The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-05-02
:" The Most Dnkiadest Cut. =


- At+NN -" 49, -@t~@F
steam ever. to stop, and he IS very much
too dreadful ever to die. So. as long
as the world lasts the people on it may
expect him around. unless, Of course,
the images all give out and at the
present rate Of destruction that doesn't
seem very improbable contingency.
A. seon as the last image gets broken
ne viii ole on tho spot, Tor he couldn't
i've without his occupation; but just
Jet another image get set up IN any
podys sanctum and he viii come 70
HE and present himself. siedge-hann-
iner IN hand. to shiver into 10000 frag-
ments the creation, however beautiful
or heroic it may be. however long II
may have been in the chiseling. how
ever thick around it may circle a halo
OF heart associations. however green #
may have grown with the gathered
MOSES and liehens Of the centuries.
He began with you early in your life.
he tried In one form or another to
make you see with his eyes that your
faVorite doll was not really flesh and
blood, but was only dilapidated bisque
and dirty kid and chipped up paint and
saWdust. He could rot quite accom-
plish that for she had slept too long
in Your arms You had felt her too
often shiver with cold or pain. she had
nestled too deep into your heart she
had received too many of your sacred
est condolences. she had given you too
much sympathy for you TO look at her
as he did But what he said about her
left you with a choking sensati0 tn
your throat and sharp little pain in
your heart az you bore her away out OF
the sight of his dreadful basilisk eyes.
Then. perhaps in another form. he
came 10 you, and at one cruel blow ne
crushed into atoms the figure Of your
childho0ds best friend. the figure that
had had q part in all your sweetest
dreams. that had been remem bered in
your childish prayers. the revered fig
ure Of the saint OF the Christmas sea-
son. After that it was not as hard for
the demon OF the siedge hammer to
reach and overthrow the other images
which YOU had set up or which had
been set up for you. He stops at moth
ing, this destroyer. Let anything take
the form Of an image and he spies it
out and lays IL low. Long enough ago
he has felled the images which stood
out from the pages Of history, song
and story. With his hammer of word
or a phrase or a date he has crushed
these images into the dust of the new
er-having- been. William Tell. Joan Of
Arc, Mary Stuart. Robin Hood, all the
heroes and heroines of your youthful
days, have been Clipped and hacked
past any recognition by his blows.
Even the knight of the crusade days
who was TO your boyish eyes the en-
b0diment Of all that was truest, purest.
braFest, best, ne has melted down into
a barbarous mingling of greed and
cruelty OF selfshness. -idleness and de-
bauchery. Whatever was best and
most encouraging and ennObling to be-
heve in profane history has fallen I'M
der the hammer Of his authority into
the dust Of the mythical, and as for
sacred history he is turning it surely
into a molten mass OF fable. romance
or falsehood.
He long ago attacked the lion. and
from his throne where he was set as
kinE Of the forest he has degraded him
into the most Bringing coward among
the beasts. He has even had a fling
al the ant and tried TO throw the tiny
creature down from the niche where
King Solomon had left her in full view
Of twenty-nine centuries of slug
CARDS. But as long as she is able 10
be up and more than willing to be at
work all day and al night. as she still
is at our house, I think she Will hear
unmoved all the ieOnoelastic efforts.
Yes. it was the icOnoclast, the ICON /
oclast out of a Job. that aimed that
Lord Bacon blow at even the image
OF Shakespeare. He didn't succeed in /
getting it down. but it tottered for =
moment on its pedestal. and for that
moment the breaker OF images was
very near to the seventh heaven OF
fiendish bliss.
Then there was 1900. the year one
thousand nine hundred. We all re-
member with what delight ne shivered
its image into atoms and stood gloating
over the ruin he had wrought. Which
one Of US had not set up an image
once. and once It seemed to US that We
would reach It in a future almost too
remote for contemplation. Ten years
before It came a small girl said to her
blooming N ther. "You viii be dead
OF old age when 1900 gets here; won't
you, poor mamma? p" A school girl got /
n letter dated in 1895. and signed, I
Yours, till 1900 (then YOU are nninel- /
TOm;" 1900 was good bit off then, and
so. wonder or a year.
Young or old, rich or poor, most of
US, whether or not We would confess TO
the weakness, had looked forward in
one way or another TO the time when
we would stop writing Is at the tops
stead. We gave 1900 a niche all to it.
self. and most Of US believed that it !
would in some way bring to US bless
ing. We reached it. and-but when we
had gotten TO the place where the
shadow Of the image fell upon us we
began 10 make plans and new resolves /
for the new life so soon to dawn upon
US. We were all having such q good
time building castles in which we were
going to live when 1900 came. We were
going to be at peace then with all men
and all women; we were going 10 have
an understanding of all old misunder-
standings: we were going to forgive all
wrongs OF supposed wrongs that we
had sufferedy We we're going to get
forgiven for all that we had done or
left undOne We were almost ready
for the new era. when the iCOnOClast
called For he called. Just as he al
ways did and always VIII DO, he called.
And ne didn't leave his sledge hammer
at home. He brought it with him,
brand new one. and with his ssrdonic
grin he raised il high above his head.
and when it fell. the image, the beauti-
fUl image OF 1900 was no more. This
If the hammer that did the work: THE
new century will dawn at 1901 a. IN. Of
Jan I. 1901
We knew that All Of US could count
But somehow we hadn't counted. It
had seemed so much nicer not TO count.
but after that We had TO count. OF
course So we gathered up q nat we
could Of the fragments Cf our fallen
image and glued them t0gethsr FOR
1901. but It was but a sorry show that
it made. And that's the reason. the
iconoclast is the reason that we went
on. all Of US. faulty. awkward, STUN
bling way, since the new century came
thar We went in the old
He despises not the day Of small
things. the iconoclast. He appreciates