Evening public ledger. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1914-1942, 1922-02-06
MORE DRAMA TO PROVE THAT
you CAN'T GET BY WITH 1T
The Swifter the Social Pace Is the
Quicker Il Brings You to the
Inevitable Smash

E(Nii 1911 WrlterS ike Mr. W els anu MT
- Bennett we're the first TO report at
length upon the devastation worked by easy
money in some avenues Of modern society
At intervals in the past rich and undis-
ciplined persons--those who had come by
great wealth without having had the cx-
rerience or the training necessary to the
proper use of money in quantty-got them
selves into trouble, into scandals or into
Jail in one spectacular fashion or another.
and We thought little of it, But the war
and the sudden rude disturbance of social
and economic balances that attended and
followed it widened the areas in which easy
money flowed and flew. Alterations once
peculiar 20 n small minority Of over moneycd
idlcrs became common 10 a far larger class.
The general result Of all this has been
apparent in the swifer pace Of London life,
in the reckless whirl Of jazz and gambling
in all continental cities and in the assertion
Of Broadway cabaret kings that they run
their places at n constantly Quickcning
tempo now not to please the professed
bounders. bur for the gilded youth Of the
good uptown families who hate to so home
before daylight.
The social conventions. observers say. are
going TO ruin. That is a misleading asser-
ton. 1t IS because the conventions remain
that the people who consistently disregard
them are going TO ruin of one sort or an
other. You have only TO read current ad-
vices from Hollywood to perceive that this
is the case.
Before Mr. Wells explored with despair
l.. II. 81, 6 7
pcriments adequate to reveal the worst
possible consequences Of easy money in eX-
rcssvc quantities were afoot in limited
and exclusive area at Hollywood, where
some of the most important and some of
the least important people in the film world
seem to have decided that social conventions
are things that can be done without.
Other people had learned and are con-
tnuing to learn that social discipline. as it
is ordinarily accepted has been an out
growth Of ages of hard human experience.
1t has grown from the wisdom of succeed
ing ages and generations. All sorts Of ex-
pcriments conducted by all sorts of people
tended always to prove that If you dance
! you have to pay the piper.
The rule operates for nations. groups and
| individuals and 1t is one of the few fixed
and certain things in this world. The trend
toward pagan license is not one in which
any one can have par: who isn't willing
| to endure the pains and discOmforts Of a
! smash.
The man found dead in his home in tho
movie colony probably wouldn't have be-
lieved this. Neither would Tho beautiful
| ladies who ere in Il way to be drawn into
| the shadow that hangs over Arbuck'c. And
neither would the sub dcbs of Broadway,
who are certain to find that tho years that
may hold the greatest happiness or the
| greatest misery lie II little beyond those
| years in which one may be tempted to view
the corsetcss age as the social millennium
Al-night dancing with jazz and under
ground gin Is bad not only for the mind
1t is bad for tho complexion and for repu-
tations. The unconventional sub deb viii
have to atone in one way or th" other or
what is more likely. in a number of ways.
The social conventions which were openly
thrown aside in some Of the more exclusive
sections of the Hollywood bungalow colon,
would have saved at least one life an,
quite few regulations and millions for th
magnates who have their money invcste'
in contracts and studios.
Here and abroad the cxhausting socia
pace has been quickened by people who
moderate enough before the war. foun
themselves suddenly rich after n riot o
profitcering There are times when it seem
that the anger of people who hated tn
proiteers was wasted. The money got b
people who didn't have any moral right t
it seems to be working its own peculia
vengeance on many of its possossors. 1t
burning them up. And it is in a way {
make life n desert for a good many of ,hci
| children.