The Miller press. [volume] (Miller, S.D.) 190?-current, 1923-05-24
By REV. D. J. QUILI.AN

preceded, accompanied, and now has
followed the most terrible tragedy in
the annals of mankind. The true spirit
of work SENS to have vanished from
millions of men.
In all countries losses by such ces-
sations from labor are little as com
pared with those due to the spirit
which in England is called ''ca' can
n.y. or the Sinking of performance OF
work, and Of sabotage, which means
the deliberat destruction OF machin-
cry in operation. Everywhere the
phenomenon has been observed that,
with the highest wages known in the
history Of modern times, there has
been an dnmistakable lessening of eff
ficiency, and that with an increase
in the number OF workers, there has
been a decrease In output. The trans
pcrtation companies i'm the United
States have seriously made o claim
against the United States Government
for damages to their roads, amount
ing to $750,000, 900, claimed to be due
to the inefficieIcy of labor during the
period Of governmental operation.
There is no better evidence of the
prevalent excessive thirst for our plea
sure than the press, which is, in our
time, the brief abstract and chroni-
Gle of the times" and which shows
the body of the age, cts form and
pressure What a transformation OF
human values of the modern news
paper discIoses. Once largely the re-
cord of mans higher achievements, in
it's discussion OF literature, art and
politics, today, with some honorable
exceptions, its space is largely devot-
ed to the ephemeral and the trivial.
Pages are devoted to sport, and even
to ignoble forms of sport; while liter
airy, art and musical reviews and
scientific discussions are either omit
ed altogether, or are grudgingly given
a little space once a week.
What better illustrations OF this ex-
~traordinary revaluation of personals
ties and incidents than the prize fight
between Dempsey and Carpenter in
Jersey City-a duel which was in
marked contrast to another fatcfui
encounter on the neighboring heights
Of Weehawken more than a centery
ago between Burr and Hamilton.
Nearly one hundred thousand men and
women of all classes and conditions
and from all parts of the world as
sembled in Jersey City on July 2, 1921
many of them only to crafty their
faded appetites for a new thrill; and
| fer many months before and for weeks
thereafter the press devoted, not mere
ly columns, but whole pages to this
worthless trial of brute strength.
OF the last count in the Pope's in
dictment, | shall say but little. 1t Is
enough for me to- say that, while the
church as an institution continues to
exist, the belief in the supernatural
and even in the spiritual has been
suppianted in the souls of millions OF
men by a gross and debasing mater
ialism.
The present WEAKNESS and lassitude
CT human spirit and the disappoint-
ment and disillusion as to the after
math of the harvest of blood, may
have aggravated, but they could not
cause the symptoms Of which i speak;
, for the very obvious reason hat all
these symptoms were in existance and
apparent to a few discerning men for
decades before the war. Indeed, it is
possible that the World War. far from
causing the malaise of the age, was.
in itself, but one OF its many symp-
toms.
Undoubtedly, there are many contri-
buting causes which have swollen the
turbid tide OF this worldwide rev.
~olution against the spirit OF authority.
Thus. the multiplicity OF laws does
not tend to develop a law-abiding
spirit. This fact has often been noted
Thus Napoleon, on the v of the 18th
Brumaire, complained that France
with a thousands folios of law. was a
iawless nation. PROFESSIONALLY, the
political state suffers in authority by
the abuse of legislation, and especially
by the appeal to law to curb evils that
are best left to individual conscience