The evening times., 1899-07-14
has not been weaker in the bluegrass Com
monwealth in a decade than Il Is today.
4 Problem In Morals.

town in Maine presents a question in
ethics which is rather interesting. Those
who take their recreation in the solving OF
chess problems and other recondite puz-
zles may be interested in deciding just
what the right and wrong of the affair
was.
1t seems that the library committee OF
the Sunday school attached to one OF the
two churches in this little town had an at
tack of morals and started out to expur-
gate the library. They had suspicion
that some of the books therein contained
were not of a nature suited to Sunday
reading for the young So they investi-
gated the collection, and found that II
was even. SO. Many of the volumes con-
tained matter which was surprisingly and
dangerously secular.
1t may be remarked in passing that the
writer of Sunday school book in these
modern days has one OF the most Gin
cult of tasks before him. When all that
was needed for such work was an angel
child, some unregenerate parents and play
mates, bad boy to put an end 10 the
angel in fit of POSSIBLY justihable) rage
and a few poor people as objects OF charity,
making a Sunday school book was as sim
pie a matter as carving the solemn cherub
on the colonial tombstone. But nowadays
young people demand human nature in
their reading, and it is rather hard to COM
bine human nature and theology in a
novel without spelling all three. The hu-
man nature is outraged the theology is
twisted, and the novel is a horrible cyea-
ton Thus the conscientious writer is
forced TO make a choice and sacrifice one
of these elements to the others. "A certain
once-popular writer of this type of litera-
ture followed the simple plan of making
all her love affairs theological The hero
sometimes began his courtship by asking
young lady Tin railway station. the
| lady being total stranger) whether or not
she was a Christian, and, If not why not
The young lady was generally struck with
remorse, and his words haunted" her
| Perhaps he gave her tract, which OBJ
stinately refused to be thrown away OF
| concealed under books or boxes. and, ol
course, she had too much reverence for II
| to throw it into the stove or tear it to
bits. And SO the thing went on ill al
the people in the book were happily gath
cred into prayer meeting circles. 1t il
difficult to see why this sort of move
should have been popular, but it was
Perhaps the reason lay in the fact tha
there always was a romance of some sor
In the book, and it generally ended happily
and youthful readers will forgive much fol
the sake of that
But the library Of this Maine Sunda!
school was not made up wholly of thu
works Of "Pansy" When the inspection
was finished and the books Objectionable
had been thrown out, the censors foun'
TO their perplexity that the excluded vol
umes were of very high class from lit
terary point of view, and they were thrift.
souls, and hated to throw such good read
ing away, or burn it. So they compro
missed They gave the books to the othe
Echurch for its Sunday school library.
Now, the question is this: Was this ac
ton right or wrong?. Were the people o
the first church iustiiable in placing in tn
way of their neighbors temptation whicl
| they rigidly removed from the vicinity 0
their own children? OF course, it is proba
BILE that the other church was greatl
benefited by the donation, but that ha
nothing to do with the case. What was tn
effect upon the moral character of the don
ors, and what will they have to say TO
themselves when they are asked in the da
of judgment what they did with that goo
literature? Was their action an indicatio
of dawning common sense, of thrift vic
torious over conscience, or OF plain malic
toward believers of another form OF faith
The psychological problem is worthy tn
Eattention of Mary E. Wilkins or William
Dean Howells.