Now you see that this constant impact of crime upon
crime protects you against further commission of crime.
It builds you up. A man can’t become
morally perfect by stealing one or a thousand green
watermelons, but every little helps.
I was at a great school yesterday (St. Paul’s),
where for four hundred years they have been busy with
brains, and building up England by producing Pepys,
Miltons, and Marlboroughs. Six hundred boys left
to nothing in the world but theoretical morality.
I wanted to become the professor of practical morality,
but the high master was away, so I suppose I shall
have to go on making my living the same old way—by
adding practical to theoretical morality.
What are the glory that was Greece, the grandeur that
was Rome, compared to the glory and grandeur and majesty
of a perfected morality such as you see before you?
The New Vagabonds are old vagabonds (undergoing the
old sort of reform). You drank my health; I hope
I have not been unuseful. Take this system of
morality to your hearts. Take it home to your
neighbors and your graves, and I hope that it will
be a long time before you arrive there.
The Young Men’s Christian
Association asked Mr. Clemens to deliver
a lay sermon at the Majestic Theatre, New York, March
4, 1906. More than five thousand young
men tried to get into the theatre, and in
a short time traffic was practically stopped
in the adjacent streets. The police reserves
had to be called out to thin the crowd.
Doctor Fagnani had said something before
about the police episode, and Mr. Clemens took it
up.
I have been listening to what was said here, and there
is in it a lesson of citizenship. You created
the police, and you are responsible for them.
One must pause, therefore, before criticising them
too harshly. They are citizens, just as we are.
A little of citizenship ought to be taught at the
mother’s knee and in the nursery. Citizenship
is what makes a republic; monarchies can get along
without it. What keeps a republic on its legs
is good citizenship.
Organization is necessary in all things. It
is even necessary in reform. I was an organization
myself once—for twelve hours. I was
in Chicago a few years ago about to depart for New
York. There were with me Mr. Osgood, a publisher,
and a stenographer. I picked out a state-room
on a train, the principal feature of which was that
it contained the privilege of smoking. The train
had started but a short time when the conductor came
in and said that there had been a mistake made, and
asked that we vacate the apartment. I refused,
but when I went out on the platform Osgood and the
stenographer agreed to accept a section. They
were too modest.
Now, I am not modest. I was born modest, but
it didn’t last. I asserted myself; insisted
upon my rights, and finally the Pullman Conductor and
the train conductor capitulated, and I was left in
possession.
