FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   >>  
ding armies of Europe, the social waste in the withdrawal of thousands of young men from industrial, commercial and professional pursuits into the barren negative life of the barracks. They might go further and lay stress upon the loss of moral sensibility, the destruction of romantic love, the perversion of the longing for wife and child. The very stability and refinement of the social order depend upon the preservation of these basic emotions. Social customs are instituted so slowly and even imperceptibly, so far as the conforming individual is concerned, that the mass of men submit to control in spite of themselves, and it is therefore always difficult to determine how far the average upright living is the result of external props, until they are suddenly withdrawn. This is especially true of domestic life. Even the sordid marriages in which the senses have forestalled the heart almost always end in some form of family affection. The young couple who may have been brought together in marriage upon the most primitive plane, after twenty years of hard work in meagre, unlovely surroundings, in spite of stupidity and many mistakes, in the face of failure and even wrongdoing, will have unfolded lives of unassuming affection and family devotion to a group of children. They will have faithfully fulfilled that obligation which falls to the lot of the majority of men and women, with its high rewards and painful sacrifices. These rewards as well as the restraints of family life are denied to the soldier. A somewhat similar situation is found in every large construction camp, and in the crowded city tenements occupied by thousands of immigrant men who have preceded their families to America. In the light of the history of prostitution in relation to militarism, nothing could be more absurd than the familiar statement that virtuous women could not safely walk the streets unless opportunity for secret vice were offered to the men of the city. It is precisely the men who have not submitted to self-control who are dangerous and they only, as the court records themselves make clear. In addition to the large social movements for the betterment of Public Health, for the establishment of Temperance, for the promotion of Equal Suffrage, and for the hastening of Peace and Arbitration is the world-wide organization and active propaganda of International Socialism. It has always included the abolition of this ancient evil in its pro
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   90   91   92   93   94   95   96   97   98   99   100   101   102   103   104   105   >>  



Top keywords:

family

 

social

 
thousands
 

affection

 

control

 

rewards

 

immigrant

 
fulfilled
 

occupied

 

ancient


tenements

 

obligation

 

faithfully

 
history
 
prostitution
 

children

 

preceded

 
families
 

America

 

crowded


painful
 

similar

 
soldier
 

denied

 

restraints

 

situation

 

construction

 

sacrifices

 

relation

 
majority

betterment

 

movements

 

Public

 
Health
 

establishment

 
addition
 
included
 

records

 

Temperance

 
promotion

Socialism

 
organization
 
active
 

Arbitration

 

Suffrage

 

hastening

 

dangerous

 
statement
 
familiar
 

virtuous