Page:The collected works of Theodore Parker volume 7.djvu/125

Rh with the design to attract, yet so disgusting that any but a corrupt man must revolt from them, there are accounts of the appearance of culprits in the lower courts, of their crime, of their punishment; these are related with an impudent flippancy, and a desire to make sport of human wretchedness and perhaps depravity, which amaze a man of only tho average humanity. We read of Judge Jeffreys and the bloody assizes in England, one hundred and sixty years ago, but never think there are in the midst of us men who, like that monster, can make sport of human misery; but for a cent you can find proof that the race of such is not extinct. If a penny-a-liner were to go into a military hospital, and make merry at the sights he saw there, at the groans he heard, and the keen smart his eye witnessed, could he publish his fiendish joy at that spectacle—you would not say ha was a man. If one mock at the crimes of men, perhaps at their sins, at the infamous punishments they suffer—what can you say of him?

It is a significant fact that the commercial newspapers, which of course in such a town are the controlling newspapers, in reporting the European news, relate first the state of the markets abroad, the price of cotton, of consols, and of corn; then the health of the English Queen, and the movements of the nations. This is loyal and consistent; at Rome the journal used to announce first some tidings of the Pope, then of the lesser dignitaries of the church, then of the discovery of new antiques, and other matters of great pith and moment; at St. Petersburg, it was first of the Emperor that the journal spoke ; at Boston it is legitimate that the health of the dollar should be reported first of all.

The political newspapers are a melancholy proof of the low morality of this town. You know what tney will say of any parcy movement; that measures and men are judged on purely party grounds. The country is commonly put before mankind, and the party before the country. Which of them in political matters pursues a course mat is fair and just; how many of them have ever advanced a great idea, or been constantly true to a great principle of natural justice; how many resolutely oppose a great wrong; how many can be trusted to expose the most notorious blunders of their party; how many of them aim to promote the