Rensselaer Republican, Volume 19, Number 51, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 25 August 1887 — VICTIMS OF CIVILIZATION. [ARTICLE]

VICTIMS OF CIVILIZATION.

People Among Whom the True Field ot Sympathy and Charity Idee. Providence Journal. ' ' The vast increase of material prosperity is the most remarkable feature of the present century. Almost unlimited qualities of the precious metals have been dug out of the earth; natural forces, steam, electricity, fire and water have b?en adapted to the production of wealth; improve ethods of tilling the soil have greatly increased its productive power; cheap means of transportation and pommercial lines to all quarters of the world have placed the productions of every climate within the reach of all but the poorest, whereas but a century ago they were at the command of only the wealthiest. Better educational methods, clearer ideas of religion, philanthropic agencies, improved sanitary regulations, and discoveries in medical science have all contributed to the elevation of the face. These agencies, operating very low down in society, have been of incalculable benaflt; and while they have raised one class very high, placing all the world has at the command of the millionaire, it should not be forgotten that they have correspondingly raised the great majority of the poor. There is bo doubt that the laborer is better paid, better housed, fed and clothed, his children better educated, and his mental and spiritual needs better met than ever before. These elevating influences are constantly extending their operations, going down still lower, and gradually getting control of the disastrous forces that had so long preyed upon human life. It seems to be ar that we have •nly to be patient to witnesa the final triumph of these elevating influences, and that this can take place, not py revolution, but only by the silent and gradual operation of natural laws. While we may not hope for the abolition •f poverty and the extinction of suffering, may hope for the gradual lessening of these evils. This fact seems to have been forgotton.not onlj by anarchists, but by labor reformers, antipoverty men and theorists in general, who assume that only revolution can correct evils which others besides themselves equally recognize and deplore. What is needed, however, is not revolution, but faith jn those influences which have already civilized man, andfeem to have no limitation of their power to elevate the race, if only a little time and -patience lire given. At the same time it is equally evident that in the mean time there is a class below the line of elevation, where circumstances, through no fault of their own, are made harder by the very conprosperity

greater. The tendency at present is to make this class appear larger than it is, and to place within it many who do not really belong there. About the ablebodied and the quick-witted we need not worry. Much of the expressed Sympathy with the laboring class is misplaced. If it be true that they are insufficiently paid, the influences above mentioned are certainly elevating their condition, and it is better to-day than yesterday, and will be still better tomorrow. And in any case they can be trusted to win their rights, as all rights have to be won, in competition with existing forces. The true field of sympathy is among those whom civilization unfits for any struggles who are neither able-bodied nor clear-minded, and whom the fierce competition of life is depressing still lower and destroying. They are not only “prisoners of poverty,” but prisoners of disease, and may be called the victims of our civilization. The high pressure under which we live makes it certain that many will be born with weak and nervous organizations. They bear the penalty of the increased mental activity of the race. Many disabled by accident, widows ahd children w’hose natural protectors have fallen in the struggle to keep up in the rapid pace at which life moves, and the larger number who, from inherited mental and moral weakness, are incompetent, belong to this class. The factory and the tenement systems have their victims. Our disregard, of -well-known sanitary laws, misplaced municipal econemy and unchecked intemperance and crime have their victims, who, without any fault of their own, have to bear the penalty of our neglect. Any one whose work lies among the poor knows how enormous they are. They may be found in the cheaper tenements of every city, where sanitary conditions are worst, with pale faces and imploring eyes and emaciated bodies that tell of insufficient food and malarial air.

4 ' T< They are simply victims, and can not be truly called by any other name—victims of our mean economy, selfishness, love of our own comfort, and carlessness about the way the less fortunate classes are living. We do not any longer publicly offer human sacrifices to supposed gods, but in back streets and unhealthy tenements such sacrifices are being daily offered to the gods Mammon, Self ishness, Indifference, and to the god Civilization. Nor can any one of us plead entire innocence of complicity. The victims are lower millstones to our lipper, and are ground by the same forces that are elevating us. It is among these unfortunate and dependent people that the true field o sympathy and charity lies. To neglect them. aeemsnot only a cruelty, hut a meanness. To care for them is not so

much an act of charity as of duty. To be mindful of thia, duty is one of the most beautiful teachings of the Christian religion. There is not a line of its teachings which sanctions indiscriminate almsgiving—the feeding of the idle hungry or the clothing of the lazy naked; but for the sick, the infirm, the weak and the incompetent it has always taught relief and care. Just the air is heated and the most favorable places are uncomfortable, it is certain that great actual and undeserved suffering exists, which comes too painfully to the notice of city missionaries and those in charge of hospitals and homes for •hildren or aged men and women. If the favored many who are leaving the city for comfort or pleasure would leave behind them a contribution to the fresh air fund, the hospital, the Day nursery the Woman’s City Missionary Society, or other institutions whose work is entirely among the “victims of civilization,” it would relieve much actual distress and perhaps make their own enjoyment greater.