The St. Louis Republic. [volume] (St. Louis, Mo.) 1888-1919, 1903-09-24
PRESERVE EQUILIBRIUM.

Public purpose should be fixed, but the public
mind should be kept free to comprehend the whole
situation. Missouri must guard morality against de-
moralization. Good helmsmen hold the PROV true 20
direction, but in order to do so they do not fix the
eye immovably upon a single point of the compass.
Rather they look about them to observe all the con-
ditions of sea and sky and port.
Incident to an experience of tremendous moral
agitation there are several dangers, one of which is
the danger of becoming morbid. Certainly there is
enough of vice in sight to inspire the public breast
with a sort of tragic melancholy, provided the public
does not maintain its moral equilibrium. The at
mosphere is filled with rumors; inquests and discov-
cries and exposures are rife, and the tone of public
discussion is condemnatory. A tendency. at such Il
time, to dwell upon only the ug,iness of things is
perhaps but natural.
And it is dangerous. To assume that there is but
one thing in creation is pitiable weakness.
Corruption is the vital thing-to, be rid of. The
lobby must be wiped out; the boodler eliminated;
the unfit politician deprived of power; criminals
prosecuted and punished; laws inimical to society's
clean purposes abolished. But the process of re-
form in its larger sense-which is synonymous with
progress-is dual; it is constructive as well as cura-
tive. If society is 10 be laid under a morbid spell
by the single and undisturbed contemplation of vi
ciousness, then it is rendered powerless both as to
destroying the viciousness itself and as to positive
or constructive works.
Our ears are attuneJ to the story of corruption.
and we are curious for the story. We should not go
to the lengths of pruriency. However ~virtuous may
be our concern for public morals, we should stop
short of the prudishness which is a sort of pruri-
ency. That is a hopeless state, fatal to purpose.
Preserve a sense of proportions. Missouri is
bad only as it is judged by its own standards.
Rnlotiroly II 10 uood EScontio1lr IL &c GOOD Con
slider its dominant forces, its several institutions
which make for good, the controlling motives of its
people and the specific purposes which animate
them in the present experience. Consider the cor
receive and curative forces which it contains within
itself. Lose sight of the good, and the reason for
overcoming the bad disappears. Indeed, there must
always be the light of purpose and of hope. We
must regard evil optimistically if we would conquer
it; looking beyond it to a brighter situation. We
cannot afford to stop awe-struck, wrapt in contem-
plation of the vicious for its own sake. Nor can
We allow ourselves to sink by the way, over
whelmed, despOndent.
No hopeful expressions, taking into consideration
the preponderance of honesty and integrity of mo-
tive and conduct in Missouri, need be mistaken for a
defense of a embarrassing of evil. Nor need a state
ment of evils comparative insigniticance. To re-
feet that corruption" the story of which has risen
out of this Commonwealth, like a vast black cloud
in the eyes of the world. signifies but the doings of
a small handful of men brings a sense of the extent
of its exaggeration. There have always been as
many criminals in Missouri as now; there have
never been fewer. The times are not as black as
they are painted. Men perform just as many good
works as they ever did; their. ideals are as whole
some; their purposes are as sane and as just. The
evils are not more characteristic of now than they
are of all times, nor is Missouri more susceptible of
them than in the past.