Page:Upbuilders by Lincoln Steffens.djvu/19

xiv against the saloon. That would save me, and it would not cost the saloons very much.

The liquor issue in Jersey checked, but it did not stop reform in that state. Mr. Colby has quit, for awhile, but Mark Fagan and most of the other Jersey leaders, have gone on fighting. As I am writing these lines, Mark is preparing to run again for Mayor of Jersey City. And Mr. Heney says Spreckels can't quit; and I say Ben Lindsey can't; and W. S. U'Ren—impossible!

It's hard labour: it's the hardest work in the world; and the least steady, and the most never-ending; but there's a fascination about the service of the public which holds men. It takes courage, and self-sacrifice; patience and eternal vigilance; faith and hope and human understanding; and it costs pain and disappointment and sorrow. I have seen strong men break down and weep like children because, forsooth, I had said, out of kindness and only half-believing it then, that some day, after they were dead, men would acknowledge and, ceasing to suspect their motives, might appreciate their devotion to men. It's an ungrateful career, politics is. But—and here's some more optimism for the optimists that are not mere cheerful idiots: here's a truth I would like to shout so that it might be heard some 1909 years away: