WHITENING THE SEPULCHERS.
By W. N. G.
A MEMBER of the council of this city, who is fathering a measure for reform in the conduct of saloons, gives his reasons in a recent issue of the Tribune. He says:— "The question of side entrances and back rooms connected with saloons is a serious matter. I have been considering it for some time before taking any action in the matter. It has become such an evil in the community that some action is necessary to put a check to the practise in order to protect the moral standing of the city." Now everybody knows that the greatest evil connected with a saloon is the sale of intoxicating liquors; that by far the greater number of patrons enter through the front door, and drink in the front room. But our reform councilmen have no worry over these greater features of the saloon evil. They see evil only in the side entrances and back rooms. This is admitted in plain language:— "The intention of the ordinance is not to close the saloons. There is not one of the councilmen who would be in favor of that. It is only to remedy the evil connected with the dispensing of liquors as we see it." There is another class of people who are much exercised in behalf of the evil effects of the saloon on the "moral standing of the city." But, like the councilman herein quoted, their burden is over a certain feature of the evil, and not the evil itself. They also are straining at a gnat and swallowing a camel; they would try to purify the stream which runs from a cess-pool fountain. This class see evil in the saloons only on Sunday. It may be licensed, and they will clamor for a high license for the sake of the revenue that will go to the support of some good purpose; but when opened on Sunday the saloon becomes a terrible menace to the "moral standing of the city." It was demonstrated two years ago that many of them do not favor closing the saloon altogether. It is all right six days in the week, but on the other one day it is very demoralizing. It is just so with all mere human efforts at moral reform. They are all deception. The whited sepulcher is still full of corruption and death. There is no true moral reform excepting on Gospel lines. Jesus Christ never compromised with evil; He never sought to make anything better by simply making it appear better; He never sought to counteract evil influence by merely shortening its hours or limiting its operation to six days in the week; He never sought to nullify the miasma of a poisonous tree by cutting off its worst-appearing branches. He laid the ax at the root of the tree; and no man can successfully minister in His name while compromising with evil for one hour in the week. There is no moral reform in licensing a single entrance to the den of strong drink. The saloon is bad; it is only bad; it is bad all the time. It is bad in the front room as well as in the back room. The front room is the fountain; the glittering attraction is there; the invitation to enter is there most conspicuous. The back rooms are but the murky streams fed by the gilded front room. The enticement, the allurement, begins with the brilliant exterior. The higher the license, the greater the boast by the proprietors of how much good their license money does. The more they are made to appear respectable and harmless, the greater their power to deceive. Says one class, Close the back room and the side entrance; says another, Take down the screens; says another, Close them on Sunday; says another, Close them at 10 or 12 P.M. All this in the name of moral reform; but grant each and all of these "reforms," and what is left?—The saloon is left; the intoxicating drink curse is left; the deceptive notion that the saloon has been divested of evil is left. The "better class of citizens" feel that they have accomplished a great moral reform, and rest secure in their own righteousness. But the saloon goes right on in its work of soul-destruction. Give the saloon demon license for six days in the week, sixteen to eighteen hours a day, with one room and one door, and all the attendant and consequent evils so loudly deplored will surely follow. The only remedy for the saloon curse is to root up the saloon. W. N. G.