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 IMT1.1> STATICS 01 AJtKIUCA. 
 
 
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THE 
 
 AGE OF CLEVELAND 
 
 COMPILED LARGELY FROM 
 
 CONTEMPORARY JOURNALS AND OTHER ORIGINAL 
 SOURCES 
 
 And Edited for the Benefit of PosteHty 
 BY ^ 
 
 HAROLD FULTON RALPHDON 
 
 NEW YORK 
 
 FREDERICK A. STOKES & BROTHER 
 1888 
 
iiiu^ 
 
 COPYRIGHT, 1888, BY 
 
 Frederick A. Stokes & Brother. 
 
 Edward O. Jenkins' Sons, 
 
 Printers and Stereotypers, 
 
 20 North William St., New York. 
 
TO 
 
 BIG FRED AND LITTLE FRITZ 
 
 IS de:dioa.tkd. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 It is no unusual occurrence for some 
 antiquarian, after the lapse of several cen- 
 turies, to seek to construct an historical 
 review of a past age by means of its con- 
 temporary journals, prints, novels, maga- 
 zines, and other similar literature. The im- 
 perfections of such a method of historical 
 research are manifold and various, of which 
 the first to suggest itself is the author's 
 inevitable lack of personal familiarity with 
 that period which it is his purpose to 
 chronicle. He is, therefore, though actu- 
 ated by the most impartial motives, liable 
 to exaggerate the importance of trifles and 
 underestimate the value of more important 
 
 (V) 
 
vi PREFACE. 
 
 events accordingly as they are magnified 
 or minimized by the Hterature of the period. 
 Moreover, the authorities which such an 
 historian fmds at hand are not always of the 
 highest order. In spite of that optimistic 
 view of the survival of the fittest it is un- 
 fortunately true that society is occasionally 
 very indifferent to its contemporary litera- 
 ture and ofttimes injudicious in its preserva- 
 tion, not infrequently permitting that to be 
 lost which would be of incalculable value 
 to the historian of the future. It is scarcely 
 possible to overestimate the loss which the 
 literature of Greek social, political, and lit- 
 erary life suffered in the destruction of the 
 plays of Agathon. Many perplexing phases 
 of the influence of the sophists in politics 
 would be capable of explanation, the final 
 development of dramatic art more easily 
 traced, and additional light thrown on sev- 
 eral obscure passages in the comedies of 
 
PREFACE. Vii 
 
 Aristophanes, had the age of Pericles been 
 less indifferent to the productions of its 
 great contemporary, the earliest representa- 
 tive of the fictional school of tragedy. 
 
 Although the art of printing has, by 
 multiplying the number of copies of a 
 book, materially lessened the chances of 
 its destruction, the root of the evil remains 
 unchanged. Every age disregards the 
 lessons furnished by the past and exhibits 
 equal negligence in failing to select and 
 preserve such of its current literature as 
 will convey to posterity a vivid and accurate 
 impression of its varied and multiform life. 
 
 There is, moreover, another circumstance 
 peculiarly calculated to be a fruitful source 
 of error to whoever undertakes in the future 
 to write a history of the present age. Con- 
 temporary journalism must necessarily sup- 
 ply the principal materials for such a his- 
 tory, and it is scarcely reasonable to expect 
 
viii PREFACE. 
 
 posterity to be familiar with the various oc- 
 cult methods of advertising which are such 
 a prominent feature of that class of litera- 
 ture. Yet io^norance in this direction must 
 lead to mistakes not only laughable, but 
 positively injurious to the reputation of my 
 own times. I have often, for example, re- 
 flected upon wdiat disagreeable conse- 
 quences would ensue if posterity should 
 be unacquainted with the present use of 
 the reading notice. The future student of 
 our history might naturally conclude from 
 the prominence given to the discussion of 
 the merits of different proprietary articles, 
 and the editorial comments on the same, 
 that the present age is far more interested 
 in soap than religion, and in perfumery 
 than in politics. 
 
 Again, journalism presents the news of 
 the day in a compact and abbreviated form, 
 furnishing a mere outline which the intelli- 
 
PREFACE. IX 
 
 gent reader can accurately fill in fi-om his 
 personal familiarity with all the details of 
 current events. Such an outline is admi- 
 rably suited for present needs, but is mar- 
 red by the serious fault, that it is apt to 
 convey a totally wrong opinion to those 
 readers who have no acquaintance with such 
 details. A parallel case is to be found in 
 those sketches of distinguished citizens 
 which adorn the columns of many of our 
 most popular dailies. To the personal 
 friends of the subject of the sketch they 
 convey the impression of a very accurate 
 likeness, whereas a total stranger would be 
 in doubt whether they were intended as a 
 portrait of a district attorney or of the great- 
 est showman on earth, and might fall into 
 the pardonable error of imagining that a 
 citizen of Bridgeport had been elected to 
 the head of the criminal department of the 
 city of New York. 
 
X PREI-^ACE. 
 
 For these considerations I have deemed 
 it advisable to write a history of my own 
 times. One purpose in so doing, is to sup- 
 ply what may be termed the res gestce of 
 contemporaneous events. I have, in other 
 words, endeavored to impartially record 
 those circumstances which are regarded as 
 trite or trivial, by contemporary journalism, 
 and accordingly omitted entirely. 
 
 The book is therefore in no sense de- 
 signed for my contemporaries, who will no 
 doubt find it a tedious chronicle of events 
 so familiar as to be wholly without interest; 
 but exclusively for posterity, whom I am 
 sanguine enough to expect to be grateful 
 for these exact memorials of an age which 
 seems tame enough to us, but which wnll 
 no doubt be magnified into great import- 
 ance through the telescopic vision of time. 
 
 I have not deemed it necessary to enu- 
 merate the various cyclopedias, biographies, 
 
PREFACE. xi 
 
 handbooks, and other vohimes of statistics, 
 not to mention pamphlets, reports, alma- 
 nacs, and similar paper-covered literature 
 which I have consulted in the preparation 
 of the present work. It Is sufficient to say 
 that I have drawn larg-ely for my informa- 
 tion upon our great dailies and current 
 periodicals, so that it may be truthfully 
 said to be brought down to date. 
 
 I have, however, deemed it of import- 
 ance to explain a rule of syntax which has 
 been adopted. As I have compiled this 
 volume for the exclusive benefit of poster- 
 ity, the secondary tenses are obviously ap- 
 propriate in chronicling events for such a 
 constituency. As it is my intention, how- 
 ever, to publish my book at once, it seemed 
 equally imperative to employ the primary 
 tenses. The necessity for choosing be- 
 tween these two alternatives caused me no 
 little anxiety, for no one stands in greater 
 
Xii PREFACE. 
 
 awe of the critical spirit of the age than do 
 I. Even such insicrnificant circumstances 
 as blunders in punctuation, and typograph- 
 ical errors, are apt to lead to serious con- 
 sequences. The omission of a comma has 
 been known to nullify a statute, and the 
 unauthorized insertion by a printer of a 
 vowel-point in a Hebrew noun is sufficient 
 to jeopardize a whole system of theology. 
 Grammatical errors are likely to so mo- 
 nopolize the attention of the critic that he 
 can devote but scant space to the review 
 of the book itself If the present age is 
 so critical, it is appalling to think what it 
 will be in the future. My perplexity was 
 naturally great, for I desired to avoid hav- 
 ing my book irretrievably condemned for 
 what w^ould be at the best but a mere fault 
 of style, and could in nowise affect the 
 matter. After no little consideration, I 
 concluded to uniformly employ the primary 
 
PREFACE. Xlll 
 
 tenses. Such a rule of syntax is eminently 
 suited to my contemporaries, while it can- 
 not fail to lend an air of realism to the vol- 
 ume when it comes to be perused by pos- 
 terity. I trust this frank explanation will 
 serve to disarm the hostility of any critic 
 who may be inclined to question the pro- 
 priety of my syntax on the ground that the 
 primary tenses have been employed to de- 
 scribe events which must necessarily be- 
 long to the past, w^hen my book obtains 
 that constituency for which it is specifically 
 desio-ned. 
 
 o 
 
 I would simply add, in conclusion, that 
 I have at all times tried to assume a neu- 
 tral position on the questions w^hich I have 
 attempted to discuss, and although it has 
 been necessary in a few instances to dis- 
 close my personal convictions on some 
 particular subject, I have earnestly en- 
 deavored to make no statement which I 
 
XIV PREFACE. 
 
 myself have not, as far as it was possible, 
 carefully verified, and have conscientiously 
 avoided creating a false impression, not 
 only by a positive violation of the truth, 
 but by guarding against that tendency to 
 exaggeration which is such a serious fault 
 in the historian. 
 
 Harold Fulton Ralphdon. 
 
 Groonkay, N. Y., February, 1888. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 FAGB 
 
 The General Condition of Politics, . . 3 
 
 The State of Science, 45 
 
 The Moral, Industrial, and Social Condi- 
 tion OF the Age, 73 
 
 Literature and Law, iii 
 
THE GENERAL CONDITION OF 
 POLITICS. 
 
THE GENERAL CONDITION OF 
 POLITICS. 
 
 Before entering into any detailed dis- 
 cussion of the principles and condition of 
 the political parties of the present age, I 
 have deemed It prudent to anticipate and 
 correct certain errors Into which posterity- 
 might possibly fall from a perusal of our 
 contemporary literature. 
 
 For this reason I desire to state at the 
 outset that Grover Cleveland was Presi- 
 dent of the United States during the pe- 
 riod covered by this chapter. I make the 
 statement with considerable reluctance, for 
 I am of the opinion that posterity, upon 
 reading it, will be Inclined to seriously 
 question my reliability as a historiographer 
 of my own times. For it requires no effort 
 
 (3) 
 
THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 of the imao^Ination to foresee the indio^nant 
 and emphatic protest which this statement 
 will elicit a century hence from every pure 
 and simple-minded patriot who is familiar 
 to any extent, either by personal examina- 
 tion or by tradition, with many of our con- 
 temporary journals. " What ! " such a 
 one will exclaim; "this incarnation of 
 guilt and incapacity, this corrupt politician, 
 who never said a wise thing, and always 
 did a foolish one, the successor of the 
 blameless Washington and the martyred 
 Lincoln ! It is preposterous ! The parti- 
 sanship of the American people could never 
 have so mastered their patriotism as to 
 have permitted his election. There is as- 
 suredly some mistake." 
 
 Yet, incredible as it is, I am compelled 
 to reaffirm the statement that Grover 
 Cleveland is, to the best of my information 
 and belief. President of the United States 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 5 
 
 in the year of our Independence the one 
 hundred and twelfth. I cannot make the 
 statement absolute, because I was not 
 present either at the official canvass of the 
 votes of the various electoral colleges by 
 the joint Houses of Congress, or at the 
 ceremony of inauguration. But I have 
 seen certain acts, messages, and public 
 documents which purported to be signed 
 by him in the capacity of Chief Magistrate. 
 I have also heard him frequently alluded 
 to as President, and occasionally spoken 
 of with respect. 
 
 I have likewise deemed it advisable to 
 make the statement that Grover Cleveland 
 did not bear arms against the government 
 of the United States in the years 1861-65. 
 It is not within the province of the impartial 
 historian, whose function is simply to re- 
 cord external events, to enter into any 
 analysis of the finer motives of human con- 
 
THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 duct, and determine whether Grover Cleve- 
 land's loyalty during these years was act- 
 uated by prudence or patriotism. But, as 
 a considerable portion of the current press 
 has been neMIo-ent in observinor the meta- 
 physical distinction between act and inten- 
 tion — a species of negligence which cannot 
 mislead those who are familiar with all the 
 facts — I have considered it prudent to thus 
 enlighten posterity, lest future generations 
 might confound moral culpability with 
 overt guilt, and imagine that Grover Cleve- 
 land and Jefferson Davis were one and the 
 same person. • 
 
 It is also appropriate to state in this 
 connection that Grover Cleveland was not 
 connected with any of the Ku Klux raids 
 in the South during the period of recon- 
 struction. To this affirmation I am able 
 to bring the irresistible support of very 
 strong circumstantial evidence. A cursory 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. / 
 
 examination of a map of the United States, 
 supplemented by a careful study of the 
 facilities of transit between Buffalo and 
 Louisiana during the time of the existence 
 of that marauding organization, will prove 
 that the time consumed in travelling be- 
 tween these two points would have been 
 so great as to make It an impossibility for 
 a citizen of Buffalo to have been present 
 at any one of these raids without rendering 
 himself conspicuous by his protracted ab- 
 sence from home. I am therefore con- 
 vinced that in this instance Grover Cleve- 
 land can successfully prove an alibi, and I 
 may add that in this opinion, a considera- 
 ble number of my contemporaries who have 
 impartially examined the facts in the case, 
 heartily concur. 
 
 It may, however, relieve In a measure 
 the mortification of posterity to learn that 
 Grover Cleveland was, after all, only de facto 
 
THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 President of the United States, and that 
 ample evidence of the worth and incom- 
 parable superiority of our de jicre President 
 during this same period will be found in 
 not a few of our daily and weekly journals. 
 For the benefit of posterity I will explain 
 these two terms. A de facto President is 
 one who receives a majority of electoral 
 votes. A de jure President is one who 
 would have received such a majority, had 
 not the will of the people been defeated by 
 the action of a Returning Board, an un- 
 timely speech of a clerical constituent, or 
 some other untoward or unforeseen cir- 
 cumstance wholly incommensurate with the 
 dignity of a presidential election. The du- 
 ties connected with the two offices are also 
 dissimilar. Those of a de facto President 
 are to conduct legislation in the present; 
 those of a de jui^e one to shape politics in 
 the future. 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 9 
 
 For fear the point might be raised here- 
 after, I have deemed it advisable to state 
 in this connection that up to the present 
 month (February, 1888), no question has 
 been raised as to whether our de jure 
 President did not work a forfeiture of his 
 office by visiting England and France dur- 
 ing the present year. Such an extra-terri- 
 torial residence would seem to be contrary 
 to the letter, at least, of the law forbidding 
 the President to depart from without the 
 jurisdiction of the United States during his 
 official term. I am not a lawyer myself, 
 and cannot therefore determine the ques- 
 tion from a strictly legal point of view. I 
 would, however, suggest that, had any 
 sufficient grounds existed, the many enemies 
 of our de jure President would have been 
 quick to insist upon his removal from of- 
 fice, and that their failure to do so furnishes 
 strong presumptive evidence of the ab- 
 
10 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 sence of all such grounds. Moreover, the 
 example of Mr. Tilden can perhaps be 
 pleaded as a precedent, for he made a pro- 
 tracted visit to Europe after his inaugura- 
 tion in the preceding March. 
 
 I am sincerely solicitous for the sake of 
 the honor of my country, that posterity 
 may find in this suggestion of the distinc- 
 tion between de J2ire and dc facto an effi- 
 cient means of escaping from the awkward 
 and humiliating predicament of acknowl- 
 edging Grover Cleveland as the twenty- 
 second President of the United States. I 
 am not sure but that it has occurred to 
 many of my fellow-countrymen equally 
 patriotic with myself, but I believe I am 
 the earliest to elevate it to the dignit)- of a 
 principle. It is surely infinitely better 
 founded than a thousand and one other 
 legal distinctions, and certainly no more 
 difficult to be comprehended b)- a human 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. II 
 
 than many of the decisions of the highest 
 courts of record in the various States of 
 the Union. i 
 
 I am also anxious to anticipate and cor- 
 rect another error into which posterity 
 may possibly fall. There was no civil 
 war in the United States in the year 1887. 
 I have deemed it advisable to make 
 this statement, because I opine that the 
 future historian of our country, when he 
 comes to that passage in our history which 
 is known as the Veto of the Pension Bill, 
 and the Order to return the Rebel Flags, 
 and reads the fierce denunciatory curses 
 which made historic Harlem ring, the bel- 
 ligerent resolutions of G. A. R. Posts, and 
 the angry threats of old war Governors, 
 will impatiently turn the subsequent files 
 of these same journals in order to learn the 
 details of that bloody and fratricidal strife 
 which he confidently expects was the log- 
 
12 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 ical consequence of such an universal out- 
 burst of indignant patriotism. It is to re- 
 lieve the perplexity of such an one that I 
 make the definite, unqualified assertion in 
 this place, that there was no civil war in 
 the United States in the year 1887, al- 
 though this is of course intended as no in- 
 timation that the circumstances did not 
 furnish an adequate castes belli. I must, 
 moreover, confess that I have never had 
 it satisfactorily explained to me how a 
 repetition of the terrible years of 1861-65 
 was averted. In the absence of any other 
 explanation, I would venture to suggest 
 the following, which, although candidly 
 admitted to be of my own personal inven- 
 tion, must be understood as founded upon 
 a careful consideration of all the facts 
 in the case. The McGlynn matter, the 
 Queen's Jubilee, the opening representa- 
 tion of the Fall of Babylon, all providen- 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 1 3 
 
 tially occurred at this juncture, and happily- 
 served to relieve the overcharged feelings 
 of the nation as a lightning-rod attracts to 
 itself the bolt which threatens destruction 
 to the house, and dissipates its deadly fluid 
 into the ground. 
 
 Having thus disposed of certain errors 
 concerning contemporary politics, into 
 which posterity might naturally fall had 
 the foregoing explanations been omitted, 
 I will proceed to a brief review of the 
 principles of the political parties of the 
 present age. 
 
 The two great parties are the Republic- 
 an and Democratic,* although there is a 
 third, commonly called Mugwump. This 
 
 * In using the words Democratic and Republican, I 
 must be understood as referring only to the Simons 
 Pure of each party. I have not deemed it necessary 
 to record the views of those Moderates who are being 
 constantly ground to pieces between the upper and the 
 nether mill-stones of the Extremists. 
 
14 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 last party has no machine, and is conse- 
 quently expected to have no principles. It 
 is therefore extremely difficult to define its 
 exact position In municipal and national poli- 
 tics. A Mugwump may perhaps, however, 
 be defined as a Galilean in politics, who 
 is constantly irritating the Ultramontanes 
 of his party by voting 7ion placet at Repub- 
 lican Primaries. It is in fact the party of 
 dissent, and regards with a curious lack of 
 reverence many of the most cherished tra- 
 ditions of both parties, notably those which 
 relate to the Importance of the machine and 
 the intimate and intricate connection be- 
 tween good government and a partisan 
 civil service. 
 
 The vital distinction between the Re- 
 publican and Democratic parties is that the 
 former insists that the war is not 3'et over, 
 the latter that It has never taken place. I 
 cannot emphasize too strongly the necessity 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 1 5 
 
 for posterity familiarizing itself with this 
 distinction. If it is ignored the substantial 
 foundation for much of the virulence of the 
 current press of the period can never be 
 appreciated. For it would otherwise seem 
 both absurd and illogical that two parties 
 who are so perfectly agreed that the 
 Chinese must go, that seventy-two cents 
 make a dollar, that the laboring man is 
 entitled to fifty-two half holidays during 
 the year, and that eight hours' work de- 
 serves a ten-hours' wage, besides exhibit- 
 ing equal unanimity on various other ques- 
 tions, should nevertheless be so bitter to- 
 ward one another that a member of one 
 party Is never mentioned in the official or- 
 gans of the other, except In terms of un- 
 measured contempt, and his memory when 
 dead, accorded less respect than Is usually 
 given to that of a valuable setter or favorite 
 race-horse. But such mutual hostility is 
 
l6 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 perfectly intelligible to us, as it will be to 
 posterity, if that vital distinction between 
 the two parties which has been noted 
 above, is only kept constantly in view. 
 
 One of the most distinctive principles of 
 the Republican party is that of protection. 
 Not only does it insist that home manu- 
 factures need to be protected against the 
 pauper labor of Europe, but advocates with 
 equal vehemence and persistency, that the 
 negro requires protection against his for- 
 mer master; a disunited North protection 
 against a solid South ; the people of the 
 United States protection against a Demo- 
 cratic President ; the President protection 
 against his own party ; the people of the 
 State of New York protection against a 
 Democratic Governor ; the liquor-dealer 
 protection against the Prohibitionist, and 
 the Prohibitionist protection against the 
 Personal Liberty League. I am quite con- 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 1/ 
 
 vinced, from such examination as I have 
 been able to make, that no other party, 
 either past or present, was ever more be- 
 neficently paternal in its purpose and its 
 scope. 
 
 Another principle equally Republican in 
 its character, although of more recent origin, 
 is that of political entail, or that a man is 
 entitled to a nomination because he is the 
 son of his father. The genesis of this doc- 
 trine is not to be traced, as has been im- 
 puted in certain hostile quarters, to a con- 
 fession of paucity of candidates possessing 
 sufficient merit of their own to entitle them 
 to the honor of a nomination, but to that 
 great principle of the party that the war is 
 not yet cv^er. The most ordinary conser- 
 vatism would naturally influence any party 
 to select in such a critical state of affairs, 
 only those candidates whose loyalty is as- 
 sured beyond all question, not only by pred- 
 
1 8 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 ilections of a personal nature, but by that 
 great principle of heredity which science 
 has demonstrated to be the controllinof 
 force in human conduct. 
 
 Yet, however great may be the differ- 
 ence between the two parties on certain 
 domestic issues, they are nevertheless in 
 complete accord in regard to what should 
 constitute an appropriate foreign policy. 
 Both unqualifiedly approve of Home Rule 
 for Ireland. Perhaps of the two the par- 
 ticular plank in the Republican platform 
 Avhich touches on this subject is a trifle 
 more unequivocal, for it mentions Glad- 
 stone and Parnell eis nomiiiibiis, whereas 
 they are not specified at all by name in the 
 corresponding plank of the Democratic 
 platform. This is naturally a matter of 
 just pride to every Republican, and simple 
 justice requires it to be said that it is per- 
 haps due to the direct or indirect influence 
 
GEXERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. I9 
 
 of our de jiu^e President over this party, 
 who, though he has been charged at times 
 by his enemies with indifference to events 
 at home, is conceded by both friend and 
 foe to be unequalled at flying the Ameri- 
 can eagle in foreign affairs. 
 
 In order to explain the raison d'etre of 
 what follows in this chapter, it becomes 
 necessary to violate that principle of strict 
 neutrality which I have conscientiously 
 striven to uniformly observe elsewhere 
 throughout this volume. By reason of my 
 party affiliations, I am bound to believe 
 that another term of Democratic rule, with 
 its systematic indifference to the import- 
 ance of G. A. R. Posts, and unseemly des- 
 ecration of Decoration Day by fishing 
 excursions, can only terminate in the over- 
 throw of all constitutional government, the 
 successful establishment of the Confeder- 
 acy, and the restoration of slavery. Re- 
 
20 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 cent events have caused me to view with 
 unfeigned alarm the constandy increasing 
 chances of the election of a Democrat to 
 the Presidency in 1888. It is in view of 
 such a catastrophe that I have been influ- 
 enced to write the remainder of this chap- 
 ter, thinking that posterity might feel a 
 melancholy interest in the examination of 
 the Constitution of our one and indivisible 
 Republic before it had been split up into 
 innumerable petty States. I have not, 
 however, deemed it necessary to literally 
 transcribe the various provisions of our 
 Constitution, or furnish a detailed de- 
 scription of our present form of govern- 
 ment. I will not admit, even to myself, 
 that the sectional hate of the Solid South, 
 who, though former slaveholders, are still 
 Americans, will ever attain such depth of 
 intensity and malignity, so that when the 
 sad day of its supremacy arrives, it will 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 21 
 
 endeavor to systematically obliterate all 
 memorials of the past. It is scarcely prob- 
 able that the various volumes containing 
 copies of our Constitution will, immediately 
 after the final success of the rebel arms, be 
 burned by the common hangman in the 
 city of Richmond, and any allusion to the 
 past forbidden under severe penalties, as 
 a toast to the exiled Stuarts, in the days 
 of the Commonwealth, sent a loyal cavalier 
 with short shrift to the headsman's block. 
 I have deemed it reasonably certain that 
 copies of our Constitution, surviving the 
 dismemberment of our Union, will be 
 easily accessible for the inspection of pos- 
 terity, and that a general recollection of 
 our present form of government will be 
 transmitted from loyal sire to loyal son. 
 But I desire to call the attention of poster- 
 ity to that unwritten constitution, that 
 higher law, of which no exact memorials 
 
22 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 exist, and the memory of which even tra- 
 dition cannot be expected to preserve when 
 State Sovereignty has become supreme, 
 and Federalism a mere dream of the past. 
 First of all, I wish to refute a slander 
 which has obtained a wide circulation in 
 our day, and may possibly find an echo in 
 the sounding corridors of time. It is a 
 standing reproach among European nations 
 that the United States is wholly indifferent 
 to the class of foreiorners which she w^el- 
 
 o 
 
 comes to her shores, and makes no dis- 
 tinction between what would and would 
 not form a desirable addition to her popu- 
 lation. The orio^in of such a serious mis- 
 statement may be readily traced to that 
 ignorance, prevalent in all monarchical 
 countries, of the high value placed by us 
 on our Elective Franchise, which rests 
 not upon intelligence or thrift, but upon 
 simple citizenship. It is therefore only 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 23 
 
 logical that the immigration of all who pos- 
 sess capacity for citizenship, even though 
 it be in an imperfect and embryonic state, 
 should be welcomed as a substantial addi- 
 tion to our population, while the presence 
 of those who lack this important qualifica- 
 tion should be distinctly discouraged. That 
 this is no fanciful distinction of my own, 
 invented to excuse what has been fre- 
 quently urged as a reproach upon my 
 mother country, is fortunately capable of 
 easy demonstration. For how else is it 
 possible to explain the policy of extermin- 
 ation adopted toward the Indians, or the 
 stringent laws forbidding the immigration 
 of the Chinese ? It is therefore appropri- 
 ate to state at this point that both the In- 
 dian and the Chinese are regarded as ex- 
 cepted from all the benefits conferred by 
 that clause of the Constitution which pro- 
 vides that no State shall " deprive any 
 
24 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 person of life, liberty, or property without 
 due process of law, nor deny to any person 
 within its jurisdiction the equal protection 
 of the law." I am especially anxious that 
 posterity should note this exception, as it 
 affords the only possible explanation of the 
 paradox that a people so sensitive to con- 
 stitutional rights as to resent the indigni- 
 ties of prison clothing, discipline, and fare 
 to which Mr. O'Brien was subjected at Tul- 
 lamore Jail, should view with apathetic un- 
 concern the outrages on life, limb, and 
 property, to which two classes of their own 
 population are not infrequently subjected. 
 
 The intimate connection existing be- 
 tween the Declaration of Independence 
 and the Constitution of the United States 
 may perhaps justify a brief allusion to a 
 limitation recently attached to one of the 
 clauses of the former. It has been judicial- 
 ly decided that the pursuit of happiness, 
 
GENERAL CONDITI(3N OF POLITICS. 2$ 
 
 Specifically stated In the Declaration to be 
 one of the inalienable riorhts wherewith all 
 men are endowed by their Creator, does not 
 extend to the happiness of getting drunk 
 on Sunday or to that of killing policemen 
 with dynamite. I have regarded it as not 
 superfluous to make this statement, as a 
 perusal of certain current petitions, open 
 letters, and legislative memorials, — a class 
 of literature which seems to possess great 
 tenacity of life,— might, in the absence of 
 all knowledge of the real facts in the 
 case, create a directly contrary impression. 
 I have for this reason deemed it prudent 
 to record in this place that it has been 
 judicially decided in more than one in- 
 stance that the happiness of getting drunk 
 on Sunday is not such an inalienable right 
 but that it can be abridged by local legisla- 
 tion, and that so high a tribunal as the Su- 
 preme Court of the United States has held 
 
26 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 that fanatic principles justify homicide not 
 one whit more than a quick temper or any 
 other equally unromantic cause. 
 
 As has been hinted above, it is especially 
 difficult for the writer of contemporary 
 history to observe that strict neutrality 
 which is rigidly required of the reliable 
 historian. The extent of that difficulty 
 may be perhaps appreciated by reflecting 
 that many historians of periods which are 
 separated by several centuries from that 
 of the author, have, nevertheless, been 
 unable to view such distant events ex- 
 cept through the colored medium of their 
 personal sympathies and convictions. The 
 names of Mr. Mitford and Mr. Grote will 
 readily occur as examples of this very seri- 
 ous fault of introducing into historical 
 composition what is in effect a species of 
 anachronism. Yet if the historian, detect- 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 27 
 
 ing an analogy between the political parties 
 of ancient Athens and those of modern 
 England, can be influenced by his Whig or 
 Tory sympathies in his estimate of states- 
 men and philosophers of an age as remote 
 as that of Pericles, it is not, surely, surpris- 
 ing if the writer of contemporary history 
 should at times depart from the narrow 
 line of a strict neutrality in the discussion 
 of events in regard to which he has at some 
 prior time assumed, in all likelihood, a pos- 
 itive and personal position. But even such 
 a temptation is less subtle in its character 
 than is still another which assails the his- 
 torian of his own times. He is a part of 
 the age which he depicts, and consequently 
 feels a certain amount of personal pride in it. 
 The temptation is therefore strong to soft- 
 en, if not wholly conceal, such flagitious 
 acts and circumstances as would seriously 
 reflect upon the reputation of that age. 
 
28 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 I have ventured the foregoing prekide 
 to the concluduig part of the present chap- 
 ter, for the purpose of explaining the dis- 
 agreeable position in which I am now 
 placed. For it has become necessary to 
 record at this point a state of affairs which 
 will justify posterity in believing that our 
 beloved Republic, with her much vaunted 
 equality of all citizens in the sight of the 
 law, is at the best but a pretentious sham. 
 It has almost seemed to me as if my duties 
 as an historian scarcely required me to re- 
 cord so shameful a fact. I have been able 
 to find but slight consolation for the sense 
 of injury done to the reputation of my age 
 and country by my scrupulous regard for 
 the truth, in the reflection that an exhibi- 
 tion of veracity in a direction so manifestly 
 disagreeable must serve to convince pos- 
 terity that this history, be its other faults as 
 thick as dust, is at least reliable. 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 29 
 
 I would therefore reluctantly state that 
 an opinion, involving in a peculiar degree 
 the reputation of our Republic and stigma- 
 tized In 1864 as treasonable and disloyal, 
 has in the year 1887 not only obtained a 
 wide-spread circulation, but the refusal to 
 accept it is viewed with suspicion as in- 
 dicative of absolute disloyalty. I refer to 
 the opinion that the war is a failure. In 
 order that posterity may appreciate the 
 weighty consequences involved in such an 
 opinion, it is wise to be explicit. 
 
 It had long since been admitted that the 
 war is a failure from any stand-point of 
 preserving the Union. The reconciliation 
 which was effected between the North and 
 the South at Appomattox, has for many 
 years been viewed as purely formal, as a 
 mere outward show of peace and good- 
 will, under which sectional hate bubbles 
 and burns as fiercely as ever. Although 
 
30 THE AGE OF CLEVELAKD. 
 
 forced from this point of view to admit 
 that the war is a failure, it was customary 
 for every pure-hearted patriot to find a 
 certain amount of comfort and orratulation 
 in the thought that the war is a confessed 
 success, in that it secures by the Fifteenth 
 Amendment the riq^ht of suffrage to the 
 negro. But it is now no longer possible 
 to conceal the fact that the war is a failure, 
 even from this stand-point. Humiliating 
 as it is, the truth inexorably requires the 
 confession to be made that the rio^ht of 
 suffrage is not simply occasionally or local- 
 ly denied the negro in the South, but sys- 
 tematically and universally. I am aware 
 that such an accusation involves a seri- 
 ous attack upon the integrity, honor, and 
 loyalty of a large portion of our population. 
 It in fact implies the commission of such 
 heinous crimes that I feel as if I had a right 
 to ask posterity to demand no further proof 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 3 1 
 
 of its truth than my uncorroborated state- 
 ment. For no one, unless actuated by 
 motives of unparalleled malevolence, Vv^ould 
 venture to make such an accusation except 
 upon evidence so convincing as to make 
 any other conviction impossible. The ac- 
 cusation has, in fact, obtained considerable 
 circulation in our day by the weight at- 
 tached to the personal word of the accus 
 ers. I frankly admit that within the past 
 year I have never seen produced in its 
 support a particle of evidence of that for- 
 mal and solemn character which is required 
 to convict a citizen of the violation of a cor- 
 poration ordinance. The wide circulation 
 which this accusation has obtained, is due 
 in a large measure to the unsworn state- 
 ments of men whose social and political 
 position is so high, whose professions of 
 regard for the reputation of our Republic 
 are so profuse, and vvhose protestations of 
 
32 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 interest in our national prosperity are so 
 fervent, that incredulity would be almost 
 a reflection upon their personal honesty 
 and integrity. I have, however, decided 
 to depart from the example set by these 
 gentlemen who largely constitute my au- 
 thority for bringing this accusation, and 
 produce evidence of its truth.* Before 
 doing so, I must, however, first caution 
 posterity to avoid certain natural errors of 
 judgment, which would make a proper ap- 
 preciation of the value of this evidence 
 impossible. Posterity must disregard the 
 Bworn statements of many Southern citizens 
 of excellent repute, must reject as worthless 
 the official reports of several Congressional 
 committees, and above all, attach no value 
 
 * I must distinctly disclaim all credit of being the 
 original discoverer of this evidence. I have heard it 
 used on more than one occasion, although I am unable 
 to state to whom the credit of its original discovery- 
 should be given. 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 33 
 
 as a precedent to the decision of the Elec- 
 toral Commission, whereby it was decided 
 that the properly certified returns of any 
 State were such conclusive evidence of the 
 regularity of an election as not only to ex- 
 clude any legal action in the shape of a 
 quo warranto, but as having such moral 
 weight as to forever elevate the question 
 from the region of debate. If the example 
 of the present age in this direction is fol- 
 lowed, the weight of the evidence which I 
 am about to produce will be as apparent a 
 century hence as it is now. 
 
 This evidence is based upon two prin- 
 ciples, that of population and that of he- 
 redity. Before entering into any specific 
 explanation of the former, I have deemed 
 it wise to make another cautionary state- 
 ment. The zeal of some few of my con- 
 temporaries has not infrequently betrayed 
 them into a certain intemperance of state- 
 
34 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 ment, wherefrom It might be inferred, that 
 if there were a fair count in the South- 
 ern States, every one of those States 
 might be reHed upon as invariably giving 
 a RepubHcan majority. That is scarcely 
 an accurate view of the case. By the 
 principle of population the character of 
 the present majorities of the two States 
 of South Carolina and Mississippi, would 
 alone undergo a radical change. This is 
 in a measure irrelevant, but I have ven- 
 tured to make the statement, hoping that 
 my frankness in conceding that even under 
 a fair count many of the Southern States 
 would still be entitled to a Democratic ma- 
 jority, may serve to convince posterity 
 that my conviction of the absolute nullifi- 
 cation of the Fifteenth Amendment south of 
 Mason and Dixon's line, rises to the dignity 
 of a principle, and is not simply the result 
 of a bitter and intemperate partisanship. 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 35 
 
 The principle of population may be 
 briefly stated to be a comparison of the 
 black and white voting population of any 
 State, with the certified returns of that 
 State. The method of arriving at prac- 
 tical results may be succinctly stated as 
 follows. The negro, if unintimidated, will 
 always vote the Republican ticket. This 
 proposition rests largely upon the princi- 
 ple of heredity to be shortly explained. 
 Hence, by comparing the total Republican 
 vote in any State with the total number of 
 colored electors in that State, it is an easy 
 matter to exactly determine to what extent 
 the negro has been denied the right of suf- 
 frage by either actual or constructive in- 
 timidation. It is from such a comparison, 
 made by myself personally, and based up- 
 on the official census and certified returns, 
 that I have been forced to accept the con- 
 viction that the provisions of the Fifteenth 
 
2,6 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 Amendment are systematically violated in 
 many of the Southern States. I have not 
 deemed it necessary, however, to furnish 
 any tables of statistics in support of this 
 statement. If posterity desires such con- 
 firmatory proof it will be easily found in 
 the same orio^inal sources which I have con- 
 suited. 
 
 I shall now dismiss this branch of the 
 subject and proceed to give a brief expla- 
 nation of the principle of heredity. This 
 principle is based upon the scientific theo- 
 rem, that political tendencies are like any 
 other physical or psychical habit trans- 
 mitted from one generation to another. 
 The importance of this principle of hered- 
 ity cannot be depreciated by the easy sneer 
 that it is purely theoretical, for it affords 
 the only possible solution of an otherwise 
 very perplexing political problem — z. c, how 
 many generations of colored voters must 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 37 
 
 arise in the Southern States before the in- 
 herited fealty of that class to the Republi- 
 can party shall entirely disappear. 
 
 The number of consecutive generations to 
 which any peculiarity of a common ancestor 
 will be transmitted, depends almost exclu- 
 sively upon the degree of intensity which 
 marks the presence of that peculiarity in 
 such an ancestor. The craving for tobac- 
 co has been known to descend to the great- 
 great-great-grandchildren of an inveterate 
 smoker, while it is no unusual occurrence to 
 find the immediate issue of the son of a mod- 
 erate wine-drinker, uncompromising teeto- 
 talers. It is therefore necessary in the pres- 
 ent instance to simply ascertain how strong 
 was the loyalty of the first race of colored 
 citizens to the Republican party, in order to 
 determine to how many consecutive gen- 
 erations that loyalty will be transmitted. 
 In order to fully appreciate this principle 
 
38 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 of heredity, however, one more circum- 
 stance must be noted. It is a well-known 
 physiological fact, that a habit which is 
 contracted in childhood, is marked by 
 much greater tenacity than if contracted 
 in middle age or even in early manhood. 
 The value of this fact is evident, when it is 
 remembered that the negro contracted the 
 habit of voting the Republican ticket dur- 
 ing the very earliest stages of his political 
 infancy. The strength of that habit will 
 become equally apparent from the most 
 superficial acquaintance with the thorough- 
 ness of the training whereby he was led to 
 contract it. 
 
 In this view of the case it is highly im- 
 portant for posterity to become familiar with 
 that vigorous and systematic instruction 
 furnished the negro at the very outset of his 
 political life, that it was his solemn duty to 
 invariably vote the Republican ticket, and 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 39 
 
 that his failure to do so, on the occasion 
 of even such an insignificant event as a 
 local election, was not only a species of 
 ingratitude without parallel and a tacit ad- 
 mission of his readiness to return to a 
 state of servitude, but an act of unequivo- 
 cal encouragement to his former masters 
 to revive the ancien regime with all its hor- 
 rible accompaniments. It is surely rea- 
 sonable to believe that a habit contracted 
 through the powerful agency of such pains- 
 taking and thorough discipline, should be 
 transmitted to one succeeding generation 
 at least ; it is not difficult to conceive of its 
 transmission to several consecutive gener- 
 ations, so that until miscegenation, climate, 
 or other physical causes shall have inter- 
 rupted or neutralized the operation of this 
 law of heredity by completely changing his 
 status, the negro, unless intimidated by act- 
 ual violence or unlawful threats, will never 
 
40 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 of his own free, unaided choice vote the 
 Democratic ticket. 
 
 Although I have studiously avoided 
 burdening posterity with cumbersome and 
 uninteresting tables of statistics or the cita- 
 tion of special cases, I cannot refrain from 
 calling attention to an occurrence of recent 
 date which I regard as of considerable 
 value in refuting the many stringent and 
 hostile criticisms continually passed upon 
 the intelligence of the negro as an elector. 
 Many Northern voters of more than aver- 
 age intelligence seem to be unable to com- 
 prehend the exact position of the Republic- 
 an party on the question of the saloon in 
 politics. That excellent via media of pro- 
 hibition without prohibition, is not infre- 
 quently lost sight of. The blunder of 
 many of my contemporaries in imagining 
 that prohibition pure and simple, without 
 any negative limitation, is a distinctively Re- 
 
GENERAL CONDITION OF POLITICS. 4I 
 
 publican principle, led to consequences of a 
 serious character in the fall elections of the 
 past year. Yet the negro of the South ex- 
 hibited far superior intelligence in that di- 
 rection. For when that issue was raised 
 in Atlanta at a recent election, he voted 
 steadily against prohibition, presumably on 
 the ground that it was obnoxious to his Re- 
 publican principles, as he of all others was 
 the most benefited by the absence of sa- 
 loons in that city. 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 
 
 I AM sufficient of an egotist to believe 
 that I have had the good fortune to be 
 born in what is destined to be regarded as 
 the Saturnian age of Science. Moreover, 
 the modern spirit of scientific investiga- 
 tion is marked by a cathoHcity of effort no 
 less surprising than brilliancy of achieve- 
 ment. Science has, in fact, taken the entire 
 range of human comfort and convenience 
 for her especial field. A famous anatomist 
 had no sooner proclaimed the triumphant 
 discovery of a method for locating ab- 
 scesses on the brain, than a distinguished 
 specialist announced the invention of a 
 system of clothing manufactured upon 
 strict scientific and sanitary principles, and 
 calculated to materially aid in the physical 
 
 (45) 
 
46 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 regeneration of mankind. Subjects as va- 
 rying in quality and degree as the virtues 
 of cocaine as an anaesthetic, whereby 
 operations should be rendered painless, 
 and shoes sewed on anatomical lasts, 
 whereby locomotion should be made easy, 
 each and all receive the same earnest, re- 
 spectful attention of contemporary science. 
 The simple enumeration of the mere 
 titles of the various inventions of this 
 prolific age would require entirely too 
 much space, while anything like an accu- 
 rate or intelligible description of them all 
 is wholly out of the question. Nor have I 
 deemed it necessary to furnish even such 
 a catalogue of titles. There is a full and 
 accurate index of patents in the office of 
 the Commissioner at Washington, and the 
 systematic date kept of the record of the 
 filing of the caveats, makes it extremely 
 unlikely that the present age will be de- 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 47 
 
 frauded of the credit for any invention 
 which has been properly patented. 
 
 But there is reasonable ground for ap- 
 prehension lest in the case of those dis- 
 coveries which are unpatentable in them- 
 selves, and of those for which the inventor, 
 either through negligence or poverty, failed 
 to secure a patent, a certain amount of 
 confusion may arise, and the reputation of 
 the present age suffer a positive injury by 
 posterity arrogating to itself the credit for 
 discoveries which undoubtedly belong to 
 contemporary science. Nor shall I at- 
 tempt to describe all such discoveries, 
 many of which, I frankly admit, may never 
 have come under my notice, but shall con- 
 fine myself to a description of those alone 
 which are not ephemeral in their nature, 
 but destined to retain their novelty a cen- 
 tury or so. 
 
 The dual discovery that there is no God 
 
48 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 and no personal immortality, may be said 
 to be the chief of the many brilliant 
 achiev^ements of science, although, per- 
 haps, the honor of the first must be shared 
 with an earlier age. For, if certain ancient 
 chronicles are to be believed, the credit 
 for this discovery must be given to an 
 anonymous individual who lived some three 
 or four thousand years ago, and although 
 he was generally regarded by his contem- 
 poraries as a fool for entertaining such an 
 opinion, he must, in the light of the most 
 recent researches in biology, be considered 
 as having been several centuries in ad- 
 vance of his aofe. I have not deemed it 
 necessary to enter into any discussion of 
 the credibility of these ancient chronicles 
 with a view to determining in what period 
 of history this discovery was originally 
 made. I shall content myself with simply 
 calling the attention of posterity to one 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 49 
 
 incontestable fact. Even if a past age 
 must be credited with actually originating 
 this discovery, that cannot detract in the 
 least from the glory which belongs to my 
 own. For contemporary science has been 
 the first to make this discovery of any 
 practical utility by popularizing it, so to 
 speak, thereby bringing within the reach 
 of all what had heretofore been monopo- 
 lized by a few progressive minds. 
 
 I have sometimes wondered whether 
 posterity will be so prodigiously grateful 
 to us, after all, for these two discoveries, as 
 we are wont to imagine. Belief in Prov- 
 idence used to be a mighty comfort, and 
 the obsolete view of regarding the life of 
 the present as simply the beginning of an 
 eternal sentient existence seemed to fur- 
 nish about the only satisfactory solution of 
 very many vexatious problems. Experi- 
 ence, moreover, appears to teach that 
 
50 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 mankind are not so completely controlled 
 by a disinterested desire for knowledge as 
 to feel grateful for the explosion of a pleas- 
 ant fiction by the discovery of a disagree- 
 able truth. I have ventured these remarks 
 for the purpose of explaining any traces of 
 resentment which may occasionally exhibit 
 themselves in this chapter. I frankly ad- 
 mit that I once believed myself to be an 
 immortal soul, and I must confess that this 
 discovery of the contrary aroused in me 
 such violent feelinofs of mino;-led raofe and 
 disappointment as to make ignorance seem 
 infinitely preferable to wisdom. I shall, 
 however, make an honest effort to lay 
 aside my personal feelings and discuss 
 this whole subject with the strictest impar- 
 tiality of which I am capable. 
 
 Another discovery of great importance, 
 is that of an orio;inal and exact definition 
 of life. By reason of the long-standing 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 51 
 
 misapprehension that human and animal 
 life were wholly different in their origin 
 and scope, the former had been made the 
 subject of many flattering beliefs, and 
 come to be regarded as something akin to 
 divinity. But science, by a persistent and 
 exhaustive examination of Crustacea, oys- 
 ters, and apes, has finally succeeded in 
 distinguishing between the true and the 
 false by accurately defining life as a con- 
 nexus of organic activities. Although this 
 definition is a trifle mortifying, in that it 
 obliterates all distinction between man 
 and the mollusk, it has, nevertheless, had 
 a clarifying influence, serving to dispel 
 many illusions of long standing, and work- 
 ing a complete revolution in all prior 
 notions of ethical laws. Drunkenness, 
 murder, and theft are now no longer 
 viewed with that childish and superstitious 
 horror with which such phenomena had 
 
52 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 inspired former generations, but simply as 
 imperfect manifestations of these organic 
 activities, which, under a totally different 
 environment, would have been developed 
 into temperance, philanthropy, and hon- 
 esty ; just as flesh, brilliant in coloring 
 and exquisite in texture, differs not one 
 whit in organic structure from that which, 
 through imperfect development of the tis- 
 sues, degenerates into cancer. 
 
 It seems to me scarcely possible to over- 
 rate the importance of this discovery, that 
 mind and spirit are simply finer forms of 
 matter. I am, in fact, quite convinced that 
 it is destined to exercise a wide influence 
 over the conduct of men in the future. It 
 is, therefore, only natural that I should 
 desire to emphasize that the credit for 
 making it may be justly claimed by the 
 present age. It is for this reason that I 
 desire to call the attention of posterity to 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 53 
 
 a recent work by Herr Tudelsdorf, entitled 
 " Das Verhaltnisz Zwischen Moral und 
 Magen," or, in the translation, *' The Con- 
 nection between Morals and Stomach." 
 This valuable contribution to the literature 
 of exact science is at present known to 
 only a select few, although I am much sur- 
 prised at its limited circulation, for it pos- 
 sesses all the essentials of an extensive 
 popularity, since the author is a foreigner 
 by birth, and is both realistic in his de- 
 scriptions and heterodox in his sentiments. 
 The purpose of the book is to prove that 
 morals are a mere matter of diet. The 
 author, a distinguished biologist, and at 
 one time a professor in a German univer- 
 sity, but for many years a resident of the 
 United States, spent considerable time in 
 perfecting his theory, and has recently 
 made public the results of a long series of 
 experiments, which are alike interesting 
 
54 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 and convincing. The subject of these ex- 
 periments were, with but few exceptions, 
 notorious housebreakers, murderers, anar- 
 chists, and similar outcasts of society. It 
 follows, therefore, that the book should 
 contain the latest information concerning 
 the habits, thoughts, modes of life, and 
 peculiar aj'got of the criminal classes ; and 
 as the distinguished author is not troubled 
 with any modish scruples of propriety, the 
 style is the very perfection of art in its 
 naturalism. As has been hinted above, I 
 cannot understand why the volume has not 
 attained a wide circulation, but I wish to 
 assure posterity that not only are its con- 
 tents well known to all advanced thinkers 
 of the present age, but that the conclusions 
 reached by the distinguished author are 
 fully and unreservedly accepted by such. 
 There is space here for only the most 
 meagre summary of the contents of this 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 55 
 
 volume, which I am confident Is destined 
 to supersede the " Pilgrim's Progress " and 
 *' Paradise Lost," on the book-shelves of 
 the next generation. This summary Is 
 not, of course, furnished for the Instruc- 
 tion of posterity, but Is Inserted In this 
 place simply as proof that contemporary 
 society Is familiar with Herr Ttidelsdorfs 
 great discovery, and that the credit for It 
 properly belongs to the present age. 
 
 A falling apple first suggested the law of 
 gravitation to the Inquiring mind of New- 
 ton ; and the discovery of many of the 
 principles of science has been due to cir- 
 cumstances equally trivial. The case of 
 Herr Tiidelsdorf is no exception to that 
 rule. A law-abiding citizen, and conserva- 
 tive in his politics, he was on one occasion, 
 when walking through the Thiergarten at 
 Berlin, seized with a sudden and unac- 
 countable mania for assassinating the Kai- 
 
56 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 ser. The suggestion horrified him in the 
 extreme, but, try as he would, he was un- 
 able to expel it from his mind, and even 
 went so far as to walk in the direction of 
 the Schloss. By a prodigious mental 
 effort he finally succeeded in so far regain- 
 ing control of himself as to retrace his 
 steps, and at length reached home in a 
 state of nervous excitement bordering on 
 delirium, and trembling with the appre- 
 hension that his brain was softeninof. As 
 he entered the house he was suddenly 
 seized with severe pains in the stomach, 
 accompanied with nausea, and he mixed 
 himself a glass of pepsin and soda, which 
 brouo^ht him immediate relief With the 
 cessation of his physical pains the regicid- 
 al mania, which had given him such alarm, 
 also vanished. He then made an effort to 
 recollect if he had eaten anything unusual 
 during the day, and suddenly remembered 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 57 
 
 that he had partaken heartily at dinner of 
 some bologna sausage highly seasoned 
 with garlic, — a dish which he subsequently 
 learned, by the merest accident, was a 
 great favorite with the German socialists. 
 The synchronism between the disordered 
 condition of his stomach and anarchical 
 frenzy led him to suspect that the connec- 
 tion between the two was causal and not 
 accidental. He accordingly determined to 
 test the matter still further, and partook 
 on the following day of bologna, dressed 
 in an exactly similar fashion. The re- 
 sult was in a measure startling. There 
 was a recurrence of the same disaofreeable 
 physical symptoms, and violent regicidal 
 mania, and relief from each was only ob- 
 tained by recourse to pepsin and soda. A 
 still further incident served to convince 
 Herr Tiidelsdorf that he was on the veree 
 of one of the greatest discoveries of the agew 
 
58 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 He noticed that his youngest daughter, 
 Gretchen, a mere child, in the nursery, of 
 an unusually amiable disposition, and care- 
 ful in an extraordinary degree of her play- 
 things, was, when suffering from the colic, 
 not only subject to violent outbursts of 
 temper, but gready given to destroying 
 everything which came within her reach. 
 Subsequent investigation in this direction, 
 as well as his own personal experience, 
 ultimately served to convince the Profes- 
 sor that all kinds of anarchical sentiments 
 were due entirely to the colic in some form 
 or other. An exhaustive monograph 
 which he published, containing an account 
 of his investigations up to this point, at- 
 tracted considerable attention, and he 
 finally secured permission from the Di- 
 rector of Police to make an actual appli- 
 cation of his theory upon the prisoners 
 confined on the charge of socialism in the 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 59 
 
 prison at Plotzen See, The result was 
 satisfactory in the highest degree. The 
 method pursued was curative, and not diag- 
 nostic ; for the Professor had determined 
 to reduce his theory to practice by a prac- 
 tical demonstration, that all forms of an- 
 archical frenzy could be permanently cured 
 by the same remedies employed for the 
 relief of colic. The four subjects whom 
 he had selected for purposes of experiment 
 were the reddest and most radical commu- 
 nists in Europe, yet in less than a year 
 they were converted into law-abiding citi- 
 zens of a highly conservative type by 
 small doses of soothing-syrup judiciously 
 and methodically administered under the 
 personal direction of Herr Tlidelsdorf. 
 
 The Professor then enlarged the scope 
 of his investigations so as to include the 
 entire field of ethics. Shortly after his re- 
 moval to the United States, and at about 
 
6o THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 the same time that a distinoruished contem- 
 porary had announced that all nervous dis- 
 eases were due to the imperfect focusing of 
 the eyes, he completed and published his 
 magnum opus, which proves, by a multi- 
 tude of experiments, that all immoralities 
 are entirely due to a disturbance of the 
 normal proportion of acid and alkali in the 
 stomach. 
 
 I must now hurriedly pass over the vari- 
 ous other discoveries made by science in 
 the present age. I would, however, beg 
 posterity not to construe the limited space 
 assigned to their description as any reflec- 
 tion upon their relative importance, but to 
 regard it as due entirely to the brevity 
 necessarily imposed upon me by the size 
 of the present volume. 
 
 By the fact that it was capable of a cer- 
 tain amount of verification from the past, the 
 discovery of Natural Selection has attracted 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 6l 
 
 considerable attention. For this discovery- 
 placed in an entirely original light a custom 
 which had prevailed to a considerable ex- 
 tent in former years. I refer to mariages 
 de convenance. As man is an animal, his 
 sole object in mating must be that the de- 
 ficiencies of one of the parties should be 
 supplemented by the acquirements of the 
 other. In view of this fact, it is easy to 
 understand how 77iariages de convenarice 
 are in exact accord with the highest 
 scientific principles. For thereby the 
 poverty of one of the contracting parties 
 is relieved by the wealth of the other; 
 the bourgeois blood of the husband neu- 
 tralized by the aristocratic descent of the 
 wife. It is, however, a little curious that 
 the custom should have fallen into disre- 
 pute at about the same time that the only 
 scientific explanation of its existence was 
 discovered. There can be no question, 
 
THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 however, but that this present abeyance is 
 only temporary, and that mariages de con- 
 vena7ice will be resumed in the future, 
 when they will attain a still greater pre- 
 cision, inasmuch as they will then be wise- 
 ly regulated by scientific principles and not 
 by mere rude instinct as in the past. 
 
 But the greatest and most original dis- 
 covery of all, is that of Evolution. This 
 must not, however, be confounded with 
 Natural Selection. Both were, it is true, 
 invented by the same man, but, although 
 apparently identical, they are in reality 
 related to each other as is cause to effect. 
 The limited space which I would be per- 
 force compelled to assign to any descrip- 
 tion of this great discovery, might be 
 misleading. The conspicuous absence of 
 any details might, in fact, justify the infer- 
 ence that my estimate of the magnitude of 
 this great discovery is greatly exaggerated. 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 63 
 
 I will therefore content myself with mak- 
 ing- a single cautionary suggestion and 
 refer posterity for all further information 
 on this subject to those large octavo vol- 
 umes wherein the subject is exhaustively 
 discussed, and also to the recently pub- 
 lished life of the inventor. For I am 
 confident that the voluminous literature of 
 the subject will outlast my own genera- 
 tion for a considerable time and be easily 
 accessible for inspection a century or so 
 hence. 
 
 I would therefore caution posterity to 
 avoid the error, which is not uncommon in 
 our day, of imagining that the descent of 
 man is the only phenomenon capable of ex- 
 planation by evolution. It is infinitely more 
 ambitious In its aim and scope, seeking to 
 furnish a sufficient reason for every phe- 
 nomenon, small or great, in the universe. 
 All progress In Belles Lettres and Fhiloso- 
 
64 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 phy is clearly shown to be but the result 
 of evolution. Moreover, whenever the 
 productions or talents of an individual au- 
 thor interfere with the horoscope cast by 
 the evolutionists for some particular age, 
 science does not dogmatically seek to prove 
 his existence a myth or endeavor to depre- 
 ciate his abilities into that dead level of 
 mediocrity required by the laws of evolu- 
 tion, but charitably accounts for his ap- 
 pearance by the clever supposition that he 
 was a hybrid. States, with their complex 
 constitutions and societies, with their deli- 
 cate and elaborate machinery for the pro- 
 tection of life and property, have been 
 proven to be the evolutionary result of 
 bardic meetings in the past and the blood- 
 money of the original German tribes ; while 
 in the philosophy of cooking, the origin of 
 the miracles of pastry art constructed by 
 our modern cJiefsy has been definitely 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 65 
 
 retraced through successive and gradual 
 stages of development to the mud-pies of 
 the primitive Aryan race. 
 
 Having ventured to exhibit a certain 
 amount of personal irritation at the com- 
 mencement of this chapter, I should be 
 guilty of an unpardonable injustice, did I 
 omit to specify the unquestioned benefits 
 which accrued from many of the discover- 
 ies made by science. .Although all belief 
 in a conscious immortality had long since 
 been destroyed, science nevertheless holds 
 out the hope that according to the Con- 
 servation and Correlation of Energies no 
 life, however insignificant, is wholly lived 
 in vain. Man ani the mollusk, it is gra- 
 ciously hinted, contribute alike indifferently 
 toward keeping the world in a condition 
 of active motion, which would otherwise 
 fall into a very perilous state of sloth. I 
 
66 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 am sadly conscious of my inability to bring 
 to the discussion of this biological concep- 
 tion of the universe anything like that de- 
 gree of enthusiasm to which the subject is 
 entitled. I can only plead for my lack of 
 ardor that the discovery is of comparative- 
 ly recent origin, and that the memory of my 
 discarded belief in a future state plagues 
 me with an uncomfortable sense of the in- 
 adequacy of a posthumous and impersonal 
 contribution to the kinetic energy of mat- 
 ter, as a substitute for personal immortality. 
 But te77tpo7^a mutaiitur^ et nos imcta7nur. 
 Habit is a facile magician, and the next 
 generation will no doubt entertain feelings 
 of a very different character on this sub- 
 ject. For when the leaven of this new 
 gospel has had time to work, men will 
 view death with exceeding peace and 
 calmness, cheered by the thought that the 
 bones, which St. Paul and eighteen sub- 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 6/ 
 
 sequent centuries fondly hoped would be 
 clothed upon with immortality, will not 
 vainly perish, but by being converted into 
 excellent fertilizers, materially improve the 
 digestion of coming races, and that the 
 cunning chemic cells, once supposed to be 
 the habitation of an immortal soul, will 
 furnish a superior kind of phosphate for 
 the relief of overtaxed brain-workers in 
 the future. 
 
 It is, however, pleasant to be able to 
 record that although science destroyed 
 the world's hope of immortality, she has 
 greatly facilitated the means for the at- 
 tainment of a painless longevity. Never 
 in the history of the world as at the pres- 
 ent time have such numberless laboratories 
 been in active operation for the manufac- 
 ture of pain-killers, extracts, syrups, plas- 
 ters, and other infallible cures for all or- 
 ganic diseases. The marvellous rapidity 
 
68 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 with which such articles are manufactured 
 is only excelled by the low price at which 
 they are exposed for sale, and thereby 
 brought within the reach of both rich and 
 poor. In fact, in even the present age 
 the cost of prolonging life easily and 
 painlessly to a considerable term be- 
 yond the traditional threescore years and 
 ten, is much less than that of Chris- 
 tian burial formerly, and it is only reason- 
 able to expect that greater opportunities 
 still, will be offered in this direction in the 
 future. 
 
 Moreover, the opinion that increased 
 facilities for the attainment of longevity 
 might prove a comfortable substitute for 
 immortality, seems to have found in even 
 our day a certain amount of confirmation 
 in quarters least expected. For I have 
 noticed that many religious newspapers 
 have begun to devote their columns, here- 
 
THE STATE OF SCIENCE. 69 
 
 tofore exclusively reserved for the discus- 
 sion of themes of a spiritual nature, to ad- 
 vertisements of sarsaparillas for the blood, 
 pads for the liver, and protectors for the 
 chest. 
 
THE MORAL, INDUSTRIAL, AND 
 SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE 
 AGE. 
 
THE MORAL, INDUSTRIAL, AND 
 SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE 
 AGE. 
 
 A DISAGREEABLE and humiliating task 
 awaits me at the very threshold of the 
 present chapter. Any picture of the con- 
 dition of contemporary morality, must. If 
 faithfully limned, be absolutely repulsive to 
 such as have the slightest respect for even 
 conventional decorum. The foulest excess- 
 es are an every-day occurrence. Murder, 
 bigamy, theft, and similar crimes are on 
 the constant Increase. The Instincts of our 
 population are of the lowest order. Our 
 moral degeneracy Is, In fact, so complete 
 that the most sanguine has lost all hope 
 that temperance, honesty, and virtue should 
 ever become our national traits once more. 
 
 (73) 
 
74 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 I feel confident that I have exhibited 
 elsewhere in this volume sufficient indica- 
 tions of patriotism and personal pride in 
 my age, to convince posterity that nothing 
 except an irresistible regard for the truth 
 would induce me to bring such charges of 
 turpitude against my contemporaries. It 
 is only by evidence so conclusive as to ad- 
 mit of no denial that I have been forced to 
 accept such shameful conclusions. 
 
 That evidence has been furnished me by 
 a great metropolitan journal, the sworn 
 circulation of which is simply stupendous. 
 I have been forced to construe its popu- 
 larity as convincing proof of its reliability. 
 Any other course would have convicted 
 my countrymen of being either fools or 
 knaves, — that is, as either so credulous as 
 to be unable to distinguish between true 
 and false news, or as so lacking in all 
 reverence for the truth as to lend their 
 
MORAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 75 
 
 support to the publication of protracted 
 falsehoods and misrepresentations. Apart 
 from my unwillingness to place such an 
 unflattering construction upon the char- 
 acter of my contemporaries, the continued 
 success of that journal soon convinced me 
 that either of these two propositions was 
 untenable. A fraud is always short-lived, 
 and time alone is required to make a liar 
 tiresome even to those who are themselves 
 wholly indifferent to the truth. The con- 
 stantly increasing circulation of that journal 
 was, therefore, accepted by me as an addi- 
 tional proof of its reliability. 
 
 I must admit that it has required no in- 
 considerable effort to overcome my natural 
 reluctance to expose the unwholesome 
 condition of contemporary morality. My 
 feelings on this subject have in fact been 
 so stronof that I have resorted to various 
 expedients whereby I might be enabled to 
 
'j6 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 truthfully modify my views. I, for in- 
 stance, made a systematic search to dis- 
 cover some ground for believing that the 
 policy of this journal was purely sensa- 
 tional, and that it therefore only sought to 
 record those events w^hich became tragic, 
 because of their criminality, or startling, 
 by reason of their sensuality. But I 
 speedily became convinced that I had no 
 reasonable ground for such an hypothesis. 
 I was forced to conclude, from the profuse 
 and passionate claims to impartiality put 
 forth by this journal — to the sincerity of 
 which so many of my contemporaries had 
 attested by their subscriptions — that it was 
 wholly without likes and dislikes, that vir- 
 tue and vice were viewed by it from the 
 same impartial stand-point of news, and 
 that, if the record of good and fair actions 
 found only an occasional place in its col- 
 umns, this was entirely due to their rarity 
 
MORAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. "JJ 
 
 in real life, and not to any editorial aver- 
 sion to their publication. 
 
 It is no occasional or spasmodic exam- 
 ination of the columns of this journal which 
 has led me to form such a damning opinion 
 concerning the present state of morals. 
 That opinion has been formed only af- 
 ter a careful and systematic daily perusal 
 for a period of more than two years. 
 It is too much to say that I have been un- 
 able to discover a single action which dig- 
 nifies human conduct recorded during that 
 time in the columns of that journal. But 
 those which I did find were of such rare 
 occurrence, and the space allotted to them 
 was so brief, that they would have wholly 
 escaped my attention had I not been on 
 the constant alert to discover some in- 
 stance of virtue and decorum, however in- 
 significant, to relieve the blackness of the 
 long catalogue of crime. 
 
78 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 I would that I could relieve myself of 
 all personal responsibility in this matter, 
 by disclosing the name of my authority, 
 which, for prudential reasons, I have 
 deemed it best to withhold altogether. To 
 be frank, I am afraid lest posterity, be- 
 coming familiar with the various artifices 
 employed as advertising mediums in the 
 present age, would view this volume with 
 a certain amount of distrust, did I specify 
 that journal by name. It might, in fact, 
 suggest the suspicion that this history, 
 which I have conscientiously endeavored 
 to raise to the dignified level of an impar- 
 tial record of events, is no history at all, 
 but simply a novel species of editorial en- 
 terprise on the part of that journal, invented 
 for the purpose of increasing its circulation 
 by publicly advertising the large space re- 
 served in its columns for the discussion of 
 scandals and crimes. It is in view of some 
 
MORAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 79 
 
 such insinuation being made that I have 
 deemed it pertinent to distinctly affirm, in 
 this place, that neither this chapter nor 
 this book is written in the interest of any 
 daily or weekly journal. I will make that 
 affirmation stronger by the additional state- 
 ment that I have no affiliations — social, 
 political, or literary — with any member of 
 the newspaper press. 
 
 I have also considered it wise to explain 
 at this point why it is that, in discussing 
 the subject under present consideration, I 
 have contented myself with general alle- 
 gations, which, though, I trust, are suffi- 
 ciently unequivocal to be explicit, are con- 
 spicuous for an absence of all details. 
 Another reason than a feeling of repug- 
 nance toward lingering over a subject so 
 manifestly painful, has influenced me in 
 this respect. Although it was possible to 
 comment on many vices and crimes with 
 
80 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 perfect frankness and unlimited freedom, I 
 would still have had to confine myself to 
 the widest generalities in the discussion of 
 one class of immoralities. It is only simple 
 justice to state that this would not have 
 been due to any lack of particulars in the 
 journal constituting my authority. That 
 class of immoralities are described therein 
 with painstaking attention and patient re- 
 gard for the most insignificant items. Cau- 
 tion alone has prompted me to take this 
 course, for I was quite unable to determine, 
 with any degree of certainty, to what ex- 
 tent the Society for the Suppression of 
 Vice would permit me to indulge in details. 
 Nor need posterity be at all surprised that 
 what can be printed with impunity in a 
 journal claiming to have half a million of 
 readers, cannot be safely published in a 
 book which can never hope to attain such 
 an extensive circulation. The paradox will 
 
MORAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 8 1 
 
 become at once intelligible if a single im- 
 portant distinction is only noted. It is 
 agreed in the present age that the most 
 extravagant license of theme and treatment 
 is not only excusable, but commendable, 
 when used for the dissemination of news ; 
 whereas the same license, if employed in a 
 formal contribution to literature, is promptly 
 rebuked as injurious to the public morals. 
 For this reason, I deemed it prudent to 
 avoid any possible risk of collision with 
 that Society which might result in causing 
 my book to be suppressed within ten days 
 after publication. That Society, therefore, 
 and not I, must be held responsible for the 
 vague treatment which this whole subject 
 has received at my hands, as it seemed 
 ridiculous to exhaustively discuss some 
 topics, when, by the very nature of things, 
 I would be compelled to dismiss others of 
 equal importance with the most general 
 
82 THE AGE OF CLEVELANR 
 
 allegations. Having made this explana- 
 tion, I shall now turn from this very disa- 
 greeable theme to the discussion of an- 
 other infinitely more pleasing to me. 
 
 It would be unnatural for any one having 
 the prosperity of our country at heart, to 
 curb in the least his fervent expressions of 
 thankfulness for our recent safe deliverance 
 from a most serious industrial crisis. I 
 am not, of course, unaware that such an 
 intrusion of personal feelings is, from a 
 strict point of view, slightly unprofessional, 
 and apt to be regarded as inconsistent with 
 that judicial attitude which the historian is 
 expected to uniformly observe. I am confi- 
 dent, however, that posterity will view with 
 a kindly eye any effusion of enthusiastic 
 pride, which it were well-nigh unpatriotic to 
 suppress, in describing our narrow escape 
 from a predicament of such a critical nature 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 83 
 
 as to threaten for a time the stability of 
 our government. As a familiarity with the 
 gravity of the situation is necessary in order 
 to appreciate the sufficiency of my grounds 
 for congratulation, it is pardonable to mi- 
 nutely describe the condition of affairs 
 which culminated in such a serious crisis. 
 
 It had been surmised for a long time by 
 the more astute observers of current events 
 that there was on foot a secret but wxll- 
 developed plot to betray the United States 
 into the hands of Great Britain. '* Trifles, 
 light as air," if viewed as detached circum- 
 stances, but of w^eighty moment if regarded 
 as parts of a coherent whole, had not failed 
 to attract considerable attention in certain 
 quarters. The unpatriotic indifference ex- 
 hibited in the Fisheries Dispute, the negli- 
 gence in providing proper and adequate 
 coast defences, the erection of a monument 
 to Major Andre on American soil, and the 
 
84 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 unconcealed admiration of Mr. Lowell for 
 British society — these, and many other in- 
 cidents which might be easily cited, were 
 highly suspicious as evidences of some oc- 
 cult scheme of disgraceful treachery ; just 
 as the indications of g^neiss at occasional 
 intervals on the surface is sufficient to con- 
 vince the geologist that an excavation of 
 the soil will reveal a continuous stratum of 
 that primary rock. 
 
 Although subsequent events fully justi- 
 fied such prognostications, only a few were 
 sufficiently far-sighted to discern from the 
 first the omens of coming danger. The 
 people at large, lulled into a false security 
 by the deceitful indications of coming pros- 
 perity, pursued their wonted avocations, 
 oblivious of the sword of Damocles sus- 
 pended above their heads. But on De- 
 cember 6, 1887, the slight thread by which 
 that sword was suspended was rudely sev- 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 85 
 
 ered, and it fell with an ominous clatter, 
 bringing consternation and panic to the 
 American people. On that day, to drop 
 all metaphor, our de facto President made 
 public the contents of his annual Message 
 to Congress. I would remark here that I 
 have no desire to impugn the motives of 
 our de facto President, for I feel as if he 
 were entitled to a certain amount of respect 
 by virtue of his position. For this reason 
 I shall not dwell, as have many of my con- 
 temporaries, upon the latent suggestions, 
 hidden meaning, and general tenor of that 
 Message, from which the inference would 
 be clearly deducible that the author must 
 have been influenced to write it by the 
 promise of a large subsidy from the Eng- 
 lish government. I shall therefore content 
 myself with the statement of undisputed 
 facts, leaving the analysis of motives to 
 some other historian. 
 
S6 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 The unequiv^ocal encouragement given 
 by that Message to British industries was 
 patent on its face. Not less patent was 
 the evidence which it furnished of a foul 
 conspiracy for the final destruction of the 
 Union. Moreover, the audacious details 
 of that conspiracy, as revealed in the Mes- 
 sage itself, were a surprise even to those 
 who had had their suspicions already 
 aroused. It was now apparent to the most 
 sceptical that the ultimate purpose of the 
 Anglo-American Cabal was to completely 
 beggar the country by free trade, when by 
 reason of its exhausted condition it would 
 fall an easy prey to the gun-boats of the 
 British navy. 
 
 The blackness of that day will scarcely 
 admit of exaggeration, recalling, as it did, 
 the deep despondency which prevailed at 
 the North at the time of the attack on 
 Fort Sumter. It is not indeed too much 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 8/ 
 
 to say that the gloom was even more in- 
 tense. The prospect of our glorious 
 Union, rent with civil feuds, and drenched 
 with fraternal blood, was hard enough to 
 face. It was an infinitely more bitter 
 thought that our Republic, born from the 
 throes of revolution and fostered into a 
 great commercial commonwealth by a sys- 
 tem of wise and generous protection, was 
 destined to degenerate into a mere terri- 
 torial adjunct of Great Britain. What 
 disgrace could be keener than that thirty- 
 eight States should be treacherously de- 
 prived of that independence which had 
 been won a century before by only thirteen, 
 at the cost of unparalleled heroism and 
 self-sacrifice ? 
 
 Such gloomy thoughts were to be read 
 on every countenance. The mechanic cast 
 his tools on his bench, the weaver left his 
 loom, the shoemaker dropped his last. 
 
88 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 each and all disheartened by the thought 
 that the time was not now far distant when 
 the laboring man in America would be 
 compelled to work for pauper wages and 
 die in a pauper workhouse. The actual 
 injury done to great industrial enterprises 
 was of a serious nature. I shall, however, 
 leave it to the statistician to formally record 
 how many factories shut off steam, and 
 how many furnaces banked their fires in 
 consequence of this Message. An atmos- 
 phere of absolute panic prevailed. Men 
 sorely felt the need of help, but where was 
 help to come from when the de facto Presi 
 dent of the United States had shown him 
 self to be an open sympathizer with the 
 Anglo-American Cabal ? 
 
 But help did come. " The land laughs 
 with applause," to quote the felicitous 
 phrase coined by one of my contempo- 
 raries in describing the present crisis. 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 89 
 
 The revulsion from tears to lauorhter, 
 from gloom to glee, was quick, but none 
 the less genuine and sincere. More- 
 over, help came from the only source 
 whence it could be expected to come, al- 
 though it involved an economic paradox. 
 A dual executive is usually considered a 
 menace to constitutional government. In 
 the present instance it proved our salva- 
 tion. For shortly after the formal trans- 
 mission to Congress of the annual Message 
 of our de facto President, the annual mes- 
 sage of our de jt^re President was trans- 
 mitted to the American people. The lat- 
 ter outlined a policy directly contrary to 
 that which had been indicated in the former. 
 Its effect was electrical. Men of varying 
 and diverse conditions, — the poorest labor- 
 er, the more prosperous shopkeeper, the 
 wealthy manufacturer, — lost all fear. Con- 
 fidence succeeded panic, for the prophecy 
 
90 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 made at the time of the nomination of our 
 de jure President had been Hterally ful- 
 filled. Nothinor more was needed than 
 the presence at the helm of such a "calm, 
 deliberate, commanding, sagacious man," 
 to eive the fullest assurance that the old 
 Ship of State which seemed destined but 
 a few days before "to go down beneath 
 the waves forever, carrying her precious 
 freight with her," would now surely " come 
 into her harbor, into still water, into safety." 
 I have purposely refrained from tran- 
 scribing in full this message of our de jiire 
 President. In the first place, I am not quite 
 sure that it has received the author's latest 
 revisions ; and I am, moreover, confident 
 that it is destined to be reverently cherished 
 by succeeding generations, as the Mag- 
 na Charta which saved the liberties of the 
 people in 1887, and will therefore be easily 
 accessible for the inspection of posterity. 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 9I 
 
 There is one feature of it, however, to 
 which I desire to call particular attention. 
 Posterity must not regard this message as 
 the unofficial utterances of a simple Amer- 
 ican citizen. Such a view of the case 
 would furnish sufficient grounds for believ- 
 ing that I had either exaggerated the 
 gravity of the situation or magnified the 
 importance of the message itself For it 
 would naturally seem incredible that the 
 personal opinions of a single individual 
 could have so powerfully swayed the 
 destinies of fifty millions of people. It 
 is, therefore, with no intention of disparag- 
 ing the broad statesmanship apparent in 
 every page of that message that I empha- 
 size the fact that it was the official position 
 of the author as the de jicre President of 
 the United States, which lent it such a po- 
 tent influence. Moreover, the subsequent 
 revelation that the policy of our de jure 
 
92 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 President met with the approval of one 
 member of his cabinet at least, contributed 
 in no small degree toward fully restoring 
 public confidence. For, on January 4, 
 1888, our de jure Secretary of the Treas- 
 ury, in his annual report to the Senate of 
 the United States, expressed his full con- 
 currence in the recommendations previous- 
 ly suggested by his official superior. 
 
 . No apologies are, I am sure, required 
 for the foregoing circumstantial account of 
 this critical period in our history. It, 
 moreover, serves as an excellent introduc- 
 tion to the discussion of our present in- 
 dustrial condition, to which I shall forth- 
 with devote myself. 
 
 No one is better aware than am I of the 
 popular prejudice which exists against 
 tables of statistics. I have for this reason 
 decided to depart altogether from that 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 93 
 
 formal statistical method uniformly ob- 
 served by all writers on the industrial con- 
 dition of a country. Such a resolution 
 necessarily involves the exclusion of all 
 comments upon the balance of trade, the 
 condition of agriculture, the growth of 
 manufacturing and mining interests, and 
 other kindred subjects which cannot be in- 
 telligently discussed without the aid of 
 tables and diagrams. I shall, for this 
 reason, confine myself strictly to the con- 
 sideration of the condition of labor in the 
 present age, which, though but a single 
 phase of this great subject, is entirely 
 worthy of the exclusive attention which I 
 shall bestow on it. 
 
 Every one, unless lacking in all humane 
 instincts, must view with unfeigned indig- 
 nation the disgraceful anachronism pre- 
 sented by the present position of the 
 
94 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 American laborer. While England, through 
 the persistent efforts of the late Lord 
 Shaftesbury, was passing law after law for 
 the benefit of those employed in factories 
 and mines, and even barbaric Russia was 
 relieving the hardships of her peasantry by 
 giving them a communal interest in the 
 soil, the United States can point to only 
 one triumphant act of legislation in the 
 direct interest of labor, and that is the 
 half-holiday law. 
 
 Posterity must not construe this con- 
 spicuous absence of all labor legislation as 
 evidence that there is need of none. It is 
 not too much to say, that at no time in the 
 past was the condition of the laboring 
 man accompanied with more peculiar hard- 
 ships than it is in the present. The ma- 
 jority of able-bodied workmen are wholly 
 unable to obtain work, and such few as are 
 so fortunate as to find employment receive 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 95 
 
 only Starvation wages. The poverty and 
 distress which marks the lot of the laborer 
 is pitiable. He never has a fire in winter, 
 and his clothing is so scant and thin as to 
 scarcely meet the requirements of decency, 
 and is painfully insufficient as a protection 
 against the most mildly inclement weather. 
 These statements are no hasty or irre- 
 sponsible utterances of my own. They 
 are made upon the authority of a gentle- 
 man who has devoted much time to the 
 investigation of the subject, and is the 
 proclaimed champion of labor. I am, 
 moreover, obliged to confess that these 
 statements, though appalling in themselves, 
 seem cold and meagre when taken out 
 from the rhetorical setting of pathos, pas- 
 sion, and invective in which they are en- 
 shrined in the various published volumes 
 and printed addresses of that gentleman, 
 and which I should have been gratified to 
 
g6 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 have quoted In full had it not been for two 
 considerations. Anything like liberal or 
 literal quotation would, in the first place, 
 have occupied entirely too much space ; 
 and in the second place, have involved an 
 infringement of the copyright monopolized 
 by that gentleman, the purchase of which 
 required an outlay of capital quite beyond 
 my means. 
 
 This picture of the condition of con- 
 temporary labor, though presented only in 
 miniature, is necessarily so black that I 
 cannot resist the temptation to relieve it 
 in a measure by recording in this place 
 certain instances of material prosperity 
 among the poor, which have by accident 
 come to my notice. I am confident that 
 in so doinor I shall win the o^ratitude of 
 every intelligent and sympathetic reader. 
 For I myself vividly remember what pleas- 
 ure it was in a;iU belhu7i days to turn 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 97 
 
 from the sickening recitals of the cruekies 
 practiced in cotton-fields and rice-swamps 
 to pleasant tales of slave-life on Kentucky 
 plantations. It is, moreover, superfluous 
 to state that the citation of these isolated 
 cases is not made with any intention of 
 lessening confidence in the veracity of that 
 gentleman whose statements I have in sub- 
 stance quoted. I could scarcely be expect- 
 ed to impeach the credibility of my own 
 witness, even for the laudable purpose of 
 flattering my age and pleasing posterity. , 
 I therefore desire to say, subject to the 
 foregoing qualification, that to my certain 
 knowledge six car-drivers in the city of 
 New York possess heavy winter overcoats, 
 and as many pile-drivers extra thick flan- 
 nels, and that in the discharge of certain 
 business duties I discovered, to my great 
 gratification, that a dozen day-laborers re- 
 ceive sufficiently high wages to keep their 
 
98 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 families supplied with fuel during the win- 
 ter months. I am also ready to affirm that 
 I have repeatedly read in a daily journal 
 an advertisement offering work to such 
 compositors as might apply at the office of 
 the subscriber. I do not, however, place 
 implicit confidence in the good faith of this 
 advertisement, as it appeared in October 
 of the past year, and may have been only 
 a clever electioneering dodge, invented by 
 the capitalists to impress the public with a 
 totally erroneous view concerning the tra- 
 ditional difficulties of the workman obtain- 
 ing work. 
 
 As has been stated above, these fruits 
 of personal observation are in no wise 
 intended to destroy confidence in the 
 Champion of United Labor. It has, how- 
 ever, been a pleasant task to record these 
 evidences of occasional prosperity among 
 a class whose condition must be viewed by 
 
INDUSTRIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 99 
 
 posterity as infinitely more severe than 
 that of the villein of the Middle Ages, 
 and as accompanied with considerably 
 greater hardships than that of the serf in 
 Russia before the period of his emancipa- 
 tion. 
 
 Before dismissing this subject altogether, 
 I desire to correct a totally wrong impres- 
 sion which posterity may possibly receive 
 from a perusal of much of our Anti-Pov- 
 erty, United Labor, Central Labor, Social- 
 istic and Anarchical literature. The con- 
 spicuous absence of any allusion to female 
 wage-workers in these journals might lead 
 to the inference that in the present age no 
 woman is required to earn her own living, 
 or if so, that her services are so generous- 
 ly paid that she has no cause for com- 
 plaint. I am naturally loth to dissipate 
 any such flattering reputation for chivalry, 
 but the truth inexorably requires me to 
 
100 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 admit that there is a large class of noto- 
 riously underpaid female wage-workers. 
 The only possible explanation of the para- 
 dox that five minutes' infraction of schedule 
 time leads to a general tie-up, while the 
 long hours and starvation wages of a 
 seamstress provoke no comment, lies in 
 the intimate connection between politics 
 and philanthropy. The absolute worth- 
 lessness of woman as a political factor is 
 regarded as cancelling all her natural claims 
 on ordinary humanity. I am not wholly 
 without hope, however, that this defect, if 
 defect it be, will be remedied in the future 
 by the recognition of the indirect relation 
 which women hold to politics as the pos- 
 sible mothers of Walking Delegates. 
 
 I have occupied so much space in dls- 
 cussinor the moral and industrial condition 
 of the age, that I can only briefly sketch 
 
SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. lOI 
 
 our social customs and usages. Fortun- 
 ately, the last-named subject will suffer no 
 great injury if dismissed with scant notice. 
 The proverb, though musty, is true, that 
 nothing is so monotonous as fashion and 
 sin, and that any effort to be original in 
 either must necessarily prove a failure. 
 The superficial forms of society are, in- 
 deed, by no means permanent. I myself 
 can remember many changes introduced 
 during my own generation concerning 
 questions of precedence, the proper attitude 
 to be observed in saluting a lady, and the 
 correct cut for a dress-suit. I have, how- 
 ever, regarded such customs as of scarce- 
 ly sufficient dignity to come within the 
 scope of the present history. But that 
 dread of ennui, hatred of solitude, and in- 
 defatigable craving for amusement, which 
 seeks relief indifferently in Browning Clubs, 
 Palmistry entertainments, and Opera par- 
 
102 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 ties, can scarcely be claimed as original by 
 the present age. I have, in fact, diligently 
 searched for some expression of originality 
 in our various social customs and usages, 
 and failing to find any, shall dismiss this 
 subject altogether, after making one or two 
 cautionary suggestions for the benefit of 
 posterity. 
 
 I therefore desire to state at this point 
 that what is technically known as our best 
 society has succeeded in forming the ac- 
 quaintance of not a few genuine members 
 of the British aristocracy. I have deemed 
 it prudent to make this statement, lest 
 posterity might form a directly contrary 
 opinion from reading the frequent accounts 
 in contemporary journals of the ease with 
 which needy adventurers successfully mas- 
 querade as legitimate descendants of the 
 Plantagenets before our American popula- 
 tion. Such numerous instances of credulity 
 
SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 103 
 
 might, in fact, lead to the unflattering- infer- 
 ence that our people had never had an oppor- 
 tunity to distinguish between the true and 
 the false in this particular by the presence 
 of a real member of the English peerage in 
 their midst. This is not so. I am ready 
 to make affidavit that H. R. H. Albert Ed- 
 ward, Prince of Wales, Field Marshal, K. 
 G., K. T., K. P., G. C. B., G. C. S. I., G. 
 C. M. G., once visited us, for I myself saw 
 him in an open barouche on Broadway, in 
 the city of New York. Moreover, many 
 elder sons of families tracing their pedigree 
 to William the Conqueror, have made 
 themselves so conspicuous by their vices 
 or dullness, that the rumor of their pres- 
 ence on American soil has reached even 
 the seclusion in which I dwell. 
 
 Although our society is severely demo- 
 cratic in its structure, I would not have 
 posterity imagine that we are so rude as to 
 
I04 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 be wholly without any system of caste. I 
 feel that there is no need to call attention 
 to that untitled nobility among us, which 
 trace their descent in a direct or collateral 
 line to some signer of the Declaration of In- 
 dependence, or immigrant in the Mayflower. 
 Such genealogical claims to social pre-emi- 
 nence are sufficiently cosmopolitan to be 
 easily understood. There is, however, one 
 class distinction among us which, were it 
 not specially noted by me, posterity might 
 scarcely suspect existed in an age pre-emi- 
 nently commercial, and a society peculiarly 
 plutocratic. From a social point of view, 
 there is a well-recocrnized difference be- 
 tween selling goods at wholesale and re- 
 tail. The vendor in the former case is 
 a merchant ; in the latter a shopman. 
 Although I can truthfully attest that this 
 distinction is rigidly observed in excluding 
 and receiving applicants for admission into 
 
SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 105 
 
 society, I am forced to admit that there is 
 considerable confusion in certain instances 
 as to how much business makes the mer- 
 chant, and how Httle the shopman. I am, 
 for example, quite unable to specify, with 
 any degree of exactness, how many hogs 
 a man is required to slaughter, in the 
 course of a year, in order to be removed 
 from the vulgar plane of the butcher to 
 the dignified level of a pork-packer. 
 
 I shall venture to close this chapter with 
 a statement which I greatly fear will pro- 
 voke the derisive laughter of posterity. 
 There are not only several colleges and 
 universities in our country, but a goodly 
 number of our population are extremely 
 ambitious to have their sons educated at 
 these institutions of learning. This will 
 naturally seem incomprehensible to poster- 
 ity, in view of the constant fire of ridicule 
 to which all forms of higher education are 
 
I06 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 exposed In our current press. As an in- 
 exhaustible source of wit, that subject bids 
 fair, in fact, to rival the old standard one 
 of the frailty and fickleness of woman. 
 A comic paper is very poorly officered 
 unless possessing an editor capable of ex- 
 temporizing innumerable watty paragraphs 
 at the expense of the college-bred youth, 
 while no minstrel troupe is too ignorant to 
 invent a gibe or jest at classical learning. 
 It might reasonably be expected that this 
 species of lunacy would long since have 
 been laughed away. Yet it is incontesta- 
 bly true, that not only the number of col- 
 leges in the country, but their rates of at- 
 tendance, are on the constant increase. I 
 solemnly assure posterity that no joke is 
 lurkincr in this last statement, and that it is 
 made, not in the spirit of the farceiu', but 
 in the character of the grave historian. I 
 am, moreover, wholly unable to suggest 
 
SOCIAL CONDITION OF THE AGE. 10/ 
 
 any explanation of such a paradoxical state 
 of affairs. For it is universally conceded that 
 a collegiate education entirely unfits a man 
 for the duties of life, and that he has to 
 painfully unlearn whatever he has acquired 
 during his scholastic career. Nor is class- 
 ical learning regarded as only interfering 
 with the prospects of those destined for 
 trade or commerce. It is also viewed as 
 exerting a positively injurious influence 
 over those entering what have been digni- 
 fied as the learned professions. A critical 
 familiarity with New-Testament Greek 
 makes a clergyman dull and doctrinal, 
 thereby putting an end to the most cher- 
 ished hopes of his friends that he would 
 become a great popular preacher. A phy- 
 sician knowing more Latin than is sufficient 
 to make his prescription intelligible to the 
 apothecary, may win the equivocal reputa- 
 tion of a student, but must never expect 
 
I08 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 to be a successful practitioner, while a ris- 
 ing young lawyer could easily cultivate the 
 acquaintance of all the politicians in his 
 ward, in half the time required for the 
 mastery of the Institutes of Justinian. 
 Why parents have persisted, and still per- 
 sist, in placing such a serious obstacle to 
 success at the very outset of the career of 
 their sons, I frankly admit I am unable to 
 explain. 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 
 
 I AM sensible that the classification of 
 literature with law seems awkward and 
 arbitrary, yet the heterogeneity existing 
 between the two is, after all, only super- 
 ficial. As there are certain tints which 
 harmonize equally well with brilliant or 
 quiet colors, so literature is of such a neu- 
 tral character as to be suited to all profes- 
 sions and pursuits. 
 
 This peculiarity of literature is due to 
 the fact that no special abilities or training 
 are regarded as necessary for its success- 
 ful cultivation. It would be difficult in- 
 deed to find an individual so diffident as to 
 hesitate to pass an extempoj'e judgment 
 upon the rhythm of poetry, the subtleties 
 
 of satire, the passion of oratory, and the 
 
 (III) 
 
112 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 technique of tragedy, and who would not 
 resent, as an imputation upon his natural 
 intelligence, the suggestion that any special 
 education might be required to intelligent- 
 ly criticise such subjects. In this respect 
 literature stands at a great disadvantage 
 with base-ball, lawn-tennis, and roller skat- 
 ing. The latter pursuits have all risen to 
 the dignity of professions, whereas the 
 former is viewed as occupying the level 
 of an amateur recreation, which any and 
 everybody may cultivate with equal ease 
 and success. 
 
 Again, literature is unique in that it has 
 no special precincts wherein it is strictly 
 lodged. Chemistry cannot flourish away 
 from the fumes of a laboratory, and law 
 withers outside the atmosphere of a court- 
 room. But literature, like death, has all 
 times, seasons, and places for its own. It 
 is discussed in the halls of classic semi- 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. II3 
 
 naries of learning, co-operates with flirting 
 in agreeably beguiling the tedious intervals 
 between the dances of a ball, and figures 
 prominently at afternoon teas. The super- 
 ficial and the profound, the wise and the 
 ignorant, the dull and the brilliant, ap- 
 proach literature without a single trace of 
 that diffidence so conspicuous in the dis- 
 cussion of those subjects which are con- 
 sidered of such dignity as to require the 
 exclusive attention of the specialist. 
 
 It must be apparent, in view of the 
 above, that the classification of literature 
 with law is not so arbitrary as might ap- 
 pear at first blush. It might, I am willing 
 to admit, have been classified with any 
 other topic just as well. Had I had a 
 chapter on cooking or agriculture, there 
 would have been no impropriety in includ- 
 ing it in that. The present classification 
 has, however, been adopted because of the 
 
114 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 opportunity for alliteration which it affords. 
 Nor is such a ground for classification so 
 purely fanciful as to be unworthy of serious 
 consideration. It is, at least, every whit as 
 rational as many of the laws of association 
 ■which prevail In the present age. No two 
 things, for instance, could seem to be more 
 completely divorced than hosiery and lit- 
 erature. Yet a goodly number of our 
 population have discovered such an inti- 
 mate connection between the two that they 
 w^ould go through life without a library, 
 unless they could purchase their books at 
 the same counter with stocklnors and era- 
 
 o 
 
 vats. 
 
 Having thus justified the scheme of 
 classification adopted in the present chap- 
 ter, I shall proceed to discuss each of the 
 two subjects in their respective order. 
 
 Not only from the large circulation 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. II5 
 
 which his books have attained, but upon 
 the authority of a distinguished critic, am 
 I able to assert that Tolstoi is the greatest 
 living author, and that the second place 
 must be given to M. Zola. It is naturally 
 a mortification to be compelled to make 
 such a confession, but it will serve as a 
 convenient Detts ex 77iachind to introduce 
 an explanation and thereby remove what 
 might otherwise be regarded as a reproach 
 to my age, by showing that such an unflat- 
 terinof state of affairs is due to no lack 
 of ability on the part of my contemporaries, 
 but entirely to adverse circumstances. The 
 persistent opposition to realism on the part 
 of the Society for the Suppression of 
 Vice must be held responsible for our 
 inferiority in this direction. Under the 
 present censorship of the press our Amer- 
 ican authors are restricted to such vague 
 and general descriptions of immorality as 
 
Il6 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 would have severely shocked the Puritans, 
 but which seem squeamish and prudish to 
 those who have any acquaintance at all 
 with Continental literature. I am obliged 
 to confess that this Society impartially ap- 
 plies the same rules to the publications of 
 both home and foreign authors ; but then 
 the latter have the benefit of what may be 
 termed the principle of expurgation. I 
 would, in view of this fact, request poster- 
 ity to make a liberal allowance for our in- 
 feriority to French and Russian novelists, 
 as that principle seriously affects all liter- 
 ary composition. For it is obvious that 
 the restraint imposed by the observance of 
 Puritan prejudices cannot but interfere with 
 the cultivation of a fluent style. The corol- 
 lary from such a proposition is equally self- 
 evident. Althouorh the works of foreign 
 authors are subjected to a process of ex- 
 purgation for the j^urpose of adapting them 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 1 17 
 
 to the American market, their inimitable 
 traits of freedom and ease cannot be de- 
 stroyed, and that artificial restraint which is 
 such a conspicuous fault of our home au- 
 thors is wholly absent. The difference is 
 the same as that which results from prun- 
 ing off the luxuriant branches of a full- 
 grown tree, and forcing a shrub to grow 
 according to a prescribed model, as was 
 actually done with many of the plants in 
 the gardens of Versailles. In the former 
 case there is grace and naturalism in spite 
 of the missing limbs ; in the latter only 
 rigidity and a painful formality. 
 
 Candor, however, requires it to be said, 
 that the authors themselves are in a measure 
 responsible for this inferior condition of the 
 American novel. They are too jocund and 
 blithe in their temperament. Their works 
 are spoiled, beyond all remedy, by too 
 much faith and optimism for an age which 
 
Il8 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 has such an intense craving for pessimism 
 as to be satisfied with nothinof short of ab- 
 solute despair. Nor can I pretend to as- 
 sign the cause for this bHght of optimism 
 wherewith American novelists are plagued. 
 It may be due to too much morality, or 
 again to too little dyspepsia. But of one 
 thing I am certain. An optimistic novel 
 is regarded like stage-coaches, kerosene 
 lamps, and spinning-wheels, as belonging, 
 beyond all hope of revival, to a past age. 
 
 Again, American poets, with one possi- 
 ble exception, labor under the serious dis- 
 advantage of having only a constituency, 
 and not a cult. The difference between 
 the two is very marked. The purpose of 
 a cult is to clear up obscurities in an au- 
 thor's text, and consequently the delight 
 of the cult is in exact proportion to the ob- 
 scurity of the author. A constituency has 
 no such object in view, but reads for either 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 1 19 
 
 instruction or amusement, and is apt to be 
 very intolerant of an author whose meaning 
 is not perfectly apparent at a glance. I 
 am quite convinced that this disadvanta- 
 geous position of our American poets is 
 not entirely due to their inability to be dull 
 and obscure, but that quite another reason 
 must be assigned for it. No one can know 
 better than the American author how fu- 
 tile it would be under our present inquis- 
 itive system of journalism to cultivate ob- 
 scurity of style and thought for the purpose 
 of obtainino- a cult. Nothinor under the 
 sun, with the exception of the proceedings 
 of the United States Senate in executive 
 session, can be long hid from the reporters. 
 Editorial enterprise would be sure to dis- 
 cover or invent a satisfactory explanation 
 of the most abstruse poem before the cult 
 could gather sufficient material to justify 
 its existence. 
 
120 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 Although I entertain strong hopes that 
 the present deplorable state of affairs may 
 be speedily remedied, I nevertheless desire 
 to earnestly impress upon posterity that 
 the sole way in which the competition be- 
 tween American and foreio-n authors can 
 be placed on an impartial footing, is not, 
 as many of my contemporaries imagine, 
 by the passage of an international copy- 
 right law, but by a revision of the Penal 
 Code in the interest of realism, and the as- 
 siduous cultivation by the authors them- 
 selves of pessimism and a cult. 
 
 It is pleasant to be able to turn from this 
 account of the general state of American 
 literature, which candor has required to be 
 disparaging in a measure, and record that, 
 in that special department of scholarship 
 technically known as the Higher Criticism, 
 an American author has recently surpassed 
 all foreign competitors. German scholars 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. I2I 
 
 had heretofore, by their daring attacks 
 upon Plato and the Pentateuch, entirely 
 monopolized this branch of literary com- 
 position. In fact, the researches of Schleier- 
 macher, Ast, Socher, K. F. Hermann, Stein- 
 hart, Susemihl, and Ueberweg, concerning 
 the former, and those of Kuenen, Well- 
 hausen, Reuss, Schultz, Kautzsch, Stade, 
 and Konig in regard to the latter, had led 
 to the impression that Higher Criticism 
 was so indigenous to Germany that it could 
 not flourish in any other soil. It is with 
 feelings of just pride that I certify, in this 
 place, that not only is this not so, but that 
 that species of Higher Criticism which is 
 peculiarly American is equally exact, schol- 
 arly, and penetrating as the Teutonic, and 
 infinitely more novel and daring in its aim 
 and scope. Germany had been content 
 with impeaching the authenticity of the 
 Pentateuch, and revising the Alexandrine 
 
122 THE AGE OF CLEVELAKD. 
 
 Canon — subjects of equal antiquity with 
 the Pyramids — whereas, it was reserved 
 for an American to successfully question 
 the imputed authorship of plays which had 
 been in existence considerably less than 
 three centuries. In the former case, it is 
 possible for the critic to bewilder the reader 
 by a showy exhibition of that ponderous 
 scholarship which the examination of the 
 works of antiquity requires. In the latter, 
 attention cannot be cleverly diverted from 
 the only point at issue by learned digres- 
 sions on the proper use of the digamma, 
 or the relation of vowel-points to author- 
 ship. The difference must strike every 
 intelligent observer as being exactly anal- 
 ogous to that which exists between those 
 prestidigitateurs who, separated from their 
 audience by the intervention of an orches- 
 tra and footlights, require all the accesso- 
 ries of stage machinery for the performance 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 1 23 
 
 of their tricks, and those clever jugglers 
 who swallow needles and knives in the 
 open air, and in the very centre of a gap- 
 ing and admiring crowd. As the palm in 
 legerdemain must assuredly be given to 
 the latter, so, by parity of reasoning, supe- 
 riority in the use of the Higher Criticism 
 must be allowed to Mr. Ignatius Donnelly. 
 I am conscious of the necessity for curb- 
 ing my pardonable enthusiasm so as not 
 to exaggerate the praise which is the legit- 
 imate guerdon of that gentleman. I am 
 perfectly willing to admit that Poe's clever 
 story of the Gold Bug, and the investiga- 
 tions of the Potter Committee may have 
 suggested to him the skilful use which may 
 be made of cryptographs and ciphers, so 
 that perhaps his modus operandi was not 
 strictly original. But what I desire to em- 
 phasize is the daring and novel application 
 which he has made of the principles of the 
 
124 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 Higher Criticism. There would have been 
 no novelty in his method had he selected 
 as a subject the Homeric Myth, the Epis- 
 tles of Phaleris, or Pentateuchal legislation. 
 Such subjects have been discussed so fre- 
 quently by prime ministers, diplomats, and 
 divines as to be practically exhausted. But 
 to prove by the Higher Criticism that that 
 man was a forger who is the most revered 
 of all English authors, whose statue adorns 
 Central Park, whose plays are annually 
 performed in many of our larger cities, 
 whose birthplace was the only fixture in 
 the whole United Kingdom, which, with 
 the exception of Jumbo, Americans ever 
 desired to import — such daring, novel, un- 
 precedented use of the Higher Criticism 
 proves conclusively to me, at least, that 
 the present era of American literature, in 
 spite of the conspicuous absence of pes- 
 simistic novelists and poets with a cult, is 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 12$ 
 
 destined to occupy a brilliant position in 
 the literary history of the world. 
 
 I have considered it superfluous to even 
 indicate the substance of Mr. Donnelly's 
 Higher Criticism. To future generations 
 it will be a twice-told tale. I have, how- 
 ever, deemed it prudent, for the reputation 
 of my age, to thus strongly emphasize the 
 date of its original authorship. Time 
 brings many jealousies in her train, and the 
 future very grudgingly ^aelds the credit of 
 valuable discoveries to the past. As this 
 application of the Higher Criticism to 
 modern authorship inaugurated by Mr. 
 Donnelly will be widely imitated, it is wise 
 to thus definitely show that its origin must 
 be sought in the Aofe of Cleveland. For 
 I am quite convinced that it will be proven, 
 at no distant time, that the Duke of Wei- 
 mar was the real author of '' Faust," and that 
 Sir William Temple composed the *' Tale of 
 
126 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 a Tub." Nay, I will venture to predict, 
 that scarce half a century can elapse be- 
 fore it is demonstrated that Inspector Will- 
 iams, and not Inspector Byrnes, was the 
 collaborateur with Mr. Julian Hawthorn of 
 "An American Penman," and ''A Tragic 
 Mystery," and that these works, ignorantly 
 viewed by contemporary society as having 
 been written with no higher purpose than 
 to amuse, were intended, as a matter of 
 fact, to be a valuable contribution to the 
 literature of municipal politics by contain- 
 ing in cipher the only complete and au- 
 thentic account in existence of the secret 
 history of removals and promotions in the 
 Police Board. 
 
 Two considerations, quite apart from 
 the proverbial dryness of legal topics, have 
 influenced me to avoid any detailed dis- 
 cussion of the condition of the law during 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 12/ 
 
 the present age. In the first place, it is 
 naturally impossible for a layman to com- 
 press such a vast body of statutes and 
 precedents within anything like a reason- 
 able compass, nor have I been able to find 
 a single member of the bar who would ac- 
 cept a retainer to do the same, and give 
 me a written guarantee that the result of 
 his labors would be intelligible to anybody 
 except a judge of thirty years' experience 
 on the bench. But that which has chiefly 
 deterred me is the consideration that, even 
 if I did attempt some faulty and awkward di^ 
 gest of our present laws, or employed some 
 attorney to do it for me, the task would be 
 toil wholly wasted. For I am quite con- 
 vinced that if this book is read by posterity, 
 codification shall by that time have wholly 
 supplanted the present use of the Common 
 Law. By this means, the tangled maze of 
 customs, statutes, and precedents whereby 
 
128 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 contracts, torts, and crimes are now de- 
 fined, as well as the laws of procedure in 
 civil and criminal cases, will be made quite 
 intelligible to every layman of average in- 
 telli2:ence — somethinor to which the most 
 experienced lawyer in the land would not 
 now pretend. I am, moreover, pretty well 
 convinced that that unfailincr crood-nature 
 of our legislators, which keeps them from 
 passing any bill of a very positive charac- 
 ter, for fear of giving offence to some con- 
 stituent, may be relied upon to transmit to 
 posterity the entire body of our present 
 laws, without any material alteration. One 
 incidental result of codification will, there- 
 fore, be to present, in a systematic and 
 lucid fashion, and with sufficient exactitude 
 for the purposes of the antiquarian of the 
 future, what exists in the present age in an 
 obscure and chaotic state. 
 
 But there is a certain class of obiter 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 1 29 
 
 dicta which will not, in all likelihood, find 
 a place in the codes of the future. Al- 
 though not rising to the dignity of prece- 
 dents, a familiarity with them is necessary, 
 in order to intelligently comprehend many 
 phases of contemporaneous legislation, and 
 it is for this reason that I propose to re- 
 cord them at the close of the present 
 chapter. 
 
 In the first place, I wish to give an exact 
 definition of the term, ''The City and 
 County of New York." This grandilo- 
 quent phrase may possibly mislead poster- 
 ity into conceiving of a municipality auton- 
 omous to the extent of havinof exclusive 
 authority in all matters of a purely local 
 nature. Such a conception would not only 
 tend to much confusion in many instances, 
 but do a positive injury to many innocent 
 citizens by holding them responsible for 
 matters over which they had absolutely no 
 
I30 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 control. It is therefore eminent])^ proper 
 to state, that the territory and municipahty 
 of the City and County of New York are 
 separated from each other by a considera- 
 ble distance. The former is situated on 
 Manhattan Island ; the latter is located in 
 an entirely different place. In this particular 
 instance, there is a marked difference be- 
 tween the foreign and domestic policy of 
 both the Republican and Democratic par- 
 ties. Both unite in advocatinor Home Rule 
 for Ireland, and both insist, with equal firm- 
 ness, that New York shall be governed 
 from Albany. Posterity must not infer 
 from the above that there is not even the 
 semblance of a regular city government. 
 At stated intervals elections are held for a 
 Mayor, Board of Aldermen, and other 
 public officials, who succeed in investing 
 themselves with sufficient bureaucratic 
 functions to give at times the impression 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 13 1 
 
 that they constitute an actual, and not sim- 
 ply a nominal, municipality. Nor are these 
 city offices, though in a measure unnec- 
 essary, wholly destitute of importance. 
 Whenever any of them are abolished by 
 the municipality at Albany, the state and 
 national campaign fund incurs a corre- 
 sponding decrease, the very existence of 
 which would be seriously jeopardized were 
 they abolished altogether ; while the mem- 
 ory of St. Patrick would suffer a consider- 
 able loss of dignity, were there no Alder- 
 manic Chamber to regularly adjourn on 
 the seventeenth of March, out of respect 
 for the day. 
 
 I am sincerely anxious that the gratify- 
 ing reputation for opposition to official 
 jobbery and corruption recently secured to 
 my age by the conviction of the Broad- 
 way bribe-takers may survive the present 
 century at least. I therefore appreciate the 
 
132 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 importance of exactly acquainting- posterity 
 with what is now reorarded as constituting 
 the crime of askinor or receivinof a bribe. 
 All mole-hills seem equally small when 
 viewed by the naked eye, but a percepti- 
 ble difference can be noted in their height 
 when submitted to a closer inspection 
 under the microscope. Just so, while many 
 gratuities may seem equally corrupt to the 
 unaided eye of morality, a difference be- 
 tween a priori and ex post facto bribery 
 can be easily detected through the lens of 
 the law. Moreover, not only is there such 
 a difference, but different names are ap- 
 plied to each. The former is called a 
 felony, the latter a perquisite. I feel the 
 fullest assurance that posterity, if the fore- 
 going distinction is only kept constantly in 
 view, "will find no difficulty in lauding the 
 present age as the stern and unrelenting 
 foe of official bribe-taking. 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 1 33 
 
 I cannot close this chapter more appro- 
 priately than with a partial explanation of 
 the anomalous position occupied by cor- 
 porations in the present age. The ex- 
 planation can be only partial, because I 
 can urge no sufficient reason why corpora- 
 tions are allowed such enormous privileges. 
 They were originally granted, I believe, 
 on the theory that the recipients were a 
 benefit to the public, and therefore deserv- 
 ing of encouragement. But the actual 
 hostility of corporations to the common 
 weal has become so notorious that even 
 the inexhaustible resources of the law have 
 been insufficient to preserve that fiction 
 any longer. I must therefore frankly ad- 
 mit my inability to explain this aspect of 
 the subject. I am, however, more fortun- 
 ate in being able to offer an explanation 
 of the narrow limit fixed to the liabilities 
 of corporations. They were long since 
 
134 THE AGE OF CLEVELAND. 
 
 decided to have no souls, and are, there- 
 fore, unable to distinguish any more than 
 a cat or a doof between rio^ht and wroncr. 
 It would, consequently, be absurd to im- 
 pose upon them anything like moral re- 
 sponsibility. It, moreover, I must confess, 
 seems illogical in the extreme that, in view 
 of the recent discoveries of science, which 
 have been noted in a previous chapter, the 
 same license which is allowed to corpora- 
 tions has not been extended to natural as 
 well as artificial persons. It is to be hoped 
 that the biological conception of the uni- 
 verse may speedily receive judicial notice, 
 whereby both these classes may obtain the 
 benefit of that limited liability, which is at 
 present monopolized by one of them. For 
 men, women, and even children are now 
 held to a strict account for erecting and 
 maintaining nuisances; the commission of 
 grand or petit larceny; and such acts of 
 
LITERATURE AND LAW. 1 35 
 
 criminal carelessness as result in injury to 
 the life, limb, or property of another, — all 
 of which is a monstrous injustice, when 
 science has conclusively demonstrated that 
 they also, like corporations, have no souls. 
 

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