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About The Hesperian / (Lincoln, Neb.) 1885-1899 | View Entire Issue (Jan. 15, 1891)
THE HESPERIAN. among all people will give icalism the widest possible field for its influence. These arc some of the evils of realism. For what good is it? Not for beauty, for it reproduces the beauty in nature, man and man's works blotted and disfigured as we sec it, and docs not believe that the beauty and the disfiguration are separate things aim that it is the province of the mind to re fine the one and remove the other. Neither is it for good ness, for the basest traits of character and the most ordinary circumstancss arc represented, and this without any other purpose or end than analysis. Is it for truth, then? Some bay, "Yes!" "To follow truth where'er the truth may lead, with bosom franchiscd and allegiance clear." IJut what if the truth docs not lead anywhere? What if it is a meie col lection of unconnected facts not capable of being added to gether by any human arithmetic to form any sort of a whole and therefoie barren of result? What good is there in that? It is not even counting the pebbles on the sea shoie to find out what the shore is like; it is counting the pebbles without any purpose at all. I may believe that in the first place real ism had a purpose, that it desired to show that common and waste things contributed their part to the general stock of use and beauty, and consequent cncigy and hope. Hut this idea has vanished and in lace of it we have a mere transcript of a great many pieces of things.Thcsc seem to be valueless even allowing that there is any intention of putting them together to torin atiuth, for in mental phenomena the whole is not equal to the sum of all its parts. A man's life is not all that he has ever done in the world, but all that he has done that tended in one direction, and the world tendency which may lead us on to a glimpse of its final aim is not what every body is dointr, but what is everybody is doing to a common end. Neither in the indirect value of amusement nor in the direct value of use docs realism seem to me to offer adequate answer to the question why it should exist. And if it offers none, 1 protest against it as earnestly and forcibly as I may. We have only to look around us to see that in spite of the aids of civilization; human nature is too weak to spare any of the forces that save it from straying into bye-ways where there is no road onward and no glimpse of any road onward; but only stagnation and decay. In spite of our boasted pro gress we arc yet so near the edge of barbarism and brutality, and petty, shallow scoffing incancss that wc dare not risk a single plank which separates u from the abyss, except in the hope of getting a better one. When realism may assure us of a better thing than the pursuit of the highest form of the good, the true and the beautiful, it will liavs a substantial purpose oi which we may take hold. In the meantime these arc thousands of things in the world which arc not worth knowing and would not be worth knowing if we might live hundreds of years instead of three score and ten. I cry out against the attempt to distract us with needless, beautiful, purposeless details, when there arc so many things to be learned which wc must kiow, if wc are to be anything more than vegetables or brutes, if the sum of us is to be anything over the growth and decay of non-effective civilizations. Wc need every force wc may get, mental, moral and physical. Is realism a force in any of these directions? If it is not, it is a weakness, and wc had better put it aside. I. u, CURRENT COMMENT. $75.00 to $250.00 a month can be made woiking fur us. Persons preferred who can furnish a horse and give their uholc time to the business. Spaic moments maybe profit ably employed also. A few vacancies in towns and cities. H. F. JOHNSON & CO., 1009 Main St., Richmond, Va. The condition of the Jews in Russia today is creating a great deal of excitement and enlisting the sympathies of nearly all civilized people outside of Russia. Ever since Russia adopted a system of annexation she has had a great deal of trouble as to what she should do with hci Jewish population. In all probability the late czar, Alexander II, would have settled the problem if he had lived a year or two longer for he had consented to emancipate the Jews; but his death occurcd before the plan was consummated. His son, and successor, had a dislike for the Jews and succeeded in retarding the settlement of the dispute so that it is no nearer a settlement now than it ever was. It is very hard to determine what object Russia has in view in pel scenting the Jews so relentlessly. Probably jealousy has a great deal to do with it (or the Jews arc un doubtedly of a higher order of civilization than theii C'lirr tian pcisccutors. If it is not jealousy that causes this hatred on the pert of Russian authorities, why do they forbear to persecute these Jews that forsake their religion and adopt the orthodox one? If Russians think that the race is more susccptibc to the influences of civilization, why do they allow Jews obtaining an education to compiisc only one tenth of the total number of students? Such a law exists and it seems to us that when that law came into existence it was one of the cruellest measures that was ever enacted It forced many Jews to give up the work and desire of their life, and return to their "vile" psoplc to live and die. Jews are human beings as well as Russians, and when they were separated from that which they most cherished, it was but enacting over again the scenes that took place when slavery was practiced in this country; when, at the auction block, membcis of families weic torn from each other and sent to endure tortures away Irom the sight and companion ship of each other. The fact that the Jews will not be persecuted if they for sake their religion, places them in the condition of the Christians during the time of Polycarp, who, when brought befoie the emperor at the time of the persecutions, was told that he would be saved from death if he would curse Christ. What the Russian officials want, is to extirpate Judaism, root and branch. They aie afraid of its power, and hence they grind the Jews down in every manner possible. They impose on them a system of taxation that is simply baiba rous, worse than tho extortions at Rome during the pciiod of cmpiic. Jews have to pay a certain percentage on flic lent they 1 cceivc from their houses, shops, stores, and gran aries; they pay a percentage on the gross income they icccive from the sale of wine in public inns. Finally they have to pay a fine for wearing certaain Hebrew apparel .is the following quotation from the statute book indi:alcs; "All Jews who desire to wear a skull cap arc hereby subjected to permanent tax of neither more nor less than five silver troubles a year each." It is to be deplored that such a stale of affairs exists. In every way possible the Jews are foiled and checkmated 011 every side until it is no wonder that they resort to trickery and every cunning scheme their imaginative brain can devise to thwart their persecutors' plans, and gain their own ends. It is to be hoped that foreign nations may have some in fluence over Russian authorities, and prevail upon tlicin to give up this vile work, and accord to the Jews the position they desire in civilbcd society. Call and see Cope at 117 North Twelfth sticct.