The discussion I had
with the young people that evening has always remained with me as
one of the moments of illumination which life in a Settlement so
often affords. In response to my position that a desire to avoid
all that was "tough" meant to walk only in the paths of smug
self-seeking and personal improvement leading straight into the pit
of self-righteousness and petty achievement and was exactly what
the Settlement did not stand for, they contended with much justice
that ambitious young people were obliged for their own reputation,
if not for their own morals, to avoid all connection with that
which bordered on the tough, and that it was quite another matter
for the Hull-House residents who could afford a more generous
judgment. It was in vain I urged that life teaches us nothing more
inevitably than that right and wrong are most confusingly
confounded; that the blackest wrong may be within our own motives,
and that at the best, right will not dazzle us by its radiant
shining and can only be found by exerting patience and
discrimination. They still maintained their wholesome bourgeois
position, which I am now quite ready to admit was most reasonable.
Of course there were many disappointments connected with these
clubs when the rewards of political and commercial life easily
drew the members away from the principles advocated in club
meetings.
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