The American, in other words,
thinks that the sinner has no rights that any one is bound to respect,
and he is prone to mistake an unsupported charge of sinning, provided it
be made violently enough, for actual proof and confession. What is more,
he takes an intense joy in the mere chase: he has the true Puritan taste
for an _auto da fe_ in him. "I am ag'inst capital punishment," said Mr.
Dooley, "but we won't get rid av it so long as the people enjie it so
much." But though he is thus an eager spectator, and may even be lured
into taking part in the pursuit, the average American is not disposed to
initiate it, nor to pay for it. The larger Puritan enterprises of today
are not popular in the sense of originating in the bleachers, but only
in the sense of being applauded from the bleachers. The burdens of the
fray, both of toil and of expense, are always upon a relatively small
number of men. In a State rocked and racked by a war upon the saloon, it
was recently shown, for example, that but five per cent. of the members
of the Puritan denominations contributed to the war-chest.
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