Evening star., 1914-07-19
The TEN COMMANDMENTS
By DIR. FRANK CRANE.
Copyright, 1914. by Frank Crane.)

The champion fool of the world Is the
person who thinks he can beat the Ten
| Commandments or any one of them.
will not call him wicked. That would
please him. There is a perverted streak
in human nature that. at least in many
instances. makes a man feel perked up
when he gets a reputation for being an
expert in evil. So will call him a fool.
which is an ancient and spiritual epithet
And if that is not enough let us call him
an ass.
The most curious of all histories is the
history not of perversion. but of pride In
perversion.
The trait appears early. The boy who
can chew tobacco, swear, lie and steal
has a sort of halo in the eyes of other
boys.
The bad man" of the wild west who
shoots up the town. the .'gunman" OF the
slums and the tough country boy dare
devil all feel certain self-conceit, a su-
periority over the decent
So the man about town" in high So
ciety, the woman who has her fling. and
all the eXperimenters in intoXicauon ana
licentiousness entertain a feeling of lead
ership; well founded. il must be con-
fessed, since they are the envy OF the
young asses of the field
1t is useless to tell them that their en-
terprise is not new IL has been tried
over and over: each succeeding generation
has thought it could beat the game.
The end has invariably been dreariness.
a Ioathing of life and the kiss OF death.
Meanwhile the Ten Commandments
stand firm. They are as true now as the
day when they came fresh from the hand
of the great lawgiver.
Thou shalt not lie. Thou shalt not
steal. Thou shalt not commit adultery.
IL L. URd q
human soul that could beat them.
Around the tables of Monte Carlo gath
an unfailing troop OF fools. They are
eternally trying. The record is one of
the game makes enough to pay all the
expenses of the dukedom. Still. oc-
casionally some one does break the bank.
But in the great game of beating the
Ten Commandments nobody succeeds
One may seem to succeed But follow
him. BY and by fate comes along with
the az Visit him; eventually he lands
in boredom, or pessimism. or some other
mudhole.
4 boy the other day in Passaic broke
into a house and stole S1.I5 in order to
get money to go to school. He got his
quickly He is now in prison. He was
fortunate in that the Ten arose and
whacked him at once.
They don't always They have a way
of waiting. as the butcher waits for the
OK to get fat. For have you noticed how
certain men who once stole and cheated
in railways. stocks and big business.
and called ii high finance" have had to
make for cover? Have you read OF the
grand and clever schemes certain lobby
lists put over for years at Washington
and what happened to them?
Have you read the columns of divorce,
scandal and disgrace? 1t is the old Ten
finishing up a few jobs that have run
along far enough.
1t is not alone in what happened to
this and that caught criminal: it Is also
in the unpublished stories of ruined. salt
and wretched lives. thick about us all.
that you may read the everlasting.
tale of the fool who
thought he could get by.
So. if you have any sense at all. son.
think twice before you try to climb over
the fence of the Ten Commandments.