The Intermountain Catholic. (Salt Lake City [Utah] ;) 1899-1920, 1907-09-21
THE UNEM PLOYED.

bers at all times pathetic beyond expression dur
ing periods of dulness, depression or tlghtne5s
of the money market. furnishes an economic ques-
! ton which probably never will be settled. 1t GER
tainly will never be settled long as the army
exists, for the men and women composing it can
not settle it. and those whose position in the world
guarantees them life with all the necessities and
some of the luxuries do not approach the subject III
a manner sympathetic enough or sensible enough
to give any hope of solution.
The art of living receives small thought from
anybody People mostly take what they can and
give what they must. Some are hopeful, some hope
less but nearly all whose educational advantages
have not been seized made, ambe through life
with small ambition and smaller effort to realize
and bring what ambition they have to fruition
The unemployed are advised to get a job or go to
work, where how or why it is seldom stated. Very
seldom are the peculiarities of temperament which
amount sometimes to positive defects that handicap
the possessor all through his lfe considered in the
promiscuous advice to the unemployed to go to
work. Sometimes poor preacher is made of what
would have been a successful farmer The individ
ual is not given to introspection. Ambition may
lead to hope for things far beyond his physical
and mental qualifications and the secrets of the
great book of experience which some read uner-
ringly are lost forever on others. Without a fixed
philosophy, with no definite plan of life, man
with or without a Job unless he be favored by in
heritance of worldly goods, stands small chance of
meeting success as he travels the thorny road from
the cradle to the grave.
The prizes of life come only to the strong and
the brave, to the men whose nature loves combat
and with +ba
puny the timid, the unstable must inevitably bow
While the strength of the strong increases with the
passing years, the weakness of the weak is made
more manifest. Difficulties multiply as the road of
life is travelled and the guideposts may be read
only with the key furnished by experience. To the
who understands the secrets in that great book
of experience the lettering is plain, but to those
whose lessons produce but vague and shadowy out
lines the writing is in some hieroglyphics which
mean nothing They get on the wrong road; they
travel fast for while msinterpreting the signs of
the times, and plunge finally into broad field where
they meet poverty, hardship wickedness, tempta-
ton, crime. Oh if we could read unerringly the
guideposts on the great road of life, could travel
forever on the highway which leads to success and
leave the byways to the kline and the sheep, how
strong and brave would we all be- How little want
and Indebtedness and squalor would there be in the
world
But here comes the army of the unemployed
With a timd, down-hearted, hopeless look in their
faces, they seek assistance What is given them2
What do they require7
First of all, charity. And by charity we mean
not few, pennies or dollars but liberal spirit of
judgment, full of kindliness and good will, taking
81 IL,
peculiarities which have made them choose unfor-
tunately or unwisely vocation to which they are
not adapted or not to have chosen at all And then
give them job There is in this great country
enough of work to do and enough of the necessar-
les of life to alleviate all the misery and wretched
ness caused to willing workers who are unable to
obtain work.
In olden times the church was the sole relief
of those who needed advice and assistance, and it
remains today the greatest hunanistic force the
world knows, though the church's influence has suf
fered impairment through the enormous divisions
into sects and the growth of infdelity. Today,
while the church. and we include all the various
offshoots of Catholicism, each of which is attempt
ing to do what only one united force can accom-
while the church is doing more than
any other agency in the care of the unemployed
giving advice which only a free, untrammeled OPP
timistic and atruistic institution can give, hold
ing out the hand of fellowship to the weak and the
strong alike, and every day extending practical
aid to the needy, there yet remains the duty which
he strong owe to the weak to alleviate suffering
md to remedy the conditions which the latter in
heir weakness cannot.
The world is fit abode for all of Gods chill
iren, but few leaders and the many are fol-
overs. Bad leaders play upon the susceptibilities
# the weaklings, enrich themselves and render
more hopeless the condition of their followers 1t
s impossible to correct the deficiencies of the ma
critics. but not a hopeless task to place men of
terlng character in positions Of trust. Therein
les the only solution of the problem of the unen-
,loyed.