Can
society afford to shut out the intellectual and mentally progressive
element, or must it accept as normal these salaries and make it
respectable to begin on them? It is the strain which unessential social
conventions give to the young families that leads the business father to
speculate in order to get into the $10,000-a-year class, and that leads
the young scientific and literary man to take extra work outside of his
normal duties. This sort of thing cannot go on without serious danger to
the Republic. Cleanliness and good manners should be insisted upon, but
they may be secured on $3000 a year if too much else is not required. How
to secure them on $1500 is a problem to be solved, for cleanliness costs
more each decade.
After all is said, if the young people have an earnest _purpose_ in life
it is easy to plan a method of living and to carry it out. The sacrifices
one must make in the house superficially, in the consideration of a
certain class, are cheerfully borne and soon forgotten.
Little discomforts which affect only one's feelings and not one's health
make rather good stories after they are over. What is worth while? Are we
become too sensitive to little things? Do we imagine we show our higher
civilization by discerning with the little princess the pea under
twenty-four feather beds?
Let our shelter be first of all healthful, physically and morally.
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