The citizen-Republican. (Scotland, Bon Homme County, S.D.) 1???-19??, 1905-07-13
SLUMP IN MORAL MARKET
Rev. Washington GLADDEN. Makes This
Assertion in an Address to
Christian EnGeavorers.

Asbury Park, n. J., July 11.-'There is
a general slump of conscience in the moral
market of the present day." was the dec
larations of the Rev. Washington GLADDEN.
before the Christian Endeavor convention,
in the Lyric theatre. Mr.. GLADDEN. said
this slump was evident in politics, fl
nancial circles, fashionable circles, and in
the church. Mr.. GLADDEN. said in his
speech on The Education of the Con-
science:'
There is a tremendous amount of I'M
educated or m~iseducated conscience in
this country today. People in good society
and people Who are members of our
churches, people who are known as our
leading citizens are doing things which
are horribly wrong; and neither do their
own consciences protest nor is there any
moral sense in the community which ad-
equately disapproves their ~wrongdoing.
The things which have been going on OF
late can only be explained upon the theory
of a general slump of conscience, in finan.
cial circles, and in political circles, and in
society, and, most deplorable of all, in the
church itself.
Country Needs "Tonina Up."
THE one thing that this country wants
today is not better laws or better methods
Of administration, but a clearing up and
toning up Of the consciences Of it's citi-
ZenS.
while the young people of our churches
are considering what culture could do for
them and what they are going to do with
their culture. L hope that they will give
heed. first of all, to this primary need of
the training Of their c~onsciences, so that
they shall speak promptly and decisively
upon the practical moral questions with
which they will have to deal.
Another point OIL which the consciences
of most of us need toning up is that of in
dividual responsibility for corporate ac-
ton. Nearly everything is lone nowadays
by corporations.
No Morals in Commerce.
Corporations have no souls, and, of
course, can have no conscierces; upon this
theory the realm of industry and COM
merce is nearly vacated of moral signiti-
canoe.
THE point to be insisted on is thai ev-
cry member of the corporation is respon-
sible. The officers and directors are first
and most directly so. of course, and the
should be held firmly to their responsible
ity. Corporations are composed of men
and every nan has a conscience.
''If by force of cunning a group of men
should manage 10 extort 81, coo a year from
each of 100 good citizens of the city where
you live, they would think it a monstrous
crime, as would you
Watered Stock but Another Name.
"But suppose that the same group of
men, by watering the stock of a street
railway, make it necessary to keep the
fares half a cent higher than they other
wise need be, and they levy $1,000 00 a year
in half cents upon 100000 people-this does
not seem to most of us a serious matter.
Now, it is to be noted that most of the
great fortunes of our day have been
heaped up by this method of securing
~monopolies, by virtue of which it has
been possible to lay under tribute millions
of people and to collect from them small
tolls in slightly enhanced cost of the nee.
e~ssaries of life"