Life, 1913-06-26 · page 7 of 45
Life — June 26, 1913 — page 7: what you’re looking at
What you’re looking at
This page satirizes early 20th-century intellectualism and social reform movements. The article advocates for a "new society" based on scientific knowledge rather than tradition, claiming ignorance and "comfortable obscurity" are no longer acceptable. It explicitly mentions demystifying sex education and challenging medical authority. The illustration below—captioned "His Matrimonial Chances, as Viewed by His Mother"—appears to satirize this modern approach. It depicts a young man's matrimonial prospects being evaluated through a supernatural or spiritualist lens (note the ghostly figures on the wall), suggesting mothers still clung to old superstitions and traditional values when assessing their sons' romantic futures, despite the article's call for rational, scientific thinking.
📄 Transcribed text from this page (OCR, searchable)
Machine-transcribed from the original scan — historical spelling and the odd misread are preserved.
HAT is most need- ed to-day is a society for the preven- tion of knowledge. No field of ignorance and comfortable obscurity is too sacred for the vestigator to invade. We have only to intimate a curiosity upon any subject, when at our elbow stand a dozen book agents. Most of them are armed with mov- A New Society ing pictures and phonographs on the side, in order that we may sit at our ease and load up with statistics and other ball-bearing facts. It is impossible to be ignorant of anything. Doctors no longer pretend to fool us because our own symptoms are familiar before they call and every possibility of recovery has been fully discussed. The mystery of sex is now un- veiled to the toddling infant, and the boy of seventeen is blasé. Of course in a condition like this, no reflection is any longer possible, even if there were any place where we could go to reflect. Such a society as we propose would furnish islands of retreat, where those who feel themselves overburden- ed with the mass of typographical, ora- torical and literary knowledge, which is constantly breaking over us would have an opportunity te bask their souls in at least a temporary peace. HIS MATRIMONIAL CHANCES, AS VIEWED BY HIS MOTHER comicbooks.com