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SYMPATHY WITH RASCALS.
Byron says, “a fellow-feeling makes us wondrous
kind,” and we sometimes are half inclined to accept this
as the reason for a latent and deep-seated sympathy we
entertain for rascals. The confession causes us no
shame, as we think, if there is one class of men more
than another that needs sympathy, it is these. The principal
reason for this is that they receive none. The
rascal — the legitimately-recognized and found-out rascal
— stands alone, comparatively. A woman or two,
in the form of mother, wife, or sister, may cling to the
rascal, and love him better that he is debased, and follow
him to the scaffold, may be, but beyond this he is
alone. Rascals have no sympathy with each other
beyond a mere sense of mutual danger, and the master
of them all leaves them in the lurch just as they most
need his help. The antecedents of rascals are to be
looked at, and herein is much cause for sympathy.
They were, perhaps, born rascals by psychological entailment,
and could n't help it any more than they could
help being squint-eyed or club-footed; or, perhaps, by
wrong influences, — insidious and hard to be resisted,
— the best qualities of their minds became perverted,
and were led to run in the wrong channel. From the
very earliest indications of his rascally proclivities,
every hand is raised against the rascal, and society
“puts into every honest hand a whip to lash the rascal
naked through the world.” The law is against him, and
his life is literally fenced with constables' poles and
policemen's batons. His only teacher is his fear, and
his only preacher the criminal judge. Of course, this
sympathy only extends to the detected rascals. There
are many great rascals who never get found out. These
Non entendez," said he again, still smiling at her, and turning away at the crank—
"Not in ten days," she mused. P. 69
[Description: 676EAF. Illustration page. Image of an older woman, a young boy, and a dog looking out of a window at
an organ grinder and his monkey standing on the street. The monkey is wearking a little
hat, jacket, and pants.]
houses, the disturbers of the poor, the extortioners, the
slanderers, — but not one spark of sympathy should be
extended to them. It is to the wicked, hunted, benighted,
fated, tempted, and fallen man that the sympathy
belongs, who has such odds against him, — who,
with Ishmaelitish instinct, has his hand raised against
every other man, seeing in all his enemies. How far he
is from happiness! How much need he has of sympathy!
We do not love the rascality the rascal commits,
— that is ever to be deprecated, — and its hideous
character is another call upon our sympathy for the
rascal who is impelled by the insidious whisper of the
devil to commit it, and to be committed for it. Verily,
the way of the transgressor is hard, and sympathy with
him is called for in the same degree that his lot is hard.
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