The Topeka state journal. [volume] (Topeka, Kansas) 1892-1980, 1908-08-29
A SATURDAY SERMON.

He that despiseth his neishbor sinneth:
but he that hath mercy on the poor,
happy Is he. Proverbs XVII
One OF the most interesting OF the
state campaigns this summer was the
contest between Charles s. Deneen
and Richard Yates for the Republi-
can nomination fol- the governorship
OF Illinois. And, to the humanitarian.
the most interesting phase OF that
campaign was the issue Of kindness
and mercy to the criminals and un-
fortunates in the penal. charitable and
eleemosynary institutions of that
state. Each man had been governor.
One went before the public asserting
that the others administration had
been neglectful of the welfare of the
states charges. The other retorted in
kind. The list of people killed and
manned in the Illinois institutions
during the administrations of both
candidates looks grewsome. And yet,
it is good to think that we have
reached a stage Of mercifulness in
which the care of criminals the poor
and the unfortunate by the state looms
UP as an important issue. in cam
paign, and in which the voters can be
stirred to horror at the cruelty and
neglect of them.
1t was not always so. History teens
with stories of awful cruelty to the
unfortunate. The thieves crucif1ed on
Calvary are but two of myriads. The
blackened stakes of martyrs are few
as compared with those on which were
impaled men who broke the Draconian
statutes of the past. The trees bore
corpses instead of fruit. Felons were
gyved together, the irons fostering in
| rotted limbs. Children sneered at per-
sons standing in the pillory. and. hurled
stones in their unprotected faces.
Women like Hester Prynne, be-
trayed by those in whom they had
trusted, were made to stand with their
faces shut in by wooden blocks for
men to leer into, with the mark of
their shame branded upon them.
Debtors were left to starve in prison
in London. no later than the time of
Dickens. While as to the man of
proven guilt. he was one upon whom
it was a virtue to cast contempt, and
pity for him was a sin.
In foul Play one of Charles
Reade's novels, young man who has
violated his convict's parole, is cast
away on an island with a young girl,
the daughter of an officer in the Brit
ish navy. For months the convict
lives with her on the island, caring
| for her as for sister, delicate, con-
siderate, manly, chivalrous. Finally
her father finds her, and learns of the
fine manliness of the young convict
toward the girl, under circumstances
peculiar in their temptations. And
the novel largely turns on the strug-
| gle which goes on with the father be-
tween his duty to give the convict up
to punishment, and his gratitude to-
ward him for saving his daughter
from death. and preserving her from
worse than death.
| Now here's the mark of changed
| feelings. No novelist of today would
think of such a struggle. It would be.
almost absurd. The officer would now
be represented as protecting the con-
Wet and rewarding him, and readers
would universally look upon giving
him UP as horrible and unjustffable
| ingratitude and cruelty
The quality of mercy, says Shake
speare, is not strained. 1t droppeth as
the gentle rain from heaven upon the
place beneath. And it comes late in
the process of evolution. We Ameri-
cans, as people, may be a bit lax in
our ideas of law enforcement. Doubt
less we are too lax. But our mercy
toward the erring does not arise alone
from contempt for law. 1t comes
from a deep-seated mercifulness in
our hearts, such as never was seen in
any past age-and from doubt as to
the real good arising from the punish
ment of one man by another. In the
latter we RAY be in error. But for
the rising tide of love in mans heart,
let us thank God. Let us thank God
that Yates and Deneen appealed to a
constituency that care in their hearts
for the welfare of chose sick and in
prison" That constituency is no diff
ferent in this particular regard than
the constituencies in every state in the
Union. The members Of these con-
stituencies are all the happier for the
mercifulness of feeling toward the
poor and unfortunate that is in them.
And the further thought occurs that
this is a good time and a good place
to live in.