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PUBLIC MORALS

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Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Dec 9, 1875

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 46, No. 23.

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PUBLIC MORALS.

By James Russell Lowell

WORLD'S FAIR, 1876.
Columbia, puzzled what she should display Of true home-make on her Centennial Day, Asked Brother Jonathan; he scratched his head, Whittled a while reflectively, and said, “Your own invention and own making, too? Why, any child could tell you what to do. Show ’em your Civil Service, and explain How all men’s loss is everybody’s gain; Show your new patent to increase your rents By paying quarters for collecting cents; Show your short cut to cure financial ills By making paper dollars current bills; Show your new bleaching process, cheap and brief, To wit: a jury chosen by the thief; Show your State Legislatures; show your Rings; And challenge Europe to produce such things As high officials sitting half in sight To share the plunder and to fix things right; If that don’t fetch her, why, you only need To show your latest style in martyrs—Tweed. She’ll find it hard to hide her spiteful tears At such advance in one poor hundred years.” —James Russell Lowell, in the Nation.