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THE FREE PRESS.QRAKOKVII.I.K, IDAHO.FK1DAY. :::::: JANl'ARY 3s. 1*7.A noi./sil l\t; POVKtt T Y.The multiplied activities anil feverish unreal of our intense civilisation create a ceaseless clamor for reform, ami calls into existence all aorta of reformers, w ho are ready to promise inoat mar* velnus thine*, both possible and impossible. From the earliest dawn of civilisation, various fanciful schemes for human improvment, based on the illusion of human perfectibility, have periodically sprung up and perished. At present we are told that we w ill be rewarded by the abolition of poverty if we will only adopt and follow a certain form of political gospel.It is a melancholy fact that a certain amount of acute poverty and suffering seems to he an inevitable concomitant of onr best civilisation. The best institutions and the most flourishing trade cannot banish misfortune nor confer universal happiness and content. It Is the part of the philanthropist and the statesman to accept humanity as it is, with its imperfections and limitations; to do the utmost for the immediate alleviation of suffering and distress, and to deal with the discontented poor bv doing everything that is practicable to help them rather than by maltiug false promises that increase tiie discontent by adding to it the bitterness of disappointment and hope deferred. In the meantime, the air is lllled with schemes and promises ol the impossible. Some of them arc made by scheming demagogs, others by misguided but well-meaning fanatics, hut the result is the same in either case. The dream of an imminent and possible uiillenium is nurtured in the minds of suffering and desperate people who wait for a morning that will never break. The promise of the Hbolitiou of poverty is so pleasing in itself that it readily influences the minds of people who feel the strain of constant toil, and who would welcome a change in the hope of improving their condition.The lesson of civilisation teaches that there can be no ideul state from which all economic ills are banished. We have traditions of a mythical golden age when extreme poverty and suffering were unknown, but if they existed as we love to faucy them, they never can be restored. The piping shepherds and rustic loves of classic literature belonged to an order of things that has gone forever. The old elements of life and fortune cannot be reproduced amid the changed conditions, the keen rivalries, tlie dense populations, and increased wants of the present age. We must be confronted witli the glaring contrast of the enormously rich aud the desperately poor, but in this great new country of ours, utul more particularly in Idaho county, there are limitless chances for the thrifty and deserving who recigitise that there is no roy.d toad iti a. itth, and that the only way to iMiooah poverty is to work out ot it uiitl i.o •rt 'iisly i-|juio to a higher and more or sperous life.
Newspaper Details
Grangeville Idaho County Free Press
Grangeville, Idaho, US
Fri, Jan 28, 1887
Page 1
Full Page
Clipped by
Joan J.
USA 07 Jun 2024
Other Publications Near Grangeville, Idaho
The Grangeville Globe
Grangeville Idaho County Free Press
