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Webster, Henry Kitchell, 1875-1932

"The Real Adventure"

Jane could juggle Plato, Bergson and
William James, with one hand tied behind her. But when she incautiously
ventured out of this domain, as occasionally she did--when, for example,
she confessed herself in favor of a censorship of the drama, she was
instantly demolished.
"The state's got no business with morals," said Barry.
"That's the real cause of most of our municipal corruption," said
Rodney. "A city administration, for instance, is corrupt exactly in
ratio to its attempt to be moral. The more moral issues you import into
politics--gambling, prostitution, Sunday closing, censored movies, and
the rest--the more corrupt and helpless and inefficient your government
will be." And, between them, for the next half-hour, they kept on
demonstrating it until the roar of their heavy artillery fairly drove
Jane from her trenches.
But all this was preliminary to the main topic of the evening, which got
launched when Rodney seized the advantage of a pause to say:
"A series of articles on women, eh! What are you going to do to them?"
With that the topic of feminism was on the carpet and it was never
thereafter abandoned.


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