The herald and news. [volume] (Newberry S.C.) 1903-1937, 1910-08-16

: Sluu1uS OF virtue IS lue dFO1uduCe VI
vice. He might we'll have added, that
/ resistance OF the natural inclination
to wrong-doing, is very, very large
element of virtue throughout human
| life. This attractiveness of evil was
properly acknowledged though with
rather coarse frankness, by the
French woman after a draught of
cold water when thirsty ''It is delight
full" said she, and added: 1T would
be positively delicious, if it only had
a little sin in it." Indeed, there would
be no merit or strength, or substance
in virtue if we had no tendency to
vice to contend against.
What shall be said of literature
which not only gives no assistance
against vice, but operates as its ally
and promotes by adding to its own
inherent attractions those Of adorn-
ment and pleasurable favoring? Why,
just this: it is poisoned food made
sweet to the taste; it is eXhilarating
wine drugged with fatal chemicals;
it is gorgeous clothing reekng with
the germs of foulest disease; it is a
perfumed atmosphere laden with
''death-dealing vapors. 1t not only
hinders virtuous thought d nd pur-
pose, but makes its devotees ayerse
to them, and craving of vicious cours-
es; it not only leads to vicious living,
but renders the spirit vicious in its
very essence.
The literature I am condemning is
that found in novels, magazines. and
Sunday newspapers. OF course many
novels are not only chaste but i'm
proving; many magazine articles are
va liable, and large part Of almost
any Sunday newspaper is proper
reading. But a considerable proper
ton of the novels Of the day display
vice, and even filth, invitingly clad
and perfumed, and if there is Sum
day newspaper which publishes only
proper news and proper stories and
sketches, I am not acquainted with
it. And the trouble is that this hurt
full literature is read by the young,
who are very susceptible to all sorts
of influences, and with whom all i'm
pressions are deeper and more lasting
than those received by mature per-
sons And the youthful maiden, the
person whom it is most important to
rear and train virtuously, is most
frequently the victim. Our heather
boys in great part escape the conta-
mination, because the most Of them
read hardly anything, and most of the
readers pay very little attention to
the little they read. But it is differ
ent with a girl between, say, IA and
20 years of age. Her nerves are SEN
sitive, her imagination is eXcitable,
her sentiments crave occupation, she
INDUCES much in dreams, and plans,
and longings for larger, fuller, more
stirring life Her spiritual fran is a
rich field ready and waiting for use.
If the seed wheat of virtue is planted
there, the harvest of a pure and use
full life may ordinarily be expected;
! if the tares Of vicious thought and
sentiment are sown there, the yield is
pretty sure to be vanity, Incidence,
ill-teIlper, selishness, coarse thought,
coarse taste and coarse manners, and
often something worse than any OF
these A woman so perverted is at
best a drag and a nuisance; as a
mother, she is a positive curse to her
child and to the community
I do not refer in what have said
to the matter of physical chastity.
The white female in the South is rare
ly lacking in that quality. The tradi-
tions of our people, the censorship OF
her sex, the teaching and example Of
female parents or guardians, and
some other influences which need not
be mentioned, keep her from falling
in that way. And the custom of hus-
bands and male relations to kill i
woman's seducer commonly deters
men from attempting woman's ruin.
But this same young female is often
sadly distorted in her development by
the constant reading of gorgeously
worded stories of bright, bold, dash
ing heroines-heroines who ride and
drive horses which men can not man
age-heroines who wrangle in public
with men, and demolish them-he-
roines who, extrava gantly dressed, and
not much more than half covered, set
men frantic by the display of their
charms -heroines who spend their
days in idIeness, and their nights in