White Pine news weekly mining review. [volume] (East Ely, Nev.) 1910-1920, 1912-12-29
FROM THE BOTTOM
OF THE PYRAMID.
Selected BY Edwin Markham

In "The Man Farthest Down
Booker Washington gives the OBJ
seryations of his two months
Journey throughout laboring Eu-
rope investigating the conditions
of life among the men and women
at the bottom of the pyramid of
civilization. Mr.. Washington on
this pilgrimage saw many things
that were dark and depressing, but
he closes thus optimistically:
Under the old system in Eu-
rope-the feudal system, or what
ever else II may at various times
have been Standardization be
gan at the top. There were a few
people who were free. They had all
the wealth. the power and the learn
ing in their hands, or at their COM
mand. When anything was done It
was because they wished it or be-
cause they commanded it.
In order to give them this free
dom and secur to them this power
il was necessary that vast numbers
of other people should live in igno-
rance, without any knowledge of, or
share in any but the petty life of the
estate or the community to which
they belonged. They We're not per
mitted ia move from the spot in
which they were born without the
permission of their masters. IL was,
in their case, almost a crime to think.
II was the same system. in the South
ern States before the war, with the
exception hat the serfs in Europe
we're white, while the slaves in the
Southern States were black.
I'm Europe today the great
problem to which statesmen are
giving their thought and attention
Is not not how to hold the masses of
the people down, but how to lift
them up; how to make them more
efficient in their labor and give them
a more intelligent share and interest
in the life of the community and
state of which they are a part.
Everywhere in Europe the idea is
gaining ground and influence that
the work of civilization must begin
at the bottom instead of at the top.
Education is seeking to reach and
touch every class and every indiyi-
dual of every class in the community.
The deaf, the blind, the detectives
of every description fitting them for
trades in which they will be more
useful to the community and more
independent that 1t was possible for
them to be when no attempt was
made to fit them for any place in the
life of the community.
THE effect of this movement, or
revolution, as | have called it, is not
to ear down and level up in order to
bring about an artificial equality;
but to give every individual a chance
to make good to determine for him
self his place and position In the
community by the character and
quality of the services he is able to
perform.
Zone effect of this change in point
of view which | have described is
that today there is hardly any one
thing in which the people Of Europe
are more concerned than in the pro-
gress and future of the man farthest
down.
Behind all the movements which
have affected the masses of the PEG
ple-socialism, nationalism, emisra-
ton, the movements for the reorgan.
~ization of city and county life-there
has always been the Underman.
cropping his way upward, struggling
to rise; and the effect of all that has
been done to lift the man at the
bottom, or to encourage him to lift
himself. has been to raise the level
of every man above him.
1T is true. as l have often said,
that n man cannot hold another
down in the ditch without staying
down in the ditch with him; 1t Is
Just as true that, in helping the man
who Is down to rise, the mar who is
up is freeing himself from a burden