Evening star., 1922-05-14
BY THOMAS n. MARSHALL.
Former Vice President Of the
United States.

United States.
"ALEYRAND is recorded as
having said: "There seems
to be an inexplicable some
thing in me that brings bad
luck to governments that neglect
me-" He need not have used the
personal pronoun, singular. Diff
ferent as he was. he differed but
slightly from the ordinary man
who takes an interest in public
affairs. The wonder is how gov
ernments are able to succeed with
out pursuing the particular course
of conduct each one of us pre-
scrtbes. 1t is still more marvellous
how society manages to exist with
so little friction when it pays such
slight attention to the many things
which we deem to be of vital
moment.
Ono of the paradoxes of human
life Is that the broad-minded man
almost invariably Is narrow mind
ed and tho man mentally contract
ed usually is broad-minded within
the correct meaning of that word.
For Observation-Disclosures means prin-
ciples upon which a superstructure
may safely be erected. Yet a man
commonly denominated broad
minded Is one whose opinions are
vague and uncertain like those Of
the amiabie schoolmaster who was
willing to teach that the world was
either round or fiat, as the ma
jority Of his patrons desired. The
man who has knowledge and exact
information, courage and convic-
tion may invite the charge of being
narrow minded, but the few things
for which he stands are likely to
be vital factors in the progress
of the race.
X + X
As between the broad minded
and the narrow-minded, most of
us are neither. We accumulate
dislikes; we form prejudices: we
link certain persons with certain
courses of conduct: we assume that
conduct we do not like has been
induced by indulgence in thoughts
or principles which we do not like,
and illogically and irrationally we
trace evil to it's source.
We are fit to live in the world
which, of course, is full Of evil
only when we recognize that we
have been put here to strengthen
our moral natures by constant con-
hict with ever-recurring evils. We
are not quite what we ought to
be II we accumulate prejudices
against certain courses Of conduct
and then trace every evil to in
dulgenee in the thing which We do
not happen to approve of.
When I was Governor OF In
diana ! once appointed a rather
distinguished cleric as a delegate
on charities and corrections. On
his return Twas much amused by
his verbal report of the proceed
tngs and of the facts which were
adduced from the papers read and
speeches made. After it's first
general meeting the convention
had divided into sections and the
first section visited by my dele
gate was ono that had under spe-
Lamenting the prevalence of juve-
nile crime in the larger cities, a
tall. angular women. grim -visag-
ed. he described her and rat
trap-jawed, was talking about
cigarettes She told how many
millions were manufactured each
year. how many were supposed to
be consumed by the minors Of
America, how many Juvenile GRIM
inals were in the states where
minors could obtain cigarettes,
how many in the states where
they could not obtain them, and in
tho end she proved beyond the
shadow Of a doubt that 80 per cent
Of juvenile crime in America was
directly traceable to the deadly
cigarette.
X Il X +
Tho next morning this delegate
dropped. into the section consider
Ing the question of feeble-minded
children. Again general discus
sion was invited apd his friend Of
yesterday soon disclosed statistics
that so per cent Of defective men,