San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1897-05-16

| congregation that there is much need
of a moral sewerage system as there
is of a material one, and that the con-
ditions that necessitate these are not
so much unlike as it might at first
| sight appear. If it has not it will not
| be out of place for them to give their
| the jectWboIsodogvbgk
thoughtful attention to the subject and
see what there is in it.
And in this connection II is noteworthy
that the moral sewer system is needed
in the city rather than in the country.
Also, that the country people and those
in the city with country ideas imagine
that there is no need of such a system
in town because it is not needed in the
country. These men preach reform,
teach that all should be done in the
eye of day, condemn that which is in
secret, and contend that any provision
for these underground constructions
for the carrying off of the natural COR
ruption that is engendered in the pro-
cess of life, is wrong, only wrong and
that continually. That there is neither
moral health or soundness or any ap-
proach to better things in thus acting
is as true as that there is no improve
ment to the public health in refusing
to construct sewers, or to have them
placed under ground and so sealed that
there is no possible escape of their
poisonous gases into the houses that
are connected with the sewer pipes.
In the supply and wastage of life
there is engendered a certain mass of
effete and corrupt material that must
be carried away or buried out of sight
and smell. Life is not possible with
out this being done. The more perfect
the civilization, the living condition,
the provisions for cleanliness and
health, the more perfectly, that is the
more secretly, securely, silently, per-
fectly is this carrying off of life's
wastage accomplished. In fact so nat
urally is it done under a perfect sys-
tenn that there are thousands who new
er consider that it is being done at all.
What is true of physical life is true
of all moral and even of intellectual
life. In it's processes there is much en-
gendered that needs to be carried out
of sight and sound
Distnfectants act a very important
part in caring for effete matter in
small quantities, but this is only a
temporary relief and there is the dis
infected mass to be disposed of after
all. There is>nO use in hiding our eyes
to the facts. In all the living among
men, no matter of what tribe or kim
dred or nation or tongue, there is en-
gendered a mass of moral corruption
that it is the duty of the state and the
municipality and the nation to keep
out of sight. That it is as necessary
to provide for the carrying off in I'M
der ground cOnduits this scum of hui
man passion and crime is as certain
as it is that the sewers of a city
should be put under ground and their
air passages into the dwellings hermet-
ically sealed by the latest scientific APP
planes. This moral sewerage is an
art that is yet in it's infancy.
There is no more need in a well regu-
lated community of the innocent
members of society coming into con-
tact with the criminal, the pure with
the vicious, than there is of the clean
and the foul physically coming into
contact in the work of life These
all must meet on the street, as that
thorOughfare is open to all, but the
SMUT On the HlIny man lace uOeS not
rub off on you as you pass, nor does
the vice under the silken garments of
your vicious neighbor enter your soul,
because you pass down the same pave.
What is needed, is a sewer system,
that will so care for the corruptions
of the mind and life as to see that 1t
does not run in unsightly streams over
the face of the community and poison
all the air.
You cannot dam it up, or swear that
it has no existence because you deny
it an outlet. The more you do this the
more it thiCkens and grows corrupt
and sickens the city and the state.
1t is not the province of the Light
preacher to establish a moral sewer
system. His task is accomplished in
calling attention to the facts In urg-
ing the people who are building sewers
to protect their physical health, not to
neglect the proper means for sewering
the morals, or rather immorals of the
city. Change the course of life you
cannot and corruption comes as the
natural result of life's process. Vice
also comes and it is as necessary to
provide your sewers for that as for the
other. He that hath ears to hear let
him hear what the Light preacher
says
AMEN