How little the
so-called upper-ten know how the lower-ninety live. And how little you
and I, who are fortunate to count ourselves in the next upper-twenty,
perhaps, know how the under-seventy exist and think and do. If only the
more fortunate thirty per cent. knew of the exact conditions under which
a large proportion of men, women, and children carry on the pitiful
struggle for mere existence, there would be an irresistible demand for
betterment. Every Christian ought to know the wrongs of our
civilization, in order that he may help to right them. This glimpse
beneath the surface of the city should stir us out of comfortable
complacency and give birth in us to the impulse that leads to settlement
and city mission work, and to civic reform movements. The young men and
women of America must create a public sentiment that will demolish the
slums, and erect in their places model tenements; that will tear down
the rookeries, root out the saloons and dens of vice, and provide the
children with playgrounds and breathing space. And this work will be
directly in the line of Americanizing and evangelizing the immigrants,
for they are chiefly the occupants and victims of the tenements and the
slums.
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