The Washington times. [volume] (Washington [D.C.]) 1902-1939, 1923-12-19
DR.. FRANK CRANES
DAILY EDITORIAL
The Viii to Shock.
By DIR. FRANK CRANE.

ESIDES the Will to Rule, in which the Germans
INDUCED for a spell; the Will to Serve, which
the Will to Rob and Steal and Burn and Murder
which is exemplified by savages both among the In
dams of the Wild West and the Thugs OF the Etfete
East, might also note among the furniture of the
human mind the Will to Shock.
This might also be termed the Will to Break Loose
It is one of the primordia instincts bubblng up
through the surface of civilization volcano let's the
concealed fire come to the surface OF the
earth n
The original stuff out of which human being is
made is bundle of instincts The primitive man was
collection of usts passions desires and the like and
these still constitute the driving force of the human
slowly commenced to regulate and tame these powers
so that he could them for his welfare and not
merely follow them to his distinctions just as he broke
the wild horse to carry him and draw his burdens.
All that civilization means is that man is learning to
control guide, coordinate and master his instincts
One of the strongest of these instincts is the desire
for individual self-expression We it in of it's
crude forms in the silly Bohemian who wants to Give
his own life.
Any of you can see the same thing cropping out in
your children, they good, healthy specimens.
Your boy just loves to do everything violently and say
in making healthy, vigorous girl behave properly
and mind her P's and Q's.
You dumfounded when your small boy comes
home from school day with terrible oath or
dreadful obscenity You lecture him, and he promises
to do it again, and yet the puzzle remainsWhy
does he take to that sort of thing?
If you mingle generally with men at the club in
business on the train or on the street. you will find
certain number of them seem to like profanity and
obscene expressions all the way from those that are
mild to those that are exceedingly strong
This is the old instinct for Individual Expression
breaking out. All lives trained to keep
ourselves in hand to develop and strengthen the inhb
tons, in other words to be decent and respectable
There is good deal of Wild native blood in many of
us that chafes at this. There colts who
simply resist the impulse to kick the traces
Every effort to tame the human spirit and bring it
into order and usefulness is resisted by that savage
primitive force we are seeking to harness
This is what the Prohibition idea up against The
intelligence of the world has long that the of
alcohol works tremendous damage to the human
Eventually of course it will have to be eliminated. It
is unthinkable to suppose that humanity will go
forever doing a thing which science reason and con-
science condemn.
But the early efforts to curb drunkenness which is
the mans form of chilshness, is met by the ir
ritabe rebellion that meet in your children when
you try to teach them to speak softly and not YELL to
sit straight and not sprawl to talk English and
slang and profanity, and altogether to regulate their
wild, natural instincts by those nhibons which
along so much later in the history of evolution.
Profanity and Obscenity the Volcanoes of Civil
cation.
Copyright, Mcclure