Wit, Humor, Reason, Rhetoric, Prose, Poetry and Story Woven into Eight Popular Lectures Part 6

A set of harness was given him to clean. The gentleman went to his supper, and soon after a blue-eyed, golden-haired girl of four years came out, and approaching the tramp, said: "Good evening, sir. Is you got a little girl like me?"

"No, I am all alone in the world."

"Ain't you got no mama and papa?"

"No, they died a long time ago," and the tramp wiped away a tear as memory came rolling up from out the hallowed past.

"Oh! I'm so sorry for you, 'cause I have a home and papa and mama."

The man of the house came out, and looking at the harness said: "That's a good job; you must have done that work before. Come in and you shall have a good supper."

The little tot ran around to the front gate, where a pair of horses, hitched to a carriage, waited to take the family on a drive. The tramp finished his supper and pa.s.sing out, the little one in the carriage said: "Good-bye, mister. When you want supper again you come and see us, won't you;" and turning to the driver she said: "He ain't got no papa, nor mama, no little girl and no home."

The tramp, who heard these words taking off his old hat bowed low to the little one who had spoken the kind words.

A few minutes later while standing on a street corner, wondering where he could spend the night, some one shouted, "Horses running away!" The driver had left the team and the horses started with the little girl alone in the carriage, screaming for help. Men ran out but the mad horses cleared the track. The tramp fixed himself, and as the team swept by, he gave a bound and caught the bit of the nearest horse. The horses reared and plunged but the tramp held on, until he swerved them to the sidewalk. As the near horse struck the curb he fell and the tramp was crushed beneath the horse. A physician came and as he bent over to examine the heart, the tramp said: "Was the little one saved?"

The child was brought and as her sweet blue eyes tenderly looked at the face of the dying man he smiled, and then the spirit took its flight, to where He who died to save the world, looked with compa.s.sion upon the tramp who gave his life for "one of these little ones."

Oh, the beauty and power of human touch!

The Panama Ca.n.a.l is considered the glory crowning achievement of this century; but the building of a highway of sympathy over which to send help to the hopeless is a far greater achievement. If this republic is to endure with the stars; if it is to go down the ages like a broadening colonade of light, and stand in steady splendor at the height of the world's civilization; it will not be because of its money standard, its tariff or expansion policy, but because the heart-beat of human brotherhood sends the blood of a common father bounding through the veins of the concentrated whole of humanity, binding high and low, rich and poor, weak and strong together.

"Work brothers; sisters work; work hand and brain, We'll win the golden age again; And love's millennial morn shall rise In happy hearts and blessed eyes.

We will, we will, brave champions be In this the lordlier chivalry."

III

OUR COUNTRY, OUR HOMES AND OUR DUTY. A PLEA FOR THE HOME AGAINST THE SALOON.

The sweetest word in the language we speak is home. No matter in what clime or country, whether where sunbeams dance and play or frost fiend rules the air, there's no place like home. At the World's Fair in Chicago I visited the Eskimo village. To a woman who could speak English I said: "How do you like this country?"

"Beautiful, beautiful country. Oh, the flowers, the green gra.s.s, the lovely homes!" was her reply.

But when I ventured to ask: "Will you remain here after the fair and not return to your land of ice and snow," she shook her head and said: "No, I want to go home. I am so homesick."

"Be it ever so humble, there's no place like home." In Lexington, Kentucky, there is a modest looking house, nestled mid linden and locust trees. Visitors who pa.s.s in quest of historic spots about the far-famed city, seldom give even a glance at that humble abode. Yet when I am far away, whether in the wonderful west with its scenic grandeur, or in the east surrounded by mansions of millionaires, my heart goes back in memory's aeroplane to the old Blue Gra.s.s town, where six generations of my family sleep, the dearest spot on earth to me--"home, sweet home." When years ago I was nearing the end of a three months' lecture tour in California, a friend invited me to join him on a visit to Yosemite Valley, saying: "You will see the grandest scenery and biggest trees in the world." My reply was: "I thank you very much, but my engagements in the golden west close on the eighth and I will start east on the ninth; my old Kentucky home is grander to me than Yosemite Valley and my baby bigger than any tree in California."

Someone has said the nearest spot to heaven in this world is a happy home, where the parents are young and the children small. I don't know about that. It seems to me a little nearer heaven is the home where husband and wife have lived long together, where children honor parents and parents honor G.o.d; where the aged wife can look her husband in the face and give him the sentiment of the dame of John Anderson:

"John Anderson, my jo John, When we were first acquent; Your locks were like the raven, Your bonnie brow was brent; But now your brow is beld, John, Your locks are like the snaw; But blessings on your frosty pow, John Anderson, my jo.

"John Anderson, my jo, John, We clamb the hill thegither; And mony a cantie day, John, We've had wi' one anither: Now we maun totter down, John, And hand in hand we'll go, And sleep thegither at the foot, John Anderson, my jo."

James A. Garfield said: "It's by the fireside, where calm thoughts inspired by love of home and love of country, the history of the past, the hope of the future, G.o.d works out the destiny of this republic."

A Spartan general pointing to his army said: "There stand the walls of Sparta and every man's a brick." Can I not point to the homes of our country and say: "There stand the walls of this republic and every home's a brick." Suppose a battery, planted on some eminence outside this city, were to send a sh.e.l.l through some building every hour; how long until your beautiful city would be one of crumbling walls and flying population? On yonder heights of law are planted two hundred thousand rum batteries, sending sh.e.l.ls of destruction through the homes of the people and every day hundreds of homes are knocked out of the walls of the republic.

Do you realize what it means when an American home is destroyed by drink? Some years ago on Sunday afternoon I visited an eastern penitentiary by invitation of the chaplain. Pa.s.sing a row of cells my attention was called to a man whose face bore the marks of intelligence and refinement. The chaplain said: "That man is an ideal prisoner and a born gentleman, though here for life. He is the graduate of an eastern college. He married an accomplished young woman. In social life he was led into the drink habit, and it grew upon him until at times he became intoxicated. When under the influence of liquor his reason was dethroned, and one night in a brawl he killed a man. He was given a life sentence. Asking permission to speak he said: 'I have no complaint to make of the verdict, but beg the privilege of saying, G.o.d who knows the secrets of all hearts, knows I am not a murderer at heart, for I don't know how nor when I killed my friend.' A few days after he entered this prison his wife came to visit him. She had with her a sweet little golden-haired child. As he entered the office in his striped prison garb his wife fell into his arms; the agony on that man's face I can never forget.

The child shrank from him at first, then recognizing her father, she ran to him. As he hugged her to his bosom the little one twined her arms about his neck and said: 'Papa, please come home with us. Mama cries so much cause you don't come home.' The man sinking into a chair said: 'O G.o.d, am I never to see my home again?'"

This is but one of the thousands of homes destroyed every year by the drink curse. If I could draw aside the veil and let you look into the desolate homes of your own city tonight, you would feel Ex-Governor Hanley of Indiana did not give an overwrought picture when he said: "Personally, I have seen so much physical ruin, mental blight and moral corruption from strong drink that I hate the traffic. I hate it for its arrogance; I hate it for its hypocrisy; I hate it for its greed and avarice; I hate it for its domination in politics; I hate it for its disregard of law; I hate it for the load it straps on labor's back; I hate it for the wounds it has given to genius, for the human wrecks it has wrought, for the alms-houses it has peopled, for the prisons it has filled, for the crimes it has committed, the homes it has destroyed, the hearts it has broken, the malice it has planted in the hearts of men, and the dead sea fruit with which it starves immortal souls." With proof of the truth of this phillipic on every hand, it is a strange anomaly in our government that the degrading influence of the saloon is linked by law to the elevating influence of school, church and home.

When Jesus was on earth He came to a fig tree, dressed in rich leaves but barren of fruit; it was in fig season but the tree had only leaves. We read that Jesus cursed the tree and it withered. We have in this country a upas tree named the liquor traffic. It is not a barren tree, but far worse than barren. Its branches bend with the weight of its fruit, but not a pint, nor a quart, nor gallon, nor barrel from its boughs ever benefited a single mortal by its use as a beverage.

Its leaves drip with poison and the bones of its dead victims would build a pyramid as high as Appenines piled on the Alps. Jesus withered the tree that produced nothing. We license and cultivate the tree whose fruitage the Bible compares to the bite of a serpent, the sting of an adder and the poison of asps.

In the earlier days of the temperance movement, when we discussed the question along moral lines, the license advocates made it an economic question, but since the commercial world is fast becoming a great temperance league, and great industries are blacklisting the saloon as an enemy of legitimate business, the liquor advocates are taking refuge behind the Bible, and claiming that He who cursed the tree that was barren, planted the one whose root and heart, bark and branches are poisoning the blood of the nation. They pervert scripture, take isolated pa.s.sages and present an ominum gatherum of quotations to prove the Bible indorses the use of strong drink. By the same process I can prove one of these Bible license scholars should hang himself and be in haste about it. I read on one page of the Bible, "Judas went out and hanged himself." On another page I read, "Go thou and do likewise." And on another, "Whatsoever thou doest, do it quickly."

Against these sacrilegious uses of scripture, I place the estimate of the fruit of this upas tree from one whose words are unmistakable, and whose wisdom none can question. Solomon said: "Wine is a _mocker_."

Was there ever a word of more weight in its application? When a boy in school nothing so vexed me and made me want to fight, as for a boy to _mock_ me. I remember when one of the prettiest girls in school made faces at me and _mocked_ me; from that hour I could never see any beauty in that girl's face, nor have I quite forgiven her to this day.

When the Jews wanted to heap the greatest indignity possible upon Jesus, when they had driven the nails in His hands, pierced His side, placed the crown of thorns upon His head and pressed the bitter cup to His lips, they stood off and _mocked_ Him.

Is wine a mocker? Did Solomon know what he was talking about when he gave it that detestable name? He added still another word and called it a deceiver. Does it deceive and mock? It meets a young man at a social feast, garlands itself with the graces of hospitality, sparkles in the brilliant jewels of fas.h.i.+on, smiles through the faces of female beauty, furnishes inspiration for the dance and mingles with music, mirth and hilarity. Gently it takes the young man by the hand, leads him down the green, flowery sward of license, filled with the rich aroma of the wild flowers of life. When it has firmly fixed itself in his appet.i.te, it begins to strip him of his manhood as hail strips the trees, and when, with will-power gone, nerves shattered, eyes bleared and face bloated, he stands with the last vestige of manly beauty swept from the shattered temple of the soul, it stands off and _mocks_ him. It goes to a home, tramples upon the pure unselfish love of a wife, enthrones the shadow of a drunkard's poverty upon the hearth-stone, makes the empty cupboard echo the wail of hungry children for bread, with its b.l.o.o.d.y talons marks the door lintels with the death sentence of an immortal soul, and then stands off and _mocks_ the home. It goes to the Congress of the United States and says: "Put upon me the harness of taxation and I'll pull you out of the mire of national debt, and make the administration of the party in power a financial success." Then with a government permit, it proceeds to take out of the pockets of the people five times as much as it pays the government; creates three-fourths of the country's crimes, four-fifths of its pauperism, sixty per cent. of its divorces, dooms to poverty and shame a great army of children, blights rosebuds of beauty on cheeks of innocence, shatters oaks of manhood, leaves its polluting taint upon all that it touches, and then stands off and mocks the republic. Was there ever more meaning condensed into one brief utterance than in Solomon's warning, "Wine is a mocker, strong drink is raging, and whosoever is deceived thereby is not wise?" Is it wisdom in this republic to deliberately, for revenue, set in motion causes that neutralize its progress, waste its forces and destroy the fireside nurseries of the nation's destiny?

If I were an artist I would now place before you a picture of an ideal American home. I would not make it the fine mansion on the avenue, nor would I make it "the old log cabin in the lane." I would make it a neat country home with garden of flowers, orchard of fruits, a barn lot with bubbling spring and laughing brook. In the door of this home I would place an American mother with the youngest of four children in her arms; the oldest son driving his tired team to the barn, the second one the cows to the cupping, the daughter spreading the cloth for tea, and the head of the house sinking the iron-bound bucket in the well for a draught of cold water when day's work for loved ones is o'er. Approaching the door a commission appointed by Congress on political economy lift their hats as the spokesman says: "Madam, are you mistress of this mansion?"

"I am the wife and mother of this humble home, gentlemen; the man at the well is my husband."

"Madam, we are commissioned by Congress to investigate the home life of the country and would like to learn what this home is doing for the republic."

"Come in, gentlemen, and be seated, while I call my husband. We feel honored by your visit and would be pleased to have you take tea with us."

The invitation is readily accepted and after a good country supper the investigation proceeds. In answer to the question as to the relation of the home to the welfare of the republic, the head of the house says: "Gentlemen, we are trying to keep our home pure; it is our purpose to make our boys patriotic American citizens and our daughters true American women. We love G.o.d and endeavor to keep His commandments, and this is about all I can say about our home."

"That is well so far, but may we ask what sacrifice would this home be willing to make for the republic if its flag were in peril?"

The wife exclaims: "You alarm us by your question. Is our country in danger?"

"Yes, madam. The combined forces of the Old World are nearing our sh.o.r.es and the republic is in peril."

"Wait, gentlemen, until we talk it over."

The family retires for consultation and soon the mother appears, and with tears in her eyes says: "Gentlemen, we've decided. Take our oldest boy, who is eager to go. Take him to the battlefield; if he falls in defense of his country's flag, come back, we'll kiss the second one and tell him, 'go fill your brother's place.' Gentlemen, we love our country next to our G.o.d and this home is pledged to this country's honor."

I say, any country that has such mothers for its patriotism, such guardians for its homes, should protect these homes and mothers with all the power of police, all the majesty of law, and any evil that attempts to destroy these homes ought not to be licensed, but should be buried as the old Scotch woman would bury the devil--with "face down, so the more he scratched the deeper he would go."

I am sick of the hollow sentiment, "the hand that rocks the cradle rules the world," insofar as it relates to the drink problem. If the hand that rocks the cradle did rule the world, there would not be two hundred thousand rum-fiend vultures soaring over the cradle homes of our country today. If a mother could keep her boy in the cradle she might rule the world, but the trouble is, the boy gets too big for the cradle and jumps out. In the cradle he's mama's child, coos if mama coos, and laughs when mama laughs; but out of the cradle he's papa's boy, swears if papa swears, smokes if papa smokes, drinks if papa drinks. If papa does none of these things, then the world, ruled by hands that don't rock cradles, steps in with licensed schools of vice to teach him to drink.

When General Grant was President of the United States he appointed an old colored man mail-carrier over a route in the mountains of Virginia. One day, when in a lonely spot, two robbers faced the negro and demanded the mail. The old man, lifting himself in his saddle said:

"Gentlemen, I is de mail-carrier of de United States; you touch dis darkey and you'll have de whole army of dis government on you in twenty fo' hours."

Blessed will be the day when every mother in our land can say to the saloon: "You touch my home and you'll have the police power of this republic on your heels in twenty-four hours."