The Irish standard., 1907-01-26
The Celebrated Catholic Priest Whose Scath-
ing Criticisms Of English Social
Conditions.
Has Attracted the Attention of All England;
is Jesuit and Brother of
Cardinal Vaughan.

far more cunning. They are actual
devourers Of men.
Give a man a code of morality or
immortality, as the case may be, and
you can tell almost to Il certainty how,
under any set Of given circumstances,
he will act; whereas, no matter what
may be a wonan's ideas of morality.
the only thing you can really be cer-
tain of is that you do not at all know
what, under any given circumstances,
she will do.
Who can convict OF sin the man who
has fancy for betting OH the race
course or in the card room, provided
he is not paying to bookmakers or
card players more than he is justified
in spending on his personal pleasure?
If Dives, the rich man Of the par
able, were to revisit the earth today
he would most surely have the entree
Of London's r.,sanaftest society set.
Dives, so well zrooased, with. such a
well-lined larder and such d. we'll
stocked cellar, would berthe very ideal
host to cultivate. -
We of this country, who represent
Dives, are suffering from the way we
treated the poorer nations, who repre-
sent Lazarus. Englishmen have been
telling other nations to- amend their
manners, and yet the English are the
last people in the world who ought
, to talk Of manners. 1t is nation Of
Dives.
When this Dives dies his coffin is
generally snotlered with roses and
lilies, those emblems of beauty and
, love and chastity of life. Alas! there
is no lie OH earth like the pageant of
a rich mans funeral, unless it be the
.epitap1l ON his tombstone.
Look at the struggle of the newly
rich to get into this Smart Set, and
i, the humiliations they suffer.
Nowadays this element hires guests
and Lady So and So" pocket the heavy
commission for arranging q, dance and
the guest list. 1t is she who receives
her friends, not the host by whom the
bill is paid. The hostess is treated
much like head waiter. 1t is a sad
thing to see men and women lick the
dust to have their names associated
with hired guests.
Society's fair votaries must be set up
by the best -milliner and fed by
the best man cook, and tlen-provid-
ed they are known at the opera by
their diamonds, and in Mayfair by
| their automobiles, and at Cowes by
their yachts-what does anything else
matter?
There is one sin less pardonablc
| than being dull, and that is being moor.
Study the question as you will, wrig-
gle out of it as you may, there is no
getting away from the fact that the
Smart Set is regarded by most people
as the concentrated essence OF self
tshness-as unclean and u,lwholesome
as any condemned product from Chi
cago.
| Certainly they do not give much
care to their children, nor good ex-
ample to their servants, nor consider
alton to their neighbor. Indeed, how
can they when the card table is their
center of gravity, and it's stakes their
highest ambition in life: And it is
we'll when the winning cards fall into
their hands. For them there is just
a chance of some dressmaker OF
tradesman being paid something on &C
count before becoming bankrupt.
With such examples of the misuse
of wealth before US it is a wonder
there are not more socialists than there
actually are.
There is no language to express the
thrill of horror which a Christian
gentleman feels when he pauses tc
reflect upon the consequences to his
dear country of the ideas now in