The Wenatchee daily world. [volume] (Wenatchee, Wash.) 1905-1971, 1909-05-31
lows of necessity that his conduct will

, lows of necessity that his conduct will
be different.
In civilized countries the struggle
for existence is severe-the competi-
ton far sharper than in savage lands.
The consequence Is that there are
many failures. These failures lack,
it may be, opportunity Or brain or
moral force or industry, or something
without which, under the circum-
stances, success is impossible. Ger
tain lines of conduct are called legal.
and certain others criminal, and the
men who fail in one line may be
driven to the other How do We
know that it is possible for all people
to be honest? Are we certain that
all people can tell the truth? Is it
possible for all men to be generous
or candid or courageous?
I am perfectly satisfied that there
are millions of people incapable of
committing certain crimes, and it
may be true that there are millions
of others incapable of practicing GER
: tain virtues. We do not blame man
because he is not a sculptor, a poet,
a painter, or a statesman. We say
he has not the genius. Are we GER
ltain that it does not require genius
to be good? Where is the man with
: intelligence enough to take into con-
sideration the circumstances of each
tai balance with which 70 weigh the
forces of heredity, of want, of temp
tation-and who can analyZe with
certainty the mysterious motions of
the brain? Where and what are the
sources of vice and virtue? In what
lobscure and shadowy recesses of the
brain are passions born? And what
lis it that for the moment destroys
the sense of right and wrong?
Who knows to what extent reason
becomes the prisoner of passion-of
Isome strange and wild desire, the
seeds of which were sown, it may be,
thousands of years ago in the breast
of some savage? To what extent do
antecedents and surroundings affect
the moral sense?
Is 1t not possible that the tyranny
of governments, the injustice of ma
lions. the fierceness of what is called
the law, produce in the individual a
tendency in the same direction? Is
lit not true that the citizen is ape to
Initiate his nation? Society degrades
Its enemies-the individual seeks to
degrade his. Society plumbers its
enemies-the individual seeks to de-
grade his. Society kills it's enemies,
land possibly sows in the heart of some
Icitizen the seeds of murder.
Is it not true that the criminal is
a natural product, and that society
Iunconsciously produces these children
of vice? Can we not safely take an
other step, and say that the criminal
81 a victim, as the diseased and insane
land deformed he is afflicted with dis
lease-our desire is to find cure. We
send him, not to the penitentlary, but
to the hospital, to an asylum. We 10
this because we recognize the fact
that disease is naturally produced
that it is inherited from parents, or
the result of unconscious negligence,
or it may be of craftsmanship in
stead of Furnishing, we pity. If there
are diseases of the mind, of the brain,
as there are diseases of the body; and
if these diseases Of the mind, these
Ideformities of the brain, produce, and
necessarily produce, what we call
vice, why should we punish the GRIM
Iinal, and pity those who are physi-
cally diseased?
Socrates, in some respects at least
one of the wisest Of men, said: 1T
is strange that you should not be
angry when you meet d man with
an ill-conditioned body, and yet be
vexed when. you encounter one with
an ill-conditioned soul"
We know that there are deformed
bodies, and we are equally certain
that there are deformed minds.
| Of course, society has the right to
protect itself, no matter whether the
persons who attack its well-being are
responsible or not, no matter whether
lthey are sick in mind, or deformed in
Ibrain. The right of self-defense
Iexists, not only in the individual, but
| in society The great question is:
How shall this right of self-defense