Life — March 23, 1905 — page 5: what you’re looking at

What you’re looking at

# Life's Sunday-School Class This satirical cartoon depicts a Sunday school lesson gone awry. An angelic teacher attempts to instruct six caricatured pupils—identified as prominent figures including Johnny Rockefeller, Tommy Lawson, Henry Rogers, Johnny Gates, and Andy Carnegie—about moral teachings like "Thou Shalt Not Steal." The joke targets wealthy industrialists and robber barons of the Gilded Age, portraying them as incorrigible misbehaviors who cannot be taught ethics. The boys argue that stealing copper cents and playing "the races" (gambling) are normal behavior. The satire suggests these wealthy men's actual practices—theft, embezzlement, and financial manipulation—make them unsuitable pupils for moral instruction, implying their fortunes were built on dishonest practices.