Daily Kennebec journal. [microfilm reel] (Augusta, Me.) 1870-1975, 1913-12-31
"Comradeshi

There Is promise of much good all
ment started in Cleveland. 1t would
work wonders In the social and political
life of the country If 1t were taken up
by the fathers with deep sense of their
parental obligations, which may be
summed up in the statement that the
father can help to make his son good
man and good citizen. But he must do
more than hope or desire; he must work
to that end, and the Cleveland plan
would put this theory into practise by
encouraging fathers to make comrades
of their sons and SO add both to the
sweetness of our private life and to the
value of our citizenship"
Boys yearn for this comradeship, and
this neglect lis often unfortunate. since
boys left to their own devices may easily
fall into mischief But the very same
thing applies to the other side of the
family. and perhaps even more sharply
for the one tremendous lesson found by
the Morals Efficiency Commission that
recently raked Pittsburg over is that the
] life delinquent is rooted In vicious ten
denotes developed under parental neg
I lect. Mothers, too, need to be more COM
panionable as regards their daughters.
The movement is no cure-all, but If it
takes hold of the country it viii I'M
lquestionahly do great good. In view of
1 all the current talk about social evils,
we should say that the time was ripe
| for this comradeship campaign.-Boston
Journal.
Every movement of any kind, in
! Christian spirit does good. We may
not see it in observable elimination
of evil, but it has to some extent halt
ed evil and has set some one or more
to thinking. Further and better, it
has probably aroused the sneers and
open hatred and antagonism of the
re a,,off 7oa 81
evil. That is progress. Nothing so
clarifies mems souls as to see their
own reflection in the mirror of OPP
position to good. Many men are daily
set on the right road by the kick
of recognition of the class with which
they have been training. Evil, with
all it's cunning, sometimes over-reach-
es itself.
When a man or a factor, who or
which has placed himself or itself I'M
questionably with civilizatio accept
ed evil tendencies, promptly sneers at
father and son" movement or any
analogous expression of Christian
hope and desire, then has the devil
blundered For the sneers of evil
arouse the intelligence of good men
to action.
Without question there burns in the
heart of almost every father the flame
of high hope and desire for his Off
spring. Only the intelligence lowered
below that of the brute by indulgence
of natural passions and appetites,
sinks beyond the reach of divine love
and hope-the desire that another
generation may say: "Old Blank was
depraved animal but his son is a
man."
But while fathers have the secret
desire and underlined hope, their par
entail obligations are largely guided
by tradition and environment. 1t is
not beyond justice to say that most
fathers are pitiful moral towards, who
fear that public discharge of parental
obligations would so outrage social
customs as 10 loosen their own grip
on the good fellowship of their ac-
customed stamping ground. Some men
fear the laugh" of certain few
good fellows" more than the loss of
confidence of all the rest of human
ity and their God.
So long as social folderol dominates
men they will prefer to be referred to
as "toughs'' rather than as religious
cranks," "goody goody morallsts," or
''ramrodders" And the man who ac-
quires a taste for good fatherhood
and tries to So live that he will throw
no moral stumbling blocks in the way
Of his son, rapidly builds up dis
taste for the insanity of good fellow
ship and hilarious make-believe.
These things explain why there is
So little observable father and son
comradeship. Both yearn for it and
both would be vastly better, morally
and physically, for 1t, but they are
largely kept apart by the idiocy of
living for appearances. Indeed, the
movement is not a cure-all but it is
wholesome growth of these progress
sive, thinking, clarifying times.