Atlanta semi-weekly journal. (Atlanta, Ga.) 1898-1920, 1910-01-18

ly near being Ieganzed robbery. 1t
might not be proper for minister to
denounce IL in strong terms; but If any
gentleman, who is not restrained by his
relation % society from using vigorous
speDch in the denunciation of a politi-
cal evil which is also a matter of party
politics, feels moved to speak in Sc
we're terms of the iniquities Of the pro-
tective tariff, there are at least some
ministers of the gospel who will find it
hard to interpose a plea for softer
words.
But when all is said that justice permits
about the part which the tariff plays in
bringing to pass the present high cost of
living, 1t remains true that there are 9TH
er causes operating to produce this I'M
happy result. There is one which may
be overlooked in the discussion of the
subject, although it is of the first i'm
portance A great deal of this trouble
arises from the migration of too many
people to the cities and towns and their
withdrawal from those lines of industry
in which the necessaries of life are pro-
duced.
Food and raiment in their raw state are
rural products and it may be said that
they come out of the ground; for even
such animal fibres as wool are closely
connected in their origin with pastures
and the soil. When many people want
them and few people make them, these
prime necessaries are going to rise in
price whether we have no trusts or many
trusts, high tariffs or low tariffs. AND
this is the fact today. Multiplied millions
want these things, and fewer people are
producing them.
Competent authorities tell us that while
tWaOfU-dUa fun frIS of ,a
people of the United Staes lived in the
country and one-third in town, now the
figures are reversed, and two-thirds live
in town while one-third live in the coun-
try. Under such conditions could any
thing but high prices for bread and meat
and cotton and wool and fax prevail?
Too many people have forsaken the
farm for such work as they are able to
pick up in the cities and towns. The re-
suit of his urban migration has begun to
work out the same results which it has
invariably brought to pass in all ages ana
in all lands where IL has taken place.
Historians note i as one of the causes
which operated to accomplish the decline
and fall of the Roman Empire.
One of the consequences which always
flow from the depopulation of the rural
districts and the overpopulaton of the
towns is the ruin and final disappearance
Oh the UllQQle Classes, Dy Ine
ton of great wealth in the hands of a
few and the coming of great want into
the homes of the many. In such condi-
ton of society the tendency is for the
rich to give themselves to constituencies,
luxury and license and the poor to re-
vengeful' resentment and revolution. Even
the fragment of middle class which for
time may remain becomes disconnected
and restless because they find themselves
unable to keep up with the riotous indul-
gence of the more opulent class which is
daily displayed before their eyes; in
their souls they begin to wish to indulge
I'm the follies which they profess to de-
spise. Such was the case in Rome. DR..
Gerhard Uhlhorn in his admirable work
entitled 1.-The Conflict of Christianity with
Heathenism' has this very suggestive
passage: Wealth is not merely hazard
Gus to the individual; 1t is also dangerous
to a nation, doubly dangerous when it
pours in suddenly, as in Rome, and has
not been gradually acquired as the fruit
of labour. In Rome it resulted in the
ruin of the middle class, the accumula-
ton of colossal wealth in the hands of
a few, the impoverishment of the masses,
and finally in unrestrained luxury and
voluptuousness. Antiquity had no
knowledge of a middle class, such as
modern times are acquainted with; for
lahour, the basis of a sound middle class,
was not regarded as honorable but as a
disgrace. Plato deemed 1t right to de-
spise man whose employment did not per-
nit them to devote themselves to their
friends and to the state. According to
Aristotle, all forms of labour which re-
quire physical strength are degrading to
a freeman" Such doctrines sent hum
dreds from the fields, of course; and the
same ideas, more or less prevalent
throughout the United States now, are
producing the same evil results with us
that they did in the ancient world.
Herein is a great fault of much of our
modern education; both parents and pu-
pills (and oftimes the teachers) regard it
as means for getting a living without