Daily capital journal. (Salem, Oregon) 1903-1919, 1904-03-10
BEING GOOD
BY PROXY
DOrthy Dix Tells What She Knows
About It, and Study of Her Ideas
Wa1 Give YOu Some Of Your
Own and Convince YOu She
Knows It Pretty Near
ly All

friend is another woman who will
lend us her new sleeve pattern before
she has used it herself and who will
let us dictate to her about her clubs
and whom she will invite to her pink
tea. We frequently admire our own
disposition because we get along har-
moniously with people who will re.
frain from rubbing us the wrong way.
When II comes to economy It is
somebody else's extravaganza that wo.
man usually lops off first A woman
in boasting of her achievements in
this line once said to me: why. /
made my husband wear the same suit
Of clothes for three years" But this
same woman explained that it was
economy for her to go to the best
dressmaker. Anyway, she cut off all
Of her husbands indulgences, and they
got rich, and to this day she always
attributes their success to his having
had such an economical wife. A man
never knows until after he Is married
that IL is economy to give up cigars
in order that you may put the money
in bric-a-brac A woman's burnt offer
ings are usually made of somebo ly
else's taste.
Self-sacrifice has always been re-
garded as woman's star virtue. but
even in this he generally manages
to sacrifice somebody else instead of
herself. II is the same spirit that
prompted Artemus Ward, in a burst
Of patriotism, to declare that he was
willing to sacrifice all OF his wife's
| relations to put down the rebellion.
Women are unconscious OF this, but
when you hear one railing at the friv-
olity of fashion you may be sure that
she is too lazy to dress. and when
you hear one assert that she believes
in plain living and high thinking, and
that she sets her face against the
pleasures OF the table. you may rest
assured that she is a dyspeptic who
has no appetite anyway.
Active In Promoting Charity.
The phase Of this mania, however,
that women have for being good by
proxy that is most Objectionable, and
that is in peculiar evidence during
Lent, is the habit they have of max
ing somebody else foot the bills for
their charity. In every city through.
out the country there is coterie OF
women who outdo the scriptures in
not letting their left hand know what
their right hand gives, for their pock-
etbook never finds II out at all. They
sustain a flourishing reputation for
generosity and philanthropy, and are
conspicuous on hospital committees
and orphan asylum boards. They are
the head and front of every church
fair. and missionary bazaar, and tea
and are supposed by people on the
outside to be lavish givers, yet they
never contribute a cent Of their own
money
Let a case Of destitution be kncwn
and such a woman claps on her bonnet
and is out collecting food and cloth
ing for the sufferers from her neigh
bors, but II never occurs TO her C
supply their needs from her own store
room. Let a church fair be started
and she gives herself nervous pros
tration rushing around soliciting con
tributions from merchants, but yot
never hear OF her digging down into
her own pockets and fishing up cent
Her generosity. which is lauded II
the papers and heralded through the
consists in holding up other people and
consiss in holding up other people and
making them give.
Touching Stories Pass On.
Il is pleasant TO be charitable Wher
il doesn't cost you anything, and one
Of the reasons that women are 50 easi
" touched is because they expect e
touch somebody else for the price Of
their sympathy / have a suspicion
that there would be about a millioi
fewer causes" in the world If women