The Monitor-register., 1896-03-06
Give Us Flee frIc lights.

man of robust physique, mental culture,
and buoyant spirit-endowme that go
to MAKE an optomist--should allow him
self, by a subtitle process of false reason
ing, to be wrought into horrible night.
mare over a few dollars in taxes is a
problem for the metaphysician. But, we
are not going to censure our friend for
the position he has taken, believing it to
be founded upon an honest conviction.
We are not all inspired by like senti-
ments, and do not deduce like conclu-
sions from the same premises.
Nature is full of vagaries. In the
material world she plants, side by side,
the oak and the ivy, and sows in the same
soil the bane and the antidote. In the
world of thought she also has her antith-
esis. By her caprices one ventures where
another fears to tread, one sees the
blending colors of the rainbow where
another sees only the angry storm.
Nature makes us all optomists or pessi-
mists, as she wills. The garden of Eden
had its optomists, and we poor mortals
pay tax upon their folly; and from the
days Of Caiaphis the High Priest down to
the present the world also has had it's
pessimists.
Our friend speaks of electric lights 'sas
simply and solely luxury" That
electric lights in Woodstown would be
luxury we are ready to admit; but that
they are ''simply and solely" luxury we
are as ready to deny, until we become
converted to the belief that it is better to
go back to primitive conditions, and like
the Hottentots, wear clouts, and like the
Digger Indians, live on roots. If we
take our friends position that what is not
absolutely necessary is simply and
solely" luxury not to be INDUCED in,
then why not discard everything that
goes to mark the boundary line between
civilization and the savage state? Why
build houses, when out of twigs and bark
of trees we can construct shelter against
the storm? Why till the soil to grow
food and raiment? Why not leave it in
state of nature, and to the heritage of
brutes that would furnish US both food
and clothing?
Our friend goes on to say SIT must
ever be borne 10 mind, in speaking of the
welfare and prosperity of our beautiful
village, that one of the chief things to be
avoided is the increase of the tax rate"
What has made our beautiful village but
taxes? Not so much the taxes gathered
~ obo PooAiS unA 7SobbOtOks Oub VIC bGA6S
paid to the carpenter, the bricklayer, the
painter, the nurserymau and the florist,
Every tree we plant, whether for fruit or
ornament; every comfort we add to our
homes, every indulgence of appetite we
enjoy is tax upon our resources. Taxes
are concomitant of civilization. Stop
"the increase of the tax rate" as our
friend advises. and we apply brake to
the wheels of progress, and place the
world in status quo. Taxes are the pivot
on which our lives revolve. All the fret
and worry of business, all the hustle and
driving of hard bargains is to pay taxes.
Taxes, like the daughters of the horse
leech, are never satisfied. Their first
demand is at the cradle, and their last
demand is at the grave, when the under
taker plants us beneath the sod. Since
taxes are inseparably associated with our
being, and it costs one anywhere from a
hundred to a thousand dollars a year in
the way of taxes for the comforts we
now enjoy, why get frightened out Of our
senses if the LUXURY of electric lights
in Woodstown costs us a dollar or two
more per capita?
Our friend gave us startling array of
figures of the cost of an electric light
plant in little town, located somewhere,
the bonds for which he sold. We make
no comment on the business transaction
of the sale of the bonds of a town SO
burdened with debt-we haven't any of
the bonds. We really would like to
know, however, where that town is
located. There must be something pecu
liar about a town with a population of
8 500 souls, all told, that can own
$135, 900 electric light plant and maintain
it at a cost of SIG, 623 per year for run
ming expenses and interest. Evidently
some magician, like Aladdin, has waved
over it his magic wand, or some modern
Solomon, with foresight and sagacity
beyond mortal ken, has made money az
the stones of the streets in that particular
town; or else the inhabitants thereof are
asses in extravaganza, or on
their asininity some corporation has got
a "cinch.'
Our friend, in his article of last week.
in addition to his pronounced opposition
to electric lights, also gave vent to his
feelings against our water works plant
We are inclined to the belief that his
residence on the west coast of Africa
and the associations of the Sedan chair
and the dug out boat has had modify
ing influence, on his aspirations for public
improvements. f'We were told," he saws
shat the Introduction of water works
would increase the value Of PROPERTY
And "We ali know how false these state.
ments WERE" Now that strikes us as an
iusinuation that somebody viol ted the
spirit of one Of the commandments. and
they ought not to have done it. Again
he says, "Business was never duller, and
the price of property has steadily de.
clined from the very building of the
water works. And ''If Woodstown
property continues to decline for two or
three years more as it has done since the
introduction of the water works, we NAV
vet see it selling lower than it does now
in Jacksonville" Well, now, such a
demonstration is not very comforting.
1t sounds to us doleful as prophecy of
old Menus himself. If we were not
cognizant of our friends sunny DISPOSE
ton, we should surmise that an attack of
the "blues" had jaundiced his imagina-
ton, and that acute dyspepsia was moro
responsible, as superinducing canse.
than taxes. We fail to see where there
has been any great shrinkage of value in
property iu Woodstown in the last three
years. Property here, when offered for
sale, mas iouno reauy ouyers, notwith-
standing u goes oegglhg u towns around
us. suppose properly IN Woodstown has
deprecated IN vaine, 1t is no evidence
that our water works Is tne direct or
indirect cause. is tnere not general
snrinkage Oh values everywhere, ard in
almost everything except the rate of in
terest and the usurious loaning of money +?
The general and deploraDle shrinkage of
values everywhere IS the result OF some