The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1897-06-07
CAUSES OF HARD TIMES

Discussed by Rev. DIR. Dickerman in an
Address at Church of the Redeemer Last
Neutrality-suspicious. Views of Existing
Social and Economic ConditiOns-What
We May Expect of the Future.
Rev. Or. Dickerman preached at the
Church of the Messiah last evening,
taking as his topic Hard Times" DR..
Dickerman said among other things
that he did not believe that the middle
classes Of the country are suffering SO
much as is generally believed. He
said:
1.-THE people of the United States last
year spent $22,OOooOO for chewing gum.
How the missionary societies would
like to own that gum and sell it. The
people of this poverty stricken country
expended in 1898 $40O,00O,000 for amuse-
ments. Take the s22,OO000O and the
$4OO,000,O0O and distribute 1t among the
people of this country reported as SUI
fering it would drive the wolf from
the door of every poverty stricken fam
lily and the s22,000,000 alone would sup
ply the want of all the mission stations
in the country for forty years. In
1896 for jewelry $6OO,000,00O were spent
If you can't keep warm put on another
breast pin. Eight hundred million dol
lars were spent for tobacco and $1,40O,-
100000 for intoxicants.
us this the cause of hard times?
Undoubtedly, to a large extent, it is.
If these sums could have been spent for
bread, clothes and education, how much
good 1t would have done. These sums
exceed the national debt of the United
States. We are living beyond the level
of ordinary conditions of prosperity.
We have been drunk with prosperity
and expect by legislation to restore the
good times OF few years ago. In the
future there will be less of wealth but
more of prosperity in the United States.
The people, the masses are coming to
envy their richer neighbors; they are
making demands, and their children are
being educated and are making more
demands. They want to stand higher
than the children of a generation ago.
The rewards Of labor are not sufficient
ly ample to meet these increased de-
mands for culture. The mechanic OF
to-day is not satisfied with the social
status accorded to him in the former
times He is aspiring, and his life has
become to a degree artificial. This an
rest, this uneasiness is one of the causes
of hard times. The mechanic has be-
come a knowing man and wants to rise
but has not the means to do so.
1--WE must realize that society is an
organism and that all this will come by
growth, but not by revolution. The
great thought in the minds of the
American people to-day and in fact
in the minds of the world is that there
is sort of reality in what Jesus called
the Kingdom Of Heaven; that there
must come into the world an equality
of opportunity and privilege, where
there will be no abject poverty nor ex'
cessive wealth, and that happy dream
is within the dreams of the reasonable
dreamer of the day.
'The old days of opportunity for ex'
cessive wealth gathering are passing
away. The prosperity of future day:
will come out of the idea of brother.
hood. In place of the elevation of mer
here and there to positions of wealth
and honor. such elevation must COME
to ALL But instead of cursing the In
situations of to-day it is better to ed
ucate and lay the foundations for the
coming of the better kingdom and b.
thankful for what we now have.