Life, 1895-05-02 · page 4 of 18
Life — May 2, 1895 — page 4: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
# Analysis of Life Magazine Page (May 2, 1895) The page contains three distinct editorial cartoons and commentary: 1. **Top cartoon**: Shows a figure in bed labeled "With these is Life there's Hope"—likely commentary on mortality or hardship. 2. **Middle cartoon**: Depicts a woman at a table with cards/documents, accompanying text about the Women's Christian Temperance Union and a Kentucky court ruling. The ruling required lottery winners and those deriving income from vice (gambling, horse racing, cock-fighting) to count such gains as taxable income. The cartoon satirizes the tension between morality enforcement and taxation. 3. **Bottom cartoon**: Shows a figure labeled "CIVILIZATION," critiquing Western intervention in China and Japan's modernization efforts amid geopolitical concerns. The page reflects 1895 American anxieties about temperance, gambling, and imperial competition in Asia.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
HQhile there ie Life ther VOL. XXV. MAY 2, 1895. No. 644. 1g West Tuirty-First Street, NEw York. Published every Thursday. $5.00 a year in advance. Postage to foreign countries in the Postal Union, $1.04 a year, extra, Single copies, 10 cents. Rejected contributions will be destroyed unless accompanied by a stamped and directed envelope. HE attention of the Women’s Christian Temperance Union, the Society for the Sup- pression of Vice, the Society for the Prevention of Crime, and of all in- dividuals and societies who believe in virtuous behavior is called to a recent ruling as to the income tax, news of which comes from Kentucky. According to this ruling (made by Mr. Desha Breckinridge), persons addicted to wagers, or to such sinful games as poker, keno or craps, must count all gains derived from such diversions as part of their income, and pay a tax thereon if they win enough to become liable. So if they win a prize in a lottery they must pay on that if it is big enough, and similarly on stakes won in a horse race, or money taken in as an incident of a cock-fight. The depravity of a tax which applies the wages and rewards of sin to the support of the government need not be dwelt upon, Everybody who condemns gambling and objects to share its fruits must be conscientiously opposed to the in- come tax, and eager for its abolition. . . . A Dso Japan and China are at ( peace again, and about to be- come allies instead of enemies, and Japan has undertaken the surprising task of modernizing China. Japan it seems has let China off easy with the design of making her competent to take care of herself, and stand with Japan against the western nations, We of the United States will take a lively interest in her effort, and watch its issue with curious attention. The person who invented the adage about the west- ward tendency of the star of Empire wal omitted to specify San Francisco as the AAVICIOE ~~ limit of its course. China has boundless resources, and if with the assistance of Japan she is able to rouse herself from the condition of being Chinese, it is possible that she and Japan may become nations of the future, and share with the United States the onerous duty of teaching the effete Europeans what's what. It will be an interesting change for Americans to be in the position of spectators at a huge experiment in civilization. They have been performers so long in the world’s greatest contemporary show of that sort, and have got so used to being scrutinized and criticised that they will hardly know how to take their places on the benches and speculate about the chances of the new pig-tailed actors who are ready to tramp the boards. More folks make more fun, The world will be more in- teresting if China with her myriads can be brought into modern life. Whether it will be more comfortable is another question, and one that need not be weighed until the experi- ment is in a more forward state than now. . *- F the Prince of Wales should come over to the yacht \y races, New York will see ¥ the most curious collec- tion of expatriated Ameri- cans it has viewed for many a long day. It will s be as though Europe had ¥ § @ given up her dead, so / many of our countrymen who have been lost to sight these many years will time a visit home so as to make it cover the period of the Prince’s stay, And, bless their hearts, they will all be up on etiquette and deportment, and will tell us how to behave and what to sayin the Royal presence. Let us hope earnestly for the continuance of the health of the Queen of England, that the Prince may come, and that American families long separated may have one more reunion in New York. * . HE Spring, which starts everything, seems to have had an effect upon the environ- ment of Mr. Keeley, of Philadel- phia. A report got out the other day that Mr. Keeley’s motor was about to mote. It is highly improper that rumors of this nature should be permitted to. become current. The usefulness of Mr. Keeley's contrivance lies in its value as a test of faith, a value which is distinctly impaired by untimely suggestions of a pos- sible practical issue to Mr. Keeley’s mystic imaginings. Mr. Keeley’s motor has no need to mote. It is successful as it is; successful indeed in its own particular line of inactivity beyond any mechanical development of ich there is record, The survival of its vitality during a lifetime of suspended animation is one of the wonders of modern science, & \ é d icbooks.com