The Climax-Madisonian. (Richmond, Madison County, Ky.) 1914-1917, 1914-10-07
&SATURDAY
1 NIGHT
4 SERMONS
BY
MRM'suElW PuRNEll
THE NAV OF THE MONSTER.


murderer named Cain. The city he
named Enoch. As a preacher l look
my Bible through and I see city after
city-always evil. Always is the city
recorded as the hotbed of crime and
sin, the place where young life is soil
ed and damned. AS a journalist. lee
turer and traveller / look outside my
Bible, view the Christian centuries and
the same apparently holds true, from
the city which Cain built to New York.
Chicago and San Francisco.
Men seem always wanting to build
cities Possibly that gregarious in
stinct Is a true one. God makes the
country; man builds the city. God put
him first in a garden; not long till he
is q vagabond and builds city. The
city is fascinating because Of its hui
man interest Its atmosphere is far
reaching Beyond its smoky horizon
the moral breath Of great center OF
population is carried by currents Great
ed by newspaper, magazine and per-
sonal contact. An odor, sweet or foul,
Is carried on the wings of the wind to
village and farm. The country initiates
the city as a younger lad an older.
Mode of dress, variety Of amusement,
social custom is introduced largely by
city to country.
The Nav of the Monster.
Were you raised In the country Do
you remember your first Impressions
You saw houses instead of hills,
streets instead Of streams, men In
stead of meadows. You commented
that the city grew nothing but men.
You remember the unpleasant thrill
when your city cousins said, "The soil
of the city Is not as fertile as that OF
the country, but 1t is better adapted to
the sowing Of wild oats" You tried
to smile at his witticism, but 1t was
forced. Human history repeats itself
because it is human. The old Greek
tradition OF the doomed youths and
maidens who were every year chosen
by lot from the city of Athens to be
sent as tribute to the Minotaur, who
ievoured them, is living history to-
day. The modern city pays Its toll,
and the toll is always In young and
precious human lives, who must per
ish In the nav of the monster. The
Minotaur, who asked only fourteen
lives, was mercy itself compared with
the NAV of a modern metropolis. The
city seems at times an insensate mon
ster, ready to devour and crush all
that life holds of sweetness and beau
ty. 1t seems to pound upon the hearts
of men and women, making them as
hard as the pavement they tread. 1t
seems to turn existence into strug-
gle for survival, in which the wolfish
ara6 ind Icad
by a fierce passion to clutch desper-
ate advantage above the heads of the
crowd. The law Of the crowd is the
law Of the jungle, whereby the weak
must run and hide or else be preyed
upon. Might makes right, and no sense
of kinship or neighborliness stands in
the way of the domineering overload
ship of the strong, occupying. unchal-
lenged, the seats of the mighty.
The City Streets.
Men may sleep, but the city is sleep
less. All night long there is an indie
terminate roar and rumble, separate
sounds fused and blended in one.
yelling to a climax in early morning,
dying again at shutdown, never wholly
still, like the seas unending in
quietude. To one In the mood it is
only the City of the Dreadful Night,
never the City of Beautiful Day. One
murmurs:
Could but wander
Home, away yonder,
Far from your fretting noises and heats,
Sweeter than olden
April dreams golden
Would be forgetting you, city streetsi
The history of the street is the his
tory Of the day. Different in different
hours as in different years. At 8
o'clock milk wagons rattle by; at $50
the humber toilers hurry by with pale
unrefreshed faces; at 8 the roar Of
traffic is trumpetlike. There is a rush
and a clang Of cars, and an army is
pressing forward. at noon there is a
Iull; the multitude is feeding. At
rubber tires are where groaning wheels
have been. Incidence, luxury and re
pose are on the way to river drive
and park. At the crowd, like a flood
returned, surges through the street.
The toilers are hurrying home.
The Great White Way.
Street crowd psychology Is subtle.
If in that fierce struggle Of the day
one leelS lOSI sense Oh INDIVIDUALITY,
feels his personality non est, leaf In
q forest, a grain of sand by the shore,
a drop in a great river, each hour in
creasing the sense Of loneliness, help
lessness and submergence, night
changes all. Aladdin has rubbed his
wondrous lamp. After dinner lights
are blinking; theaters are gathering
their devotees; glimpses of lace and
jewels; beauty bares its breast to
ravished eyes. Ostentation of wealth.
in its profusion, staggering
in its effrontery. Shop windows dis
play products Of commerce created by
vanity and voluptuousness. That
makes 1t impossible to distinguish
women of fashion and women of the
street. Wickedness Is rampant, but
well clad. Forbidden fruit Is frankly
forced forward. There Is dedication
Of the bizarre and suggestive. That
which shocks the simple scarcely jars
the jaded The monster is a serpent
at night, sleek. shining. sinister. For
a raw recruit the street between and
II is Gettysburg or Waterloo.