Evening journal., 1897-09-08
MODERN sPARrANIsM.


A society of college graduates who
are physically perfect has been formed
to advance legislation that shall de-
stroy idiots, lunatics, deformed children
and old people. These are not useful
TO society, it is said, and should be
peacefully electrocuted" out of exis-
tence. Electrocutedl And these peo-
pie call themselves college graduates [!
Let the first "electrocution" be per-
formed on the inventor of that out
rageous word. The idea of these reform
ers, according to their spokeswoman, a
Mrs. McGovern, is to improve the hui
man race by wedding it's inapt mem
bers out Of it, She says that she would
see her own child put to death without
a tremor If it were deformed. II is safe
to say that she has no children. The
scheme is destined to attract some at
tention, as It does every time it comes
up, which is perhaps once in ten years,
and if the society will buy an island
for itself in the Pacific some island
that has escaped the attention of Eng
land, 1t can create a republic there and
carry on "electrocutions" in the midst
of every objecting and troublesome
member.
But why is it that the loafer and
hoodlum are not mentioned in this pro-
hibitory catalogue? Why should re-
formers prey only on the harmless and
helpless? Surely old people who have
worked hard all their lives, who have
raised families and perhaps still make
themselves useful in small ways have
a right to year or two of rest. Idiots
are seldom obstreperous members of a
community except when they get into
Congress. One w-smashingayard-
invading, pistol-fring, yelling ruffian
such as we have in all parts of the city
does more injury to nerves and prop
erty in a week than all the imbeciles in
the state in a year.
AS to the deformed, and so on, if this
society is composed of college gradu-
ates, it ought to have acquired sense
enough in the course of its schooling
TO know that the worth of a man is in
what he does and not in the way he
looks. If all the cripples and homely
people had been killed off, by electricity
or by any other process, the world
would have been short of genius in
these days Probably it is the excep-
tion, rather than the rule, that genius
is as physically perfect, as the members
of this society are. His bent is not to-
ward his looFing-glass, but toward
his books, his laboratory, his piano, his
easel. Sir Isaac Newton was tiny
weakly child, and had he been destroy.
ed In babyhood somebody else wouC
have been Obliged to discover gravita
ton. Pope was a small and ill-shape,
man. Socrates was not pretty to lool
at. Napoleon, Caesar, Alexander, Mel
son and Sheridan were understood
Thoreau and Robert Louis Stevenson
had weak lungs. Byron had a mis-
shaped foot. Scott had to walk with
cane. A recent postmaster-general o
England was blind. Several painter
have been deaf. Beethoven kept oi
composing music after he had lost hi
hearing and Handel played his Sam
son" music when, like the hero of hi
oratorio he had lost his sight. Tn
picture Of Milton, blind, and debating
his lofty epics is familiar one Fam
Crosby, whose hymns are sung b.
thousands, is sightless. Talleyrand wa
lame Richard Ill, a maligned an
misrepresented monarch, a patron G
the arts and sciences, and encourage
OF learning, is remembered chiefly 70
his crook back. Alexander Stevens
Francis Parkman, William II. Prescoi
and Mrs. Browning are familiar exam
pies of those who did important stat
or book work in spite of weak bodit
or failing sight. Richard Jefferis wa
weakened and hampered by inherite
disease, yet he did an immense amour
OF work. Demosthenes, greatest of or;
tors, was born with weak voice and
stumbling, indistinct speech. Hem
Irving, greatest Of English actors, h;
a voice that is only to be understoC
after a special course of study. and tv
intractable legs. Instances might
multiplied if it were of any use, but
ought not to be. The physically impe
feot deserve our help and sympath
We do not want to get rid of them, c
pecially by violence. II is the moral
imperfect that have become a nuisanC
and the sooner we put them out of 4
way behind bars or in graves the be
ter for them and for all of US.
The hungry undertow will soon ma
way for the football field.
II the lungs of the people Of Ma