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this deluded woman, no doubt, this paragraph tells the whole story. Has she defined the responsibility or right of parent, child or society? And at whose mercy are the parents? Here is another rush of darkness: "It seems a hopeless undertaking to lift up the race into higher conditions, with such children continually brought into existence by hundreds of thousands." That is, poor children, offspring of the lame and halt and bUni Now, who hired or authorized the Harper woman to "lift up the race?" Does she understand the business? Is she equal to the smallest part of the task?

Does she not know that the worst diseases known to the race are especially characteristic of the rich and those whose inbred and inhuman selfishness have led them to prevent numerous offspring as far as they are concerned? Is she an allround ignorant fool? Does she not know that, the world over, the select families of one or two children soon die out; in fact, lose the power of reproduction, while the hundreds of ignorant and large and poor families prosper and come to the fore? Besides, the narrow and hard selfishness of parents without children, and of parents with one or two children is proverbial, and the children in such cases are usually like their parents, unless the good God is kind enough to take them to himself that they may find better fatherly and motherly care.

The Imperial American Continent is as capable of nurturing two hundred millions or four hundred millions as it is of pretending to nurture the eighty millions of our day, and if the children of the poor grow too numerous for the taste of such abstainers as Ida Harper, let Mrs. Harper hurry up and get lots of children. If they grow too numerous for her care she can sell her fat babies to the butchers who serve the poor with food. Such fine fare would, no doubt, make the poor children fat and handsome as herself, and very moral. She need not be hopeless of doing her fair share toward lifting up the race.

If she would quit writing presumptuous folly, and begin to study practical motherhood and good housekeeping, she mig-ht yet accomplish something, but from such a woman sociologist, good Lord deliver us.

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It is never wise to be too peremptory with a woman, even

a writing woman, a strong-minded, modern reform, small

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her sex. Even u'tion and inspired ork Sun of February >Vr modern legislation

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* w<a flirt with the teachers or

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, — «*. Din presented by the

. ^ tbe Vitaxv legislature, providing that 'no
•' e^6' vrf *OT volW* whiskey or any intoxicat-

(0 * sYvaVl D Dt tobacco m any form, lend them money or
Its object is to prevent bribery at elec-

^oinen are too emotional and impractical to |S' vertne^eSS' gage in PoUtics

^CV{nce °f {ootish New York law which requires a man
Vfhat is * VCrypaying alimony to his divorced wife after she

another. Women had no

*I what they always have been admonished to do Th,S

"ida Husted harper » This woman is only insane in her moral nature and « • ^rnall *■»«■ Even President Roosevelt detec t „cS on this point, and the poor Catholic ^

on wea ma

akness on w- r~~. .ade touch oi his poor splurgmg on rational suicide *T read the Globe RfViHW of September, Igoa, in whic ^Jh ^hvsician treats the subject with knowledge as Zn med SS? then, the President „ That is the poo^ £^ **

hty for two-thirds of one po^r ternT"

But. ^^substantiality for

* other fool philosopher, D.D.:

Here is an ^ ^ Feb 23d _The Rev Dr. john L. Scudder,
"Jersey ^ngregational Church last night, in a sermon on
t the Fit**: ^nborn,' strongly advocated a law compelling

all persons before marriage to pass a physical and moral examination and secure a license from the State.

"He also declared that no poor person should be permitted to bear more than two children. He insisted that it was very well for President Roosevelt, who has an income of $50,000 a year and an independent fortune, to advocate large families.

"'But how,' he asked, 'would he enjoy his own advice if he had a dozen children and was earning $2 a day?'

"'No child has a right to exist unless there is a prospect of its possessing a good bodily constitution and being well cared for by its parents until capable of earning its livelihood.

"'I do not advocate that all sickly children, after the manner of the Spartans, should be put out of the way. But the same result may be attained, without the infraction of the moral law, by a determination on the part of the parents to be childless unless they are sure of a healthy progeny.

"'The rights of unborn generations is a branch of ethics which has been largely ignored, but which ought to form a part of our moral philosophy without delay. If a man has no right to poison his child with arsenic or strychnine, he certainly has not right to bring a child into the world with the poison of hereditary disease in his blood. In either case he is equally responsible and reprehensible. We call ourselves a civilized people, and yet what monumental ignorance exists in regard to life, the most important topic under the canopy; what criminal indifference respecting the welfare of coming generations.

"'In the absence of suitable conscientiousness on the part of the parents, the State should intervene and rightly make an examination of all couples intending to marry, and give licenses only to those who are healthy and fit to be fathers and mothers. The State has a right to place restrictions on marriage for the welfare of its future citizens. Inveterate paupers,'* etc., etc.

We have already given too much space and time to this Harper-Scudder half-breed species. It is difficult to treat such mules with respect. We would like to know who were the "moral and physical examiners" when their parents were married, and what act of legislation gave these two kidlings of the clerical and newspaper fraternity a right to be born or to open

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At'one time during the Venezuelan blockade the PhjL ,
phlAa newspapers ^ are about half nurse and h^f"

f°The queer combination of words had a smack «f u •
Co£JU when men fought and »J

certain doctrines that no man ever understood. But there was no theology or God in this latter case. Mr. Monroe once tried to promulgate a bit of nonsense that has since been called the Monroe Doctrine, and lots of wise-looking politicians, called statesmen, and lots of smart-looking men called journalists, talk big and write bigger, in these days, of a Monroe Doctrine that never existed and never can exist. Moreover, we may be sure, for all our talk, that just as soon as any of the leading European or Asiatic Powers want more territory than they now have on this Western hemisphere, they will take it, though a very large row should result from their action. Had an effete and weak nation blockaded and bombarded a port in Venezuela we would, a la the American-Spanish war, have sent our warships to attack and drive off the bombarding parties, but when said bombarders represented three of the strongest navies in the world, we took it out in the bluff known as Bowen diplomacy.

'Twas better thus. The days of fighting for a "doctrine" seem past, and as all the modern facilities of steam, electricity and wireless pow-wow have made us about as near to Europe and Asia as Philadelphia was to Pittsburg a half century ago, and as lots of European Powers have owned, and still own and control, territory on this Western hemisphere, it seems futile to flout a senseless so-called doctrine as a red rag in the face of mankind. And our own escapades in the Philippines and elsewhere stamp such conduct as the sheerest bluff of insufferable impertinence.

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The following paragraph, taken from the West Philadelphia Press, seems somewhat optimistic, but it is well enough to give and take such view of the Anglo-Irish relationship once in a while:

"Peace and Prosperity in Sight for Ireland.—The new Irish Land bill, which has been drawn up by Mr. George Wyndham, the Secretary of State for Ireland, and which will be taken up and probably passed at the next session of Parliament, promises to heal the ancient breach between the two countries and t» produce friendship and peace where there has so long be«m. strife and enmity. Its provisions have not been made public,

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