The Van Buren press., 1897-08-21
CAUSE AND EFFECT.
The Process of Making Paupers ane
Then Feeding Them.

the Process Oh mahihs g"
Then Feeding Them.
Athens had no poorhouses. The rea'
son why she had none was that she die
not supply the material with when
poorhouses are filed. Rome had as
many prisons, pro rata of her popula'
ton. as Boston. The reason why she
had as many was that she supplied the
material with which TO fill them. Rome
thought she was doing well when She
apprehended her criminals and pul
them into the Mamertine caves; Bos
ton thinks so also. Rome and Boston
have both fattered themselves win
the notion that they 'proteet society
by first producing and then caging
their criminals. Paris has as many
almshouses as New York, and both
Paris and New York have made the
wretehes who cry at the doors or DRIFT
in shoals along the streets. The reason
why Paris and New York have invented
the almshouse is because they first in
vented the beggars. II is no doubt fine
thing TO make. paupers and then to feed
themi
Observe how il works: The magniti
cent ladies' of Fifth avenue hold char
ity fair; they put thousands of dollars
into the Golfer, 10 be used in feeding
the squalid wretehes in their husbands
tenement houses They sleep that night
on their husbands breasts, thinking
how good they are! The great mer
chants and greater gamblers organize
a mont-de-piete. in which the poor and
half-starved bankrupts may pawn theiI
goods in order TO get the money to pay
rent TO the very men who invented the
big shop. l know of nothing more
beautiful; il is positively romantiei
What does all this signify2 Il sig
nifies that certain influences dominant
over man life and certain organized
powers in society have come down to
Us from the middle ages. and that these
influences and powers are so depraved
that they must in self-defense do some
thing to remedy the results of their
own abuses. They must trammel uI
the consequences little, to the end
that they may continue to despoil man
kind They must make a practical
apology to the human race by furnish
ing doubtful antidotes for the very dis
eases with which they have innoculated
the sons of men. They must save their
forfeited regulations by taking up and
fondling the poor wretches whom they
themselves have first begotten and then
disowned!
Monarchy is brute of this kind. II
is a monster that crushes down some
millions or billions of human beings
enslaves them, robs them of their lib
critics, take away the fruits of their
toll, consumes the residue in war and
lust-and then goes to work to make
the condition of the slaves so tolerable
that they may still live and have chill
dren!
A medieval church with its gothic
towers and marble palaces, with its
swarm of on-hangers and its fat men in
fashionable raiment, is another erea-
ture now busily engaged throughout
the world in trammeling up the con-
sequences of its own work. From fill
ing the world with paupers and slaves
this splendid reminiscence of darkness
and despair now turns in self-defense
to take care of its own progeny. The
great reminiscenee ought to do as
much, for it has never been regarded
as particularly meritorious to feed
ones own. How fine it is for the fruit
| full mother of outcasts and beggars to
| give them little counsel and coffeel
Plutocracy that snatehes the. wealth
Of the world from the hands of them
that produce it is another such mon
ster-plutocracy that spohges up the
ocean in order to water Siberia with
six drops! One drop is library; one
is a college; one is hospital. The IL
brary is to perpetuate the memory oi
the sponge; the college is to teach the
system of political economy by which
the sponge sucked up the ocean; the
hospital is to receive the broken bodies
of those whose families the sponge
might otherwise have, had to pay dam
ages.-Jobn Clark Ridpath, in Arena.