Page:Dealings with the dead.djvu/70

 nations merely 'Progress' every jail-yard has its gibbet; when the people are 'Unfolded,' temples for God-worship take their places. Philosophers try to explain away all crime and evil, knowing it to be real; yet at the same time treat the doers of ill-deeds as if they were not fitter subjects for soul-hospitals than for thumb-screws and disgrace. They forget that society gains nothing by making a man think less of himself! Instead of pursuing really reformatory methods with those who are vicious or whose souls are sick, they have favored the policy of revenge and atonement, and adopted the lex talionis instead of the lex justitice—as Common Sense, if nothing else, would ever seem to dictate, counsel, and approve. The Social Harmonead is yet to be. Discord rules the age. The human soul is unbalanced. Equilibrium and Virtue come together. By-and-by, Philosophers will realize this truth. Men who gaze intently on the wonderful perfection of the outer Harmonead, and realize its vast excellence, constantly fail to recognize the fact that the inner world of man would be the same were but Charity and kindly dealing, in thought as well as act, to take precedence of Suspicion and Punishment. As yet the world is but a baby-realm. There are no real saints therein at present, for the reason that the currents of the time are not adapted to the floating of that species of craft; nor will the social gardens produce that sort of fruit until it is well subsoiled by charity plows and common sense. At present, probably but few men or women live on earth, no matter how abstemious they may be, nor how correct and staid their deportment, but in whose hearts lurk many a thistle seed,