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About The courier. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1894-1903 | View Entire Issue (Aug. 10, 1895)
VOL. 10, NO 34. ESTABLISHED IN 1SSG, PRIGE FIVE CENTS '-W cry j LINCOLN, NEB., SATURDAY, AUGUST 10 1893. OBSERVATIONS. C-NCE or twice, when he seemed to y deserve it, it has been a genuine J pleasure to commend Governor Holcomb. There have been, at times, gratifying indications on the part of the populist governor of a purposed rising above his political environment for tho sake of true patriotism, and hopes were entertained that Nebraska might jet be proud of her straddling governor who blundered into office. But these hopes were short lived. I am afraid that the man who appointed Mart Howe and E. C. Rewick to office is, after all, on the Howe and Rewick level. It doesn't seem to be an easy matter to make a patriot out of a populist. Governor Holcomb is manifesting a populist's disregard for law and order, and his puppet perform ances in response to the string-pullings of the suffering Mr. Rosewater are not calculated to commend him to the favor able consideration of tho people. Jt is a great deal better, dear Governor Hol comb to follow the law, than it is to follow populist prejudice or the erratic and mentally and morally untrustworthy Mr. Rosewater. I am moved to deep and abiding mirth by theexhilerating effrontery of ''Direct or" O. B. Howell, as evidenced in a cir cular letter to former students of the Nebraska Conservatory of Music. This cheerful and enterprising promoter and erstwhile resident of Lincoln succeeded in foisting himself upon a school of some sort in Denver, and he is now in the process of transference to that city. Mr. Howell did not come up to the quite excusable expectations of hisland lordinthis city; hence he decided to abandon the conservatory of music here. He" is desirous of luring hid former Btudents out to Denver, and the circular is addressed to them. In it ho says: "It iB a well known fact that Lincoln is not in any sense of the word a musical city. The citizens take al most no interest in musical art in any of its forms. The best concert or opera companies can seldom pay expenses, when on rare occasions they venture to appear here." Now, in the name of all the black smith shops and undertaking establish ments and peculiar what-not witn wnicn "Director" Howell's past is picturesque ly intermingled, who gave this man a license to express an opinion on Lincoln as a musical city? Is it forsooth, his shaggy locks or raven imperial that give him a musical culture sufficient to ven ture to criticise Lincoln as a musical city? Or, did he learn the "art" of music by working the blacksmith's bel lows, or rise to the position of a musical critic by clambering on top of a pile of pine coffins? When and in what fashion did this charlatan with a shady past, who scarcely knows an octave from an octoroon, or a bar of music from a bar of iron, or a vocal chord from a cord of wood, become a critic of things mus ical? "Director" Howell's nerve in as suming to pass judgment on Lincoln as a musical city is almost as funny as Mr. Will Owen Joneo' testimonial for "Dear Mr. Croan"' and that was very funny. When a wooden man like Howell, crammed to the brim with ignorance, presumes to condemn Lincoln on ac count of its lack of appreciation for "musical art,"' it is in order to guffaw, and there is, no doubt, much guffawing in this city just now. It really deesn't pay to keep props under men like Croan and Howell. The former was upheld until forbearance got to be mighty tiresome, and then when he left town he sought to dis credit Lincoln before the people of tho count! y. Now this man Howell, after mining long and deep in the credulity of our people, at length reaches his limit, and in leaving has the effrontery to make disparaging remarks about us. Of course there is no use getting angry at these will-o-the-wisps. Their cavort ings are provocative of amusement rather than of anger; but in the future it would be well to keep the Croans and the Howells in their proper place as long as they stay with us. Howell de precating Lincoln as a musical city! His nerve ought to be embalmed. The attacks on Lincoln and the state institutions maintained here made by the gentleman with the disturbed in tellect, described by Judge Scott as a "cancer and microbic fungus upon the body politic.' are not without a certain definite purpose. It is no secret that Mr. Kosewater's attacks upon the pre paratory department of the state uni versity were made with a view of secur ing this class of school patronage for one or more institutions in Omaha, and his scheme includes an attempt to sep arate the agricultural college with its heavy endowment from the university, and establish it in Omaha. We are pretty bad down here in Lincoln, but Mr. Rosewater and the city of Omaha want nearly everything here. As a Eop to the Omaha Cerberus we might for ward Rev. Byron Beall and prepay the freight charges. The ministers of Lincoln seem deter mined to occupy the field heretofore monopolized by the Kansas City Sunday Sun. Not a Sunday passes, but some of them exploit some sensation from the pulpit. The Kingdom of Heaven is displa-.ed by the Reservation; salvation is ignored and sensuality is substituted: Diety is forgotten and pros titution is paraded, until our churches are polluted beyonJ the power of pastelles to purify. Has the love of the sensational crazed all men? Has relig ion so far lost its hold on men that it is necessary for the preachers to resort to the methods of travelling quack doctors, and advertise meetings "for men only," and distribute bookB which it is a crim inal offense to send through the mails in order to secure audiences? What a commentary on the absenco of pulpit oratory in the churches of Lincoln! The people are not only willing but anxious to listen to orate rs. The Lan sing theatre was far too small to accom modate the throng that sought to hear Dr. Gunsaulus. Witness the vast as semblages that welcomed McKinley and Forakerand Thurston and Bryan; and just the other day fifteen thousand peo ple gathered in the little town of Hum boldt to hear W. S. Summers talk on "Early Days in Nebraska." This is the orator's golden age, but the pulpit "wot not of this thing." It is astonishing that the preachers of the city do not see that the result of this constant and nauseating discussion of the social eril is demoralizing, de grading and dangerous. Every man knows that the surest protection from improper advances which a girl or woman can possess is manifest innocence and actual ignorance of the subject. It protects a woman the same as the down on a peach protects it from the assaults of pernicious insects. The pulpit is doing its best to brush from the woman hood of our city this most potent pro tection. The 6ense of purity is as per fect a piotection for a woman as tho garb of a sister of charity is to the mem bers of that order. The man who would strip from a sister of charity the habili ments of her order, whether he came from a dog pit or a pulpit would need to defend himself from the frenzy of a mob, yet the wrong is no greater in the one css than in the other. Men who attempt to converse with women on for bidden topics find their greatest diffi culty in introducing the subject and starting the conversation. This is true whether the result desired is good or bad. The rubicon once crossed the con quest is too frequently accomplished. Not many years ago young men used to take young women to church Sunday nights. They occupied the same pews, sitting side by side, with escape from physical contact impossible. In in veighing against dancing this physical contact is always animadverted upon by the pulpit as being a direct stimulus to the passions. Now, what would be the probable topic of conversation on the trip homeward on a summer evening after listening to one of these oft repeated discourses by our preachers? Let the ministers take heed of the in junction "Offenses must Deeds come, but woe to him by whom the offense cometh." Any man who has lived in a large city knows, and if he iB truthful will admit, that Lincoln is surprisingly exempt from public vice. The few dens and dives are incomparably small in numbers for a city of Lincoln's size. Yet these sensation mongers stand up in their pulpits and hiss out anathemas up on this community which for virulence excel the maledictions of the priests ot f ho sixteenth century. But two weeks ago one or them seriously likened our city to Sodom and Gomorrah, and with uplifted hand threatened us with God's curse. Some of us are not peripatetic humbugs or peregrinating parasites. We have an honest pride in Lincoln; we think of it every time we hea- tho song of Home Sweet Home. We 1-elieve in it, want to live and die in it, and glory in the fact that it is the grandest mon ument jet built to perpetuate the name of the martyred president, whose watch word of life was "maiice toward nono and charity for all." We look over this city and see that with a population of fifty thousand people, it has built churches enough to accommodate a city of one hundred and fifty thousand. These churches represent a cost of a million dollars, given from the scant earnings of hardy pioneers who struggled against tho rigors of the cli mate and privations of the times to se cure for themselves and their families a home. We see these churches exempt from taxation by the voluntary action of these people burdened by the struggle for existence. We see not only a school house, but a college on every hill top, and hospitals, and other eleemosynary institutions on eveYy hand, and while felicitating ourselves that these are en during evidences of morality and godli ness Lincoln is railed at by the imme diate beneficiaries of this bounty as being a modern Babylon, and another Sodom. This city is held up as a muni cipal maelstrom of iniquity, and were these tales given credence abroad, par ents would refuse to send their chil dren here to be educated, but teach them to shun this town as they would the gates of hell. Fortunately the truth is apparent, and consequently our population is annually augmented by families coming here to allow their chil dren the privileges here attainable. There is unquestionably in this city an overproduction of churches and a failure of supply of ministerial ability. The result is a diminished church atten dance. To change this condition this unseemly resort to sensationalism has been indulged in. But the time has come to call a halt. Religion itself has cause to feel alarm, when its chosen advocates pervert its purposes and des troy its possibilities. The fathers of the church foresaw that such a con dition might arise and the sacred books are full of exhortations to purity of thought, and St. Paul in his inspired writing to the Phillipians particularly admonishes them, "Finally, brethren, whatsoever things are true, whatsoever things are honest, whatsoever things are just, whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things are lovely, whatsoever things are of good report; if there be any virtue, if there bo any praise, think on these things." To the clergy ot Lincoln this ad monition of the Apostle seems to have a personal applicability that entitles it to immediate consideration. GJLs(xj I J M i i ; m tt. ri I.