Image provided by: University of Nebraska-Lincoln Libraries, Lincoln, NE
About The courier. (Lincoln, Neb.) 1894-1903 | View Entire Issue (June 15, 1901)
Y v -t VOL. XVI., NO. XXIV ESTABLISHED IN 1886 PRICE FIVE CENTS .S.i 'i f 4 LINCOLN, NEBR., SATURDAY, JUNE 13. 1901. THE COURIER, appointment. If these are true now they were EBTEEEDIK THE rOSTOFFICE AT LINCOLN SECOND CLASS MATTER. AS PUBLISHED EVEBY SATURDAY BI TIE GNRIER MIITIIG HID PUBLISHING GO Office 1132 N street, Up Stairs. Telephone 384. the appointment, but they were not expressed until after when it is sup posed the appointee has power or in fluence. Thus is the independence of the press manifested. Suicide. When a man ki'ls himself, or tries to, he lacks even the average endow ment of sense, which, we all know, Is expressions cretion is dishonorably discharged by true before society and recovers his rank only by grace and intercession extraordinary. Commercial routine is slowly respond ing to the teachings of Christ. Busi ness is business and has nothing to do with philanthropy, or pity. But in the last one-hundred years, even com merce has responded to the influence of Christianity. Kindness and for bearance is increasing. And because of this latest developement of the brave and discreet, we can influence, is sufficient for the wise man. Should every man be controlled by the thought of the long procession from the past into the future and his own insignificant, but potentially momen tous, part in it, how rapidly that pro cession would move onward and up ward? The suicides who seltishly fall out, the murderers who pick out a man here and there from the lines, all the men and women who prey upon SARAH B. HARRIS, : : : EDITOR not distributed in excessive quantities Principles of love, there is a second their fellow-men orwhoassault them Subscription Rates. Per annum fl 50 Six months 1 00 Rebate of fifty cents on cash payments Single copies 05 The Coukier will not be responsible for vol notary communications anleso accompanied by return pottage. Communications, to receive attention, must be ihrned by the full name of the writer, not merely at a guarantee of good faith, but for publication it advisable. r 8 OBSERVATIONS. 1 The Toadyism of Flunkydom. Last week a citizen of Lincoln was appointed by President McKinley col lector of internal revenue, succeeding another citzen of this city who for the past four years has fulfilled the duties of the ortice with a rare fidelity and ability, which have been repeat edly commended by his federal supe riors. The new appointee lias never been credited with a remarkable de gree of political sagacity, much less with success in his efforts in political matters. A few years ago he was a candidate for the position of clerk of the district court, but his efforts in that direction resulted only in disap pointment. Two year? ago lie was recognized as one of the managers of the senatorial candidacy of Mr. L E. Thompson which in its ter mination presented a most lamentable proposition to defeat the regularly nominated selection of the party. Last winter he again appeared as the principal manager of the senatorial candidacy of Mr. Thompson and failed again. It is probable, however, that lie did the best he could, and for that he was entitled to reward at the hands of the defeated candidate and in accordance with an agreement with to man. Occasionally an individual is afflicted with an incurable and very painful disease. Life, under such cir cumstances, loses significance. Yet there have been people whose days of agony iiave been conquered by a great spirit. Stevenson supported himselt and two other people; he gave the world a new series of novels; bis letters, written while he lay propped up in bed, are a new example of gen tleness, love and charity. If he had not been indomitable his genius would have counted for nothing. Pain would have conquered him and he might have taken poisor. like the two miser able suicides, one of whom killed her self, and the other of whom tried to kill himself, last week, in this city in a hotel which is acquiring an unde sirable reputation. The woman is dead and is therefore beyond criticism. She was a siliy woman whom vanity and drugs had already destroyed. The man was in the habit of threatening suicide when there were friends near enough to prevent him. He had at tained more than ordinary success as a salesman, and he still possessed a fine physique, though he has lost the principal element of success, the re spect of his fellowmen. The slow growth of common sense in such peo ple is very remarkable. Most of the boys in the public schools posses more discretion than the man Brink who induced a woman to take poison under the impression that he had taken it. Yet until he demonstrated inferiority he was intrusted with important af fairs. The schemes of the socialists prom ise fascinating results, but the success of all of them depends upon the in dustry and discretion of the men and women who accept and agree to de velope the sj stem. The incompetent and the lazy, who are now pupils in the school of life, are already in suf ficient numbers to defeat any scheme in which they must be depended upon to bear a part. Under the present the two senators from Nebraska the system the world ignores them, except appointment has been made, lmme- for casual charity. They do not ob diately upon the news of the appoint- struct progress, although the proces ment being made public The News sion has to go around them occasion -indulged in a paroxysm of toadyism ally. In a scheme where every one which would receive the highest en comium in the kingdom of flunkydom. Expressions like these, "As an organ izer of political movements he has few superiors In Nebraska." "He is one of the shrewdest and best noli must bear his part or stop all the rest. many more would have to suffer for the guilty than under the present system. The rules of commerce in contemporary operation are natural, not Christian. In nature, rotting use- chance for men who have voluntarily demonstrated their incapacity to con duct their own affairs. Brink, the young man whose imbecile conduct has been so thoroughly advertised, was drunk when he committed the crime. Temperance reformers have accomplished such a reorganization of society that it is now almost as reprehensible to get drunk as it is to kill ones-self. So that Brink's condi tion is not a palliation but an exag geration of his offense. But because he is not the only one who has sinned, because other men and women have numerous un lucid moments too, be cause of the infusion of Christianity into the world's business, the world will forgive him and someone will give him a job. Some individuals at the age of thir ty or even at forty have less sense than the average youth of fifteen. Brink's case may be a case of retarded developement. If hecan be induced to stay alive until he has reached the age of seventy, it ma be that in the meantime lie can still find some op portunity of usefulness. Although he has grown some six feet above the ground, mentally he is an infant, who with the childish idea that his friends would regret his loss and pity his sorrows, in a maudlin state took an insufficient dose of poison. The at tention his adventures have excited, is quite likely to induce other defic ients to take an under-dose. The only ditliculty is in graduating the dose to a size that will frighten one's friends into nervous prostration, and still not place one's self beyond the possibility of resuscitation. Suicide is the most foolish and cow ardly of crimes. A man sometimes justifies it to himself by convincing himself that his sorrows are too heavy to bear, although he knows his death will complicate the situation for the survivors whom his crime or indiscre tions have already compromised. The man who kills himself or tries to, is an egotist. Of course he fails to com prehend the immensity of the uni verse, he does not even realize the world and his relations to a part of it. The suicide is essentially subjective. He translates the world into himself, and is to himself the centre of the system. To take one s place in the great procession, to know that the long line stretches back into an tiquity, that Homer's feet and Shak- selves, have neither looked backward nor forward at the significant proces sion. From the despondenfs own point of view, and selfishly considered, suicide is the silliest expedient. In the first place he does not know what he is getting into. Then a man generally kills himself for one of two reasons: love or money. If he is a thief, why should he kill himself? Afterwards he is but a dead thief who can never be reformed. If he is an honest man through whom others have lost large sums, he will set himself strenuously to assist his creditors to save as much as possible out of the wreck he has made of their fortunes. If he is in love and his sweetheart prefers anoth er, let him travel or occupy himself with exhausting labor for a year and before he realizes It, and in spite of the love-stories that deny it. other roses will smell as sweet, and all the other fish in the sea will begin to flash brilliant scales into his some time disgusted eyes. Time is the one infallible cure for everything. It heals lacerated hearts as effectively as broken heads, and no man can say when his wound ceased to smart, but only that, where-as a year ago he was an anatomical wreck, now the valves of his heart are in perfect order and his ball and socket joints work with out friction. To kill one's-self is a denial, an irrevocable heresy, an un pardonable assault ou life and a post ponement of the triumph of goodness and of universal sanity. Omaha-Lincoln Amenities. A few people in Omaha know a few people in Lincoln, and 'occasionally they visit each other; but commercial, political and journalistic rivalry ha influenced some of the prominent peo ple in Omaha to conclude that the merchants of Lincoln are horned and hoofed. Likewise residents of Lin coln seem to believe that in Omaha men and women grow unusually ma licious and spiteful. Really they have passions and prejudices like our own. Omaha merchants, like ours, are en deavoring to sell goods at a profit, to live within their incomes, to educate their children, to give a little to church and charity, and to gather up as much sweetness and light as pos sible in their pilgrimage. The Ak- Sar-Ben association and the Commer- ticiansin the state," are due simply less matter is cast aside and reabsorb- spere's trod our dusty way of life, and cial club of Omaha are trying to make to the fact that the man of whom ed into the fibre of something useful, that the dim van leads Into the fut- of the city a busier place and toat- they were written lias received an A man who demonstrates his indis ure, the course of which, if we are tract men of means and brains away I !, .fl i 1 .
