324 LAND AND LABOR. 



If there is one social lesson, in all history, taught 

 with greater emphasis than any or all others, it is 

 that whenever and wherever the rich have made their 

 greatest gains in wealth and power, there have the 

 poor correspondingly lost in comfort and sunk into 

 wretchedness. Every historian, ancient and modern, 

 who has traced the causes and marked the steps in 

 the decline and destruction of the Koman empire, has 

 placed the growth of wealth in the ruling classes, and 

 the increase in poverty among the masses, as the most 

 powerful of all. The history of every other nation 

 adds its testimony to the same effect. And so it is 

 to-day in every nation on earth. In no country can 

 stronger evidence of the fallacy of Mr. Atkinson's 

 statement be found than in our own. 



In illustration of how the poor gain in comfort as 

 the rich gain in wealth, I quote the following from 

 the daily press : 



"VIOLENT CONTBASTS IN LIFE. 



" Ned Stokes' bar [in New York City], it is said, takes in $200 

 to $300 per day (or rather night), as it is patronized by a crowd 

 of fast fellows who drink nothing but high priced liquors. A 

 dinner at Delmonico's and Pinard's can be had at from $5 to 

 $40 per guest, according to the bill of fare and the wine list. A 

 number of dinner parties have been given during the past season 

 at the Fifth Avenue in which $200 were expended in flowers 

 alone. How easy to pay such bills when one's income is $1,000 

 'lay, and this is not a large figure among our capitalists; 

 l.ut just look at the other side of social life. 



" Four women were arraigned in the police court for selling 

 vegetables and matches in baskets in the streets. One of the 

 muntor saifl she was a widow with two children, and that this 

 was their only support. The magistrate replied that as it was 



