Omaha daily bee., 1903-06-21
The Battle. in the City

existed in a dull despair that men mis-
called content Now they have life, hope,
activity, spurred on to life by the oppor-
tunity in this new land If l were rail
road man with $4,000 OO0 to invest l should
not know how much to put into a railroad
and how much into a college. 1 am not
sure that Il railroad would not render the
best service Of the twO-much better than
some colleges. Here are the great news
papers. l do not think I quite agree with
Jefferson when he said that he would
rather have a country without government
than without newspapers. But l am quite
certain that we could get along without
congress for a year better than we could
get along without newspapers for year.
Wonderful enterprises they are, reaching
their hands out into all the world and
gathering all the news from all the world,
and serving 1t to us with our breakfast
coffee. They are great educators. They
teach us what we are. how much our Civili-
zation is, how much of solid mahogany and
how much very thin veneer Here are the
great schools. To the towns and cities
come the parents. bringing their children
to be educated, because in the towns and
cities the great universities, the great
Industrial and professional schools Here
the public school is seen at it's best. Here
too are the great churches. Protestant,
Catholic, Jewish. do not say there are
not preachers able, devOut, in many
a country village in the metropolitan
pulpits We are too prone to measure Il
man by the place he stands in rather
than by the work he is doing. Yet in the
main the great preachers and pastors are
to be found largely in the great cities.
Here are the auxiliary institutions, the
Young Mems Christian associations. the
Daughters of the King, the various mis-
sionary boards. They center here. have
their direction here. are moulded and
shaped here; but their influence does not
end here. and from these cities these
homes from these churches goes out a
stream of beneficence to bless our own land
and to bless other lands. l had occasion
ten years ago to make inquiry as to what
the churches in the city of Brooklyn were
doing: | found that in that one year they
had spent 2,250,000 on religious work. and
81. $685. eco on charitable work outside the
churches. And Brooklyn is not an excep-
tionally rich city. nor has it done nearly
much as New York. Thus we have
these two forces standing face to face in
the city, wrestling with each other the
forces of sensuality and vice and crime
and ignorance, and the forces of virtue
and intelligence and courage and moral
purpose. Here they meet at close quarters
We jostle one another on the same car,
we walk by one another on the same
street, we live beside one another on the
same block, l am not sure that We do not
sometimes kneel by the side of one an
other in the same church.
The question of political reform, there
fore is not a political question. 1t is the
battle of the ages in a microcosm 1t is
not problem that can be solved by a
political panacea or settled in half an hour
1t cannot be settled by electing one party
or another to office. Turn the Democratic
rascals out" and leave the city as it is, and
the republican rascals will come in Turn
the republican rascals out" and leave the
city as it is, and the democratic rascals will