So many of the world’s inhabitants are going through life mentally blind.
The greatest education does not always guarantee mental sight. It takes
real wisdom to open the human intellect, and education is not always
wisdom. A man may be able to solve great mathematical problems, diagram
an intricate sentence in grammatical form, name all the capitals and
great cities of the big world geographically and historically—but still
be blind to human justice.
Without geological knowledge a man goes blindly through the world,
stepping on valuable specimens of minerals and precious stones without
realizing their value or worth.
And just so, in like manner, do men who are blind to the justice that
belong to their neighbors, go tramping on human hearts and human
principles without knowing the real value and worth of the objects on
which they tread.
It is painful to see a blind man go feeling his way with a cane, but he
never creates the sorrows that are created by the man who is blind to
human justice and the rights of the people below his station.
I know a man who loves a beautiful woman. He was once engaged to marry
her, but friends who are blind to the rights of humanity, no odds how
poor or rich the individuals may be, interfered and separated the loving
couple. They trampled on their young hearts and crushed them until they
bled from the bruises, and made love appear as a criminal and outlaw.
They love each other still, though both are married to another. There
is a pain in each heart that will never cease aching, but the wealthy
friends who separated them are blind to the wrong they perpetrated
against these disappointed souls. They crushed two ideals in the soul of
two loving people, but the ideals will never die in their souls. That
first dream of love will ever remain the sweetest, dearest dream that
ever took possession of their young souls—a dream that died and was
buried there and left a grave that is always bleeding.
And yet the blind friends do not realize that the ghost of a great wrong
stalks through their hearts during the silent hours of the night, when
the world imagines they are sleeping without a shadow to obscure the
sunlight of human happiness and hope.
And this is only one case out of a million. And through the blindness
of friends and relatives our divorce courts do a big business. Young
people who are denied the companionship of the one they love best, and
are induced to marry some one else for convenience sake, soon find the
matrimonial bands galling, and a separation is inevitable. This is
the main cause of so many divorces amongst the rich. They marry for
convenience when they find it impossible to marry the one they love.
How unfortunate for parents who no longer care for each other to bring
unwelcome children into a loveless world. The children find their
environment one of cold speculation and fashionable hypocrisy, and
they grow up believing that all the world is like their own domestic
relations. Where there is no display of affection between the parents,
the child grows up believing that love and affection are unnecessary, and
passion is cultivated as a substitute. These are the sons who make the
white slave business prosperous. They come from loveless homes, and do
not realize that there is any such thing as genuine companionship love.
Father and mother lived so independently of each other, spending most of
their time at their clubs and at card parties, or visiting abroad with
strangers, that the name of wife does not suggest a companion, nor does
the name mother suggest the dearest friend on earth to the child.
And thus the fashionable world goes staggering blindly on, grasping at
wealth and power and notoriety as the only prizes worth winning.