My life and loves Vol. 3

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At length the oracle has spoken. Mr. Justice Levy of the Supreme Court in New York has looked into the second volume of My Life, and "found it necessary to read but a few passages to arrive at the inevitable conclusion that it is neither literature nor art."

Now who made Levy, with his "inevitable conclusion," a judge of literature and art? He may be a judge of what is legal or illegal; but what does he know of literature or art?

Levy proceeds to declare that my book "is not only obviously and unquestionably obscene, lewd, lascivious, and indecent, but it is filthy, disgusting and utterly revolting," and he adds, not seeing that he is contradicting himself, "I purposely refrain from naming it, as I am averse to enhancing its sale"; but if it is "disgusting and utterly revolting," then surely no sale need be feared. Levy, why play Dogberry and write yourself down an ass!

But this New York judge has given the police the power to raid private printing establishments without a search warrant and arrest the printers of a book about which nothing is known! "The police," he declares, "do not merit the criticism leveled at them" for exceeding their constitutional powers.

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