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The Golden Age
(SUCCESSOR TO RELIGIOUS FORUM}
Published Ebery Thursday by the Golden Mge Publishing
Company (Inc.)
OFFICES: LOWNDES -BUILDING, ATLANTA, GA.
Price: $2.00 a Year
WILLI HMD. UPS HMW, .... Editor
A. E. RAMSAUR, ... Associate Editor
W. F. UPSHA W, - - - - -Business Manager
H. R. BERNARD, . . . Sec’y and Treas.
Entered at the Post Office in Atlanta, Ga„
as second-class matter.
To the Public: The advertising columns of The
Golden Age will have an editorial conscience. No
advertisement will be accepted which we believe
would be hurtful to either the person or the purse of
our readers.
The Undertow.
11.
Sad enough is the sombre sight of thoughtless
boys and girls swept from homes of listless training
into a city's undertow of vice and crime. But when
parents calmly push their own tender offspring into
the swirling eddy of the dark, remorseless tide, an
gels weep. Their hearts break. Our Savior said* 4 Suf
fer little children to come unto me, and forbid them
not, for of such is the kingdom of Heaven.” It has
remained for Christian Atlanta twenty centuries af
ter the promulgation of this edict of love to furnish
an example of a man—that is a male person, white—
for the paltry need of a few unholy dollars, delib
erately casting his twelve-year-old boy into abso
lutely certain hell.
The Saturday afternoon newspapers told the story
of a boy, whose limp and senseless body was found
in a Marietta street coal yard. The officers who found
him, believing that he had been wounded into in
sensibility, hurried him to the hospital. He was
drunk; absolutely drunk. Inquiry developed the fact
that the boy was hired out by his father to a firm
of Atlanta liquor dealers. His business was to fill
bottles with liquor and fit corks to them. Thus for
a little paltry pittance to the parent’s pocket, the
lad was set to a loathsome labor, where deadly poi
son was daily absorbed by his every tender pore,
where reeking odors poured their foul stench into
his sensitive nostrils, where unflagging temptation re
morselessly held the cup to his youthful lips.
Has Atlanta a conscience? Nearer still, has At
lanta the instinct of self preservation? Reduce it to
a cold question of dollars, if you wish. Is it not
cheaper, Oh ye wise men, who guide the craft of
state, to gather the unfortunate offspring of the crim
inal and brutal under your care now and give them
decent rearing, than to build jails and alms-houses
and lunatic asylums for their occupancy a few years
later? At least is it not economy to make and exe
cute rigidly and incesssantly a few wholesome meas
ures protecting unfortunate boys from the malicious
current, rather than wait until its malicious under
tow shall clutch them, nurture them in folly, hurl
them into felony, and compel you to execute them
for diabolical crime?
The tide of sin from Satan’s shore daily ebbs and
flows in human hearts; its hungry undertow greedily
grips each victim. Sterling manhood, Oh splendid
womanhood, the wail of the helpless is sounding in
your ears. An issue vital to your future, your chil
dren’s future demands action. What will you do with
it?
The Limit of Centralization.
Human nature likes to deal with strong institu
tions—up to a certain limit. In the beginning of
most governments, absolute power was lodged in
kings, but one by one, by force of arms, and by
diplomacy, this power has been universally limited
or destroyed. In the days of primacy and weakness
a strong absolute monarchy was best, but strength,
magnitude and development demand some measure
of individualism.
Men who are fortunate enough to gather together
with ft fair fiegm of fcowty a good supply of thin
The Golden Age for March 22,1906.
world’s goods are held in high esteem—up to a cer
tain point. When wealth centralizes in the grasp of
an individual, or a group of individuals, until it
becomes a. menace to the welfare of others, public
esteem falls away, and crystalizes into implacable
opposition.
A few years ago, it frequently happened that
small life insurance companies were taken .over by
the larger companies, ami it appeared that ultimately
this business might come to be centered in a few
strong corporations. Now the inexorable limit beat
able by public opinion has well nigh been reached
in the case of the largest of these corporations. The
Armstrong report—made by a committee of the
New York legislature* after the most thorough, most
impartial, most honest investigation ever given a
subject of this magnitude—recommends a limit of
$150,000,000 per annum of new business for any
company. This demand for a limit comes straight
from the heart of humanity. It comes as an ulti
matum. The limit has been reached. Individualism
demands that this splendid business shall not become
too much centralized; that while it may grow with
the prosperity of the country, it must be divided
among a large number of disassociated corporations.
Perhaps in a few years more, the power of public
opinion will wax stronger, and while in America
an income tax has been declared unconstitutional, the
genius of virile, world-wide individualism will find
away to curb the magnitude of private fortune.
Looking to the weal of the individual millions, the
resistless power of public opinion will fix a limit
to the fortune of the individual few.
“Thus far and no farther” is a law in humanity’s
code as inexorable as the silent and solemn com
mand of the mountain to the waves of the sea.
The Closing of The Conference.
The interest and attention of the people of Atlanta
have been closely held for the past ten days, by the
Bible Conference, which has just come to a close.
Its influence, however, cannot yet be estimated,
for a Conference of this sort deals with the subtle,
elusive, mysterious but vital development of the
spirit. The stimulating character of contact with
great thinkers, profound Bible students and noted
lecturers, is so far-reaching in its effect on indi
viduals that even these individuals themselves can
not fully estimate the personal gain until after the
impressions received have been fully assimilated.
Many there are who desire to understand more fully
the force of Bible teachings and the profound wis
dom of the Eternal Truths contained in the Book
of books. But incidental to study alone is often lack
ing, as is also, ability to do so adequately, so it is
of deepest significance when the layman is enabled
to receive at first hand the benefits desired from
those who have given a life time to this very study.
The advantages of a Bible Conference are many, and
the thousands who daily attended the meetings tes
tify to the deep need of just such an all-powerful
influence in their lives. New lines of Church work
were suggested, and defects in old methods were
shown. Contact of a most inspiring kind was ex
perienced, with persons from different cities, and the
entire field of work covered was one which must be
fertile in its ultimate results.
A feature of the work was shown by the number
of young people who were present as members of the
Philathea and Baracca societies, and their unfailing
interest in the proceedings was noted and generally
commented on.
It would be impossible to make specific mention
of the distinguished speakers who, in turn, have
held the platform of the Baptist Tabernacle in At
lanta, but it is safe to assert that never in the re
ligious history of the city has a more successful
meeting been had, nor one whose every feature prom
ises to result in greater good for a greater number.
A Model Community.
Wise people predict that the millenium will not
break upon us all at once; that it will be detected
perhaps in the form of a very small spot or speck,
which will spread like measles. The first snot seems
to have been discovered in Linden, Texas. That town
h iqou to celebrate |t» fiftieth ftnnivewft ft
is stated in a recent Texas paper that not one of
its citizens has ever been arrested for, or accused
of the commission of any crime. Its jail has never
had an inmate, and its courthouse is used for school
purposes. There are no bars and no gambling joints.
No one carries concealed weapons. If true this is a
remarkable community.
A well known evangelist a few years ago, while
preaching in a Georgia city* paid his respects to the
municipal authorities, and said that if the city Were
removed bodily to hell, the management of that coun
try would have no desire to change the mayor and
aidermen. No one offered a dissenting opinion, so the
statement stood. An unkind thing like that could not
be said of Linden. Things are very different there.
All is peace and quiet, and a spirit of sweet fellow
ship rests like an aureole upon the devoted city.
No man lieth in wait for his fellow citizen with a
loaded real estate proposition, or a spavined horse.
There is no calaboose, no recorder’s court, no law
yers and, perchance, no doctors. Gold brick sales are
unknown and good rather than evil is spoken. “There
no winter comes, nor e’er the wind blows harshly.”
Experiments are now being undertaken to ascer
tain if the citizens of that town will bear trans
planting. If so, Linden grafts can be secured by other
cities.
“Why is a Poet?”
The question, “Why is a Poet” has been for a
long time unanswered, but the wherefore of that
much maligned class is now discovered. They are use
ful and valuable members of society and of the busi
ness world. Get in a street car and your eyes will be
forcibly held by the fresco of pure art and poetry
running around the upper sides of the car. You can’t
keep yourself from studying the suggestions offered
you in delightful poetry as to when and where and
why to buy certain products. Trying to stop reading
them is similar to the effort to abstain from eat
ing parched peanuts so long as you have one in your
pocket.
Suppose a modern city were to be buried as Pom
peii was, and that after the lapse of hundreds of
years the people of a new civilization in the progress
of their excavations were to unerath a few street
cars and gaze for the first time upon the advertise
ments which confront us every time we ride. It is
interesting to conjecture just how they would inter
pret the meaning of a picture depicting the mad race
of all manners and conditions of men to get some
body’s ginger ale; how they would be saddened by
the expression on the countenance of a man drink
ing a certain blend of coffee; but beyond all, what
reverence they would have for the character of good
Dr. Brown, of Spotless Town!
Probably some of the things we are discovering
to-day in the cities exhumed by archaeologists, and
interpreted to be pictorial histories of wars and the
reign of kings and the like, were in their day noth
ing but advertisements such as we have in our cars.
Why is the poet ? For the street cars, of course.
Even this Will Pass.
One of Shakespeare’s characters who was in the
midst of a run of hard luck that seemed to have
no end, remarked to a friend that the last item on
the trouble list seemed to be the limit; that the
worst had been reached. It was replied that it was
never the worst so long as it could be said “this
is the worst. ’ ’ That was but poor consolation, viewed
in one light. It was but an earlier form of the old
lady’s saying; “It might be worse.”
An Eastern monarch once called upon his wise
jester, to formulate a motto that would have some
consolation in it, no matter how gloomy the outlook
happened to be. After reflection the jester said:
“Even this will pass.”
There is a bright side to everything. There is no
better rule one can set for one’s self than that of
looking on the bright side of the trials of life. Some
times it is hard to find the brightness. The sun is
always shining, but on occasions the cloud before it
is so dense that only faith can pierce it. When trou
bles and grief almost past enduring, come; when
friends seem to have deserted us, and life itself is a
failure; etop and think—times will change—EVEN
THIS WILE PASS,