The Sun.
London, England, 1858-12-28 00:00:00

his responsibility- to his Creator, and his duty to
11:.s fellow-mcn in all his mercantile transactions.

Nothing, however, can be more disgusting than to
hear a tradesman making loud professions of reli-
gion in order to secure an advantage in the way of
business, or under the cloak of superior sanctity to
shirk his duty, and to overreach his neighbours. It
is humiliating to hear the mercantile conduct of
such men contrasted with the honourable dealings of
men who make no profession of religion, but arc only
remarkable for their profanity and rough out-and-
out, honesty.. If you wish to test the qualities of
a ;man's religion, do not follow him to church,

where he must put on the garment of pious observ-
ance, but visit him at his shop or counting-room and
mark the spirit by which he is influenced in his
dealings with his fellow-man. If he regard merely
his own interests, and, in securing his own, invades
the rights of his neighbour, it would be small un-
charitableness to pronounce that men no true fol-
lower of Him who said, "As ye would that men
should do to you, do ye even so to them." Pro-
fessors of religion sometimes seem to think
their religion too pure a thing to be brought
down into the sphere of trade; but a man's religion
is not worthy the name if it be not able to stand
the ordeal of his business life, if it do not accom-

pang him in his daily avocations, and lead him to
sacrifice lust of gain whenever it prompted him
to injure his fellow-man. Mr. Black proceeded
to advert to the desirableness of shortening the
terms of credit both in the wholesale and retail

rade, inasmuch as lengthened credits increased

risks, and had a tendency to show a greater
apparent gain than was actually realised. Petty
expenses and bad debts were too often left out of

view, and an extravagant opinion of the profits of
trade was often entertained not only by the public
but by traders themselves. It was of the utmost

impoitance, therefore, to keep accurate books and

annually to balance them. 'Alen have sometimes
gone on for years :with a vague idea that they
were making money, when, in fact, they were on
the high-road to bankruptcy. As a commissioner
of income tax he had been surprised to find so
many tradesmen who could not give an account of
their income because they did not keep books and
made no annual balance. Perhaps they thereby
thought they would evade payment of the tax to
the full amount chargeable, but in some cases he
should not be surprised if they outwitted them-
selves, and at all events the commissioners did not

accept their apology, and threatened, if they did
not keep regularly balanced books, to take upon
themselves the risk of charging them too high.
Mr. Black then referred to those traders whom he

might call the highwaymen of commerce, who fol-
lowed a reckless, unprincipled determination to

become rich by fair means, if convenient, or by. foul,
if necessary. He concluded by saying that it was
one of pie objects of the society to guard the honest
and prudent tradesman against the risks to which
he was exposed by the mismanagement of the un-
instructed and the thoughtless, as well as against
the reckless and the vicious ; and he had reason to

believe that the mercantile public had greatly bene-
fited by its agency.

THE MAILS, &C. SOUTHAMPTON, Monday.—
The steamship Behar, Capt. Field, left this day with the
Bombay mail, £155,311 in specie (mostly bar silver), and 30
first-class and 10 second-class passengers, among whom were
Rev. F. Rosie, Colonel and Mrs. Buchanan, Capt. Graves,
Mrs. Colonel Maberly, &c. The Alhambra left this day,
with the usual Peninsular mail and 14 passengers. The
passengers of the steamship Bavaria, which broke down on
her passage from New York, and put into Queenstown,
arrived here on Saturday in the steamship Bittern. Those
destined for Hamburg (64 in number) left this day in the
Haramonia.

GLASGOW ROYAL INFIRMARY.—We learn with
pleasure that the Ch 'isty's Minstrels, per their treasurer,
"Nirnmo," of Mitchell's,n Old Bond-street, have handed
over to the Royal Infirmary,
thenl. to give up the City £5 out of the £2O paid to
as it was unsolicited.-01
Tuesday evening.for the Reform meeting last
This liberal act is all the more credit-
able.....asgow Horning Journal.
ANOTHER MAN KILLED AT LIVERPOOL.-011
found
ddalyyinnu 6ightn, a man, named Bartholomew Doyle, was
m
being take
up hissolieead steps
was
bleeding profusely, and after
in Upper Beau-street On
.
being taken to a dispeniiary, where his wound was dressed,
he was taken to the workhouse, where he died on Sunday.
A man named Peppei, who struck the deceased with a
poker on the previous evening, has been taken into custody.
THE PARIS OMNIBUSES.--The following statistics
respecting the omnibuses of Paris in 1857 are not without
interest :--There are 25 lines in the capital, and the vehicles
on them conveyed not fewer than 55,474,154 passengers.
The line on which the traffic was most active was that from
' the Bastille to the Madeleine, 7,681,297 persons having
been conveyed on it ; the next is the line from La Chapello
to the Barrier() d'Enfer, on which 2,793,668 persons were
carried. On the line from Neuilly to the Lous,re there.
were 2,757,446 passengers, and on that from Les Ternes to
the Boulevard des Filles du Calvaire 2,757,440. The Cha-
renton lino was also much frequented, and on that from the
Barriere des Martyrs to the Pantheon the number of pad-
songers was 1,675,008. The lireetince.hich.the movement
is least active is that from the Bastille to Pere La Chaise,
coal/ 374,035 pei-sons having been conveyed on it. Tim
number of omnibuses employed on the different lines was
410$