve
half measures. Remember If you
please, that l am not speaking to you
along a line that l have not myself
trodden. Municipal mending, jobbing,
cobbling. will not move the popular
heart, and it is by the pressure of the
aroused popular heart you are to be
saved, If you are to be saved. Now,
how are you going to do that?
Let me go on and in few para
graphs give you a little idea as to how
we did it in New York. The conditions
are, in some respects, different with
you from what they are with us, but
men are men everywhere, corrupt
municipality is corrupt municipality all
over, and there is enough in common
between our two cities to make the
policy pursued in New York at least of
service to you here. / have examined
with good deal of care all the material
that has been put in my hands rela-
tive to your municipal condition and
there is scarcely anything in 1t that
differs essentially from what is appli-
cable to my own municipality.
Many Obstacles Encountered
"When we began work in February,
1892, everything was against us. The
difficulties were so gigantic as to be
inspiring. | have known what ii Is to
climb precipitous Alpine peaks that
were SO nearly UP and down that the
ugly obstinacy of the pile refreshed me,
recuperated me and filled my legs with
a nervous irrftabilty and muscular i'll
spiration that easily carried me up
over the rocks, perpendicular and all.
That was something the way We felt
when we started out in '92. Everything
was in the hands of the enemy. Mayor,
aldermen, commissioners, district at
torney, police justices. all banded to-
gether in solid, organized resistance to
assault, and the town in all its better
elements either so asphyxiated by the
foul miasmatic air 1t had been so long
respiring, or so appreciative of the diff
ficulties of the situation as to be pros
trated in the apathy of supine resig-
nation.
II had been requested to take the
presidency of the Society for the
Prevention of Crime vacated by the
death of DR.. Howard Crosby. l con-
sented to the arrangement provided
the society would quit quiddling with
small matters, such as arresting sa-
loon-keepers, and commence cunning
for big game. such as gambling shops
patronized by police captains and dis
reputable houses frequented by the ju-
dietary. My conditions were accepted,
and we started In. The opening gun
of the campaign was fired in the shape
Of a sermon preached from my pulpit
Feb. A. 1892.
II never could see how 1t was fair
to preach against the Ahabs and Jeze-
bells 5000 years back and be any less
pronounced In the respects we pay to
the same genius of depravity brought
down to date. 1t is just a bit sugges-
tive of cowardice to pound the antedilu-
vians for their depravity and ignore
the manifestations of equal wick
edness that are contemporary. If
man breaches in that way It
looks as though he were preach
ing for his salary and setting up his
target centuries enough away to guar
antee him against the risk Of libel suits
Severe Arraignmcnt of Officials.
"You will see what sort of a stua-
ton we had to confront If / quote a
sentence or two from the just men
toned discourse. And I want to re-
mark that my Characterization has
since THAT time been justified by de-
velopments a good many times over
| said:
Here Is an immense city reaching out
arms of evangelization to every quarter
of the globe, and yet every step that we
take looking to the moral betterment of
this city has to be taken directly in the
teeth of the damnable pack of admins
trative bloodhounds that are fattening
themselves on the ethical flesh and blood
Of our citizenship. We have the right to
demand that the mayor and those asso-
ciated with him I'm administering the af-
fairs Of this city should not put obstruc-
tions in the path of our amehorating en-
deavors. but they do There is not a form
under which the devil DISCUSSES himself
that so perplexes us in our efforts or so be-
wilders us in the schemes which, as
Christians and churches, we devise for the
good and the saving of men in our midst,
as the polluted harpies that, under the
pretense of governing this city, are feed