Barbour County index. [volume] (Medicine Lodge, Kan.) 1880-current, 1895-03-20
NEED OF THE HOUR.
First PAUSE AFTER NINETEEN
CENTURIES.
PortentiOus Omens OF an Impending Cricis
-Ohl for a Lincoln to Lead Us Out of
the Land of bondage Into the Land
of Golden Light and Hopeful Promise.

BY E. II. Belden.-In Webster's i'm
mortal reply to Hayne, the opening
paragraph reads as follows:
Mr.. President-When the mariner
mas been tossed for many days and in
thick weather and on an unknown sea,
ne naturally avails himself of the first
pause In the storm, the earliest glance
at the sun, to take his latitude and as
certain how far the elements have driv-
en- MIN from his true course. Let us i'm
Itate MS prudence and before we float
iurther refer TO the point from which
we departed, that we may at least be
"Ole 10 conjecture where we are now"
From this extract let us see if there is
any comparison to the present cOndi-
tion OF our own times, and whether
Ihere are any lines of prudence marked
out that would be well FOR us to fol-
low.
Like the mariner the great army of
round-shouldered bread winners, hav-
ing been tossed for, yea, these many
years are slowly but surely awakening
from the deep slumber of ignorance
that has prevented them from knowing
their rights, or realizing the depth of
slavery from which their generations
nave gone down to early and unhal-
lowed, yet acceptable, graves. After
nineteen centuries, during this the first
Iorced pause in the storm of dog-eat-
dog policy that has swept the worlds
surface throughout the cycles of tni-
quity, they are catching a glimpse OF
the golden light of hope that is break
ing through the veil above them, and
are pausing to find their latitude, and
70 learn. If possible. how far they have
been driven from the course marked out
by their God, in which all men could
reap the first fruits of honest toll. Be-
ware! The lion is awakening in its lair.
HIS voice is penetrating the farthest
recesses Of the jungle. Unbrowned and
eneminate aristocracy stands aghast
with fear The combined power of the
worlds Drawn and muscle is being unit
ed TO grapple with caste and cunning
In one grand effort to restore the long
lost diadem, the equality and brother
hood of man.
tion are being turned into one mighty
stream, whose sweled tide is carrying
away the flood-wood of prejudice and
superstition that has been built up
through the dark ages of federal
knight-errantry and barricaded
throughout succeeding centuries by the
prestige of musty statutes and standing
armies, that have been as leeches upon
the labor of helpless humanity, en-
shaved thereby. The very atmosphere
is surcharged with the electricity of
portentious omens for the future. All
men are awake to the impending crisis.
Savants are searching the vocabularies
of ancient and modern literature to find
soothing phrases to calm the thirst for
economic Investigations. From the es-
thetic literature of the most exclusive
magazines to the one-cent dailies, we
find exclusive articles on the great
movement, while the caricatures of the
illustrated press represent the contest
in its lurid forms. Strong men walk
as If treading the crown of volcano,
while mothers, clasping their infants
TO their bosOms. look out into the dim
future, wondering if the impending con-
test will remove the present maniacs
of unequal opportunities in the race of
life before her darlings are grown, or
will they in their tender years have to
go out on this frozen sea of corporate
greed to be permanently dwarfed upon
the tread wheels of unrequited toll?
In this hour of expectance, of anxiety
of hope and fear, oh! for a Lincoln to
lead us out of the land of bondage into
the land of light and promise. Without
such leader to pilot the way, many
weary and wornout toilers will go down
as their feet sink into the cold sands of
the Jordan that separates us from the
land of our inheritance.
AS Moses raised up the brazen serpent
in the wilderness that all who had been
bitten by poisonous reptiles might be-
hold and live, so millions are praying
that the leader may be raised up whom
all may follow that are perishing under
the bite of the poison Of corporate op-
preston.
Not with bullets, but with ballots, we
trust the citadel of plutocracy's host
must be destroyed. The calling of the
ditcher, of the hostler and the hod car
rier are called ignoble, but each forms a
rung in the ladder up which all indus
try and progress must climb, and the
ballots of these will count as much as
those whose gilded chariots spatter the
toiler in rags.
The battle-scarred veterans of toll,
awake to your opportunity and vote
only for those to make your laws whose
calloused hands are living witness
that they live not from the fruits of
others toll.