Show MODERN SOCIETY In a sermon preached in Tremont Temple Boston last Sunday Dr Loi mer said Our society is unnatural We are living at too great a speed our ideas are too material We ulan legislate and do everything for the rich JHe that hath to him shall be given and for him that has not shall be taken away even the little that he has This is our rule How else can be explained the tariff on wool which will take the coat off the poor mans back Is modern society unnatural That it is different from the societv of a hundred years ago or a thousand or two thousand years ago there is no doubt The society of one period always al-ways differs from that of another Dr Lorimer says that our society is unnatural I un-natural but can he or any one else say when it is natural or what constitutes natural society Society will be unnatural un-natural to each man or woman whenever when-ever it departs from his or her own standard of what constitutes natural society the society that is repugnant to his or her nature is of necessity unnatural un-natural There is there can be no definite standard of natural society the thing is absolutely impossible It was long since recognized that the state of nature when one got right down to it is a state of savagery and not at alt like the dreams of poets or the ideals of philosophers painted it There is much in what Dr Lorimer says about our living at too great a speed that our ideas are too material If material greatness is not followed by moral and intellectual greatness there has been no great gain But material greatness must not be despised It is often the means bv which Intellectual and moral greatness accomplish their best good As a nation we have been striving for material greatness and have achieved it While this is sothere is abundant evidence on every hand that the ideals of the people are higher than mere materiality Never were such sacrifices made for the ideal for the moral and spiritual welfare of mankind as were made in this country in the war for the preservation of the Union Then one has but to look around to behold vast endowments in almost every state in the Union on institutions for the advancement of art science and learning There is scarcely a rich man in the country today who has not an ambition to become a patron of science or learning There may be and doubtless doubt-less is much selflove in all this but it is of a more generous nature and worthy of all respect and encouragement encourage-ment Our country is by no means wholly given up to things material We heartily agree with what Dr Lorimer says about the tariff but we do not think it was said in the proper place or on the proper occasion It was as much out of to place for him to condemn con-demn where he did the tariff on wool I as it was for those New York preachers preach-ers the Revs McArthur and Dixon to denounce free silver and its advocates from their pulpits Pulpits are not the place from which to preach politics |