The Oamaru Mail FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1880.

Oamaru Mail, Volume IV, Issue 1319, 12 November 1880, Page 2

The Oamaru Mail FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 12, 1880.

Tiie editor of the Times —not Mr. Walter - nor the London Times —delivers another moral lec f ""'e to this community in +l "'s issue of that pa; or. We are doing him an injustice—he lectures all i."glish-speak-ing ccrum unities. It one cannot ad-mn-e Lis reasoning, or. lather, the reasoning of other renowned metaphysicians. v/liich iio di'?v" upon, one must give him credit for his courageous disregard of facts and common sense. He is another Foster. How fortunate that he has found a coadjutor. Such men are rare, and we can picture the affectionate meeting the shaking of hands and rubbing of noses, Maori fashion —when the only two social reformers met in the seat of learning, Wansbeek-street, on Wednesday evening last, and Mr. Foster s epistle in its entirety was handed to our contemporary. We are grateful for a repetition of the dose of erudite philosophy to -which our contemporary treats tis periodically. The twang of the last joram has scarcely yet left our palate we mean "the decoction flavored "with hot denunciations of our young folk which appeared in our contemporary some time ago. We suppose that such men as the Rev. Mr. Foster and the Editor are necessary evils—beacons that warn us to avoid the dangers of moral shipwreck upon the shoals of slander and gross misrepresentation. The inculcation of moral and social virtues in our public schools is, of course, admirable ; but here, apparently, two men unconsciously proclaim themselves shocking examples of the necessity for such teaching. The Editor asserts that a man who " speaks the truth according to his knowledge and conscience, may soon find the great British people howling around him like so many hungry*hyenas thirsting for his blood." We have not yet witnessed such a scene outside the Editor's office. Perhaps he has not yet spoken the truth "according to lii.s knowledge and conscience." Like the Rev. Mi\ Foster, the editor considers that he emanated from the cream of British Society, and that he is therefore eutiiled to sit in judgment on the people of the Colonies. His fellow-colonists came from the same countries, but tliey are sociall} r , mentallv. and morally inferior. If such an impression is anything mote than a mad fanta.siii. how grateftil we should be that he and liis confrere have left realms and peoples congenial to their higher attributes. to sojourn amongst their deteriorated fellow-countrymen. But Ave are so far lost i o a sense of viijht and wrong that we cannot even appreciate the fie v. Mr. Foster's letter nor the editor's opinions concerning it. Had we been in the rev. gentleman's position, we think we should have taken care that truth, and not untruth, preponderated in our comments on the Colony and its people. We should not expect our untruths to be overlooked because emigration agents had been rrttiltv of gross misrepresentation. :l Two blacks do not make a white." The naked truth would have been more creditable to the writer, and just to colonists. The editor—his champion —even confesses that not one of his statements was correct, but he excuses him because of the earnestness which pervades his letter. We have the presumption to contend that lie has uiistaken unaccountable spleen for earnestness. If Mr. Foster was not splenetic, how is it that in every case he has been guilty of exaggeration. His statements in almost every instance are wrong on a side not favorable to the Colony. It is not uncharitable to deduce from this that Mr. Foster wrote under the inspiration of disappointment and dislike. The statement that every second tradesman in Oamaru had made acquaintance with the Bankruptcy Court is defended by the editor. He says that Mr. Foster wrote figuratively. We are not sufficiently in Mr. Foster's confidence to ascertain what he meant —we only know what he said. As the statement stands it is a gross libel on the tradesmen of this community. If the writer did not mean what he said, he should have inserted a note to the effect that he had drawn the long bow, or that he had written actuated by feelings of annoyance that his golden dreams had not been realised. There is scarcely a word of truth in Mr. Foster's letter—that is as we understand truth—and our contemporary has been guilty of another act of inconsistency in championing such a rotten cause. This is, of course, only the common-sense conclusion of the people of this benighted and corrupt community. We naturally resist the civilising operations of reformers of the Foster stamp.