nt estate. Furthermore,
they realize that only by a fearless denunciation of existing evils, by
faithful though gloomy pictures of life _as it is_, by raising the
interrogation point after every wrong or unjust condition sanctioned by
virtue of its antiquity and conservatism and by appealing to the reason
and conscience of the people has humanity been elevated. They have
studied the problem of human progress profoundly; they have strong faith
in the triumph of justice, but they realize that victory can never be
attained as long as conventionalism lulls to sleep the public
conscience. They know that only by bringing the truth effectively before
the people, only by raising questions and stimulating the mind can
reforms be inaugurated. The present calls for honest thought, for true
pictures, for brave and earnest agitators. Give us these, and humanity
will soon take another of those great epoch making strides which at
intervals have marked the ascent of man.

THE PESSIMISTIC CAST OF MODERN THOUGHT.

Much of the best thought of to-day necessarily takes on a gloomy cast,
because the most wise and earnest reformers keenly realize the giant
wrongs that oppress humanity. They see the splendid possibilities
floating before mankind, even within the grasp of the rising generation,
if the heralds of the coming day are courageous and persistent; if they
sink all hope of popularity, all thought of self-interest; if they are
loyal to their highest impulses, regardless of what may follow.

_The era of the questioner has arrived._ Soon mankind will refuse to
accept anything simply because others believed it. Traditions and
ancient thought, though weighed down with credentials of past ages or
dead civilizations, will be cast aside. All problems will be weighed in
the scales of the broader conception of justice which is daily growing
in the mind of man. The twilight is passing, the dawn is upon us, and
to-morrow will be indebted chiefly to these true brave men and women
whom the superficial call pessimists, for the glorious heritage which
will fall to humanity; for they are related to the manifold reforms
which crowd upon the present, as were Copernicus and Galileo related to
the science of astronomy, as Luther was to the Reformation, Jefferson to
modern Democracy, as Wilberforce in England and Garrison in America to
the overthrow of black slavery. They denounce the iniquity of the
present hour; they unmask the carefully concealed evi