St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1895-08-11

would make II the marVel OF the age.
1t would permit no structure to be
built, for business or residence pur-
poses, which did not conform, in the
space allotted to each person, in the
arrangements for light and air, and
in the assurance of perfect ventila-
ton, with the most eXacting de-
mands of sanitary science. These
changes alone, in bricks and NOR
tar and paving stones and the
primitive processes of life, would re-
move a great city almost as far in
civilization from the city of the
present as the latter is from the
mud village of the savage.
These things are but a beginning.
spection is possible by which nothing
adulterated could be placed on the
market. Meat and drink might be
adjusted exactly to the demands of
health. Conduits and subways could
be so arranged that wire crossing
a street would no more be toll
Grated than a clothes line. If the
mere mechanical adjustment of
means to ends were made as complete
as the state of our knowledge per-
mits, it would be revolution. In
the waste of food products, through
Of
gathering and distribution, and ig-
norance in selecting, there is treas
ure lost every year greater than
the national debt. Nor do we eXag-
gerate in saying that the chemistry
of cooking has already made such
progress that the results obtainable
by following it would compare with
the offerings of the average table as
those do with the roots, nuts and
berries on which our remote fore
fathers lived. Again, as compared
with what we know, what we do
augurs a low civilization.
We have referred thus far only to
conditions that are physical and ele-
the shortcomings of the proudest
races are more painfully prominent.
We pity the 'low civilization" of
China, while negroes and Italians
are shooting each other in Spring
Valley; nay, while labor and cap
ital are lodging each others clubs
and bullets as occasion may arise.
We feel the same about the wretches
who spear and club each other in
African forests, while the great
armies and navies of the world are
a thousand-fold as direct a chal-
accept a religious system founded on
a life which only a scanty few even
attempt to initiate in detail; eX-
cusing themselves by changed con-
ditions and the argument of parallels.
We say that state education is justi-
fed by the necessity of making intel
ligent citizens, and then teach not
a. word about the duties of citizen
ship in most of our schools. Praetic-
ally none of them teach systematic
morality, without which neither pub
lie nor private conduct can improve
on the barbarous virtues. We have
a stage which must be supported in
large part by exhibitions that would
Of the Orient; and a literature sui
lied with an erOtic outpour that
would make a Turkish pasha blush.
With the sublimest thoughts and
dreams of the race to feed upon, our
achievement is gross rather than
great. In any direction, by the old
test, the departure of best
knowledge from average prac-
tice, it will be found that
we cannot claim to be highly civil
lied. This does not argue degener-
acy. The world moves, and the pres
ent grows beyond the past. But it
is progress by imperceptible ad-
vances, with ever about the same
distance between the best we know
and the best We do. While we share
that reproach with what we are
pleased to designate the inferior
races, we cannot make just claim
to a high civilization.