Omaha daily bee., 1916-03-11
Hon. the w eUkLl11g
Gossip Becomes
.Gl0nt Scandal
By BEATRICE FAIRFAX.

The critical faculty Is one in which
no human being is lacking. No matter
how lowly the station of an individual
or how underdeveloped his mentality. he
finds someone to look down upon and
criticise 1t seems foregone conclusion
that everyone in the world of today is
going to knock" just about everyone
else.
How could she do this" How dare
he do that?" How under the sun
could they be guilty of such conduct"
such comments fairly fly whenever
two are gathered together. Human
beings confess readily enough that they
like a harmless bit OF gossip. and fail
utterly to realize that that harmless
bit OF gossip grows in the telling and
assumes the proportions OF harmful
bit OF scandal.
with every breath reputation dies"
IIideously truel We have often dis
cussed In this little circle Of ours the
evils Of Rossip-its unfalrness 70 others,
its cruelty to It's objects. But now it lie
worth while to consider its greater HARM
fulness-which is subjective.
None OF US can be sure what we would
10 were we in the position in which
some one else is placed. The old story
81 John Bunyan and the criminal who
was going to be hanged applies all
. through life. Said he: There, but for
Nhe grace Of God. goes John Bunyan.'
And there. but for the grace Of God.
goes any one Of us in any set OF cir
cum stances, however unimaginable, or
contemplate. or painful.
How is any one OF us to know what
we would have done in circumstances
which tempted some one else to wrong
doing, or even to his undoing?
Any one who has a poor heredity.
who Is brought up in bad environment.
who has the handicap Of physical ILL
health to swing his mentality from the
healthful, and who meets the particular
set of temptations best calculated to
break down his own set OF defenses, 10
pathetically likely to yield to tempta-
ton
To one of us money is the temptation
that is practically irresistible, Hasn't
each of us heard some sturdily honest
individual say to a bank cashier or to
the handler OF money in any large con-
Germ, II wouldn't want to be In your
place. Doesn't handling all that money
every day drive you almost mad with the
longing to have 1t for your OWN
Now, probably. the particular indivld-
ual who was advanced to that position
is there pretty largely because he is
an individual OF commercial honesty
Most abscondng treasurers and cashiers
run away. not because they have yielded
60 the temptation directly due to their
money responsibility, but because of some
outside influence--the races, cards, drink
or even an Illicit love affair. And prob
ably an individual who meant to be hon
est and who thought he was honest
yielded to just the particular Temptation
an inherited and cultivated tendencS
toward a certain sort of weakness made
too big for his power OF resistance
Cultivating strong inhibition and strons
power over ourselves is likely to hell
any one of us to resist temptation Bu
not all of us know this. Not all OF VI
train ourselves early in life TO resist oui
own weaknesses. The self-indulgent boS
WhcSe parents let MIN nave MS V"h wa
and who makes everybody else let hin
have his own way is training himself fol
manhood in which he will want some
thing 10 which he has no right, M
which his own desperate desires TO hav'
what he wants when he wants II viii
make him the victim.
How can any Of us know what set o
circumstances makes one man THE
and another an honored citizen? Tn
thing for us to do is to get at the foun
dations. help raise standards of honest
and virtue. help make other rewards pos
,slble for virtue than merely virtue itself
$what we need is to get at causes o
crime. So az once we eliminate to n
even greater extent our own cruel tend
ency 20 judge IL.
And that swings US back full circle L
the magnificent summing up to it al
witch each OF us may find in the Bool
o. Books:
fudge not, that ye be not judged