The Potter journal. [volume] (Coudersport, Pa.) 1857-1872, 1859-03-31

| new I Ofk Sn0QlQ De Tree until IL IS nom
est. Let any man study the different
phases that this untruth assumes in all
regions Of our work, and he will no long
er wonder at our thousand embarrass-
ments, No class of laborers is exempt
from it. The farmers are always too ready
to slight their work, to cheat the land of
its proper cultivation and defraud their
crops and focks and herds of their just
attention, and therefore plunder society
of what it has right to expect from the
soil to say nothing of their question
able ways of dealing in their products
The root of all other industrial dishones-
ty is laid in the field, the pasture, the
dairy and the kitchen. Thence the i'll
weed grows apace the manufacturer, thus
skinned by the producer, Sights his work,
makes clothes and tools and shoes and fur
niture to "ser' and not to use. The me-
chanic VITO buys diluted milk, and half
fatted beef and mutton, and -four that
won't "rise," has his revenge by building
house that will tumble down over the
heads of second generation, by charging
exorbitant prices for poor service. and
making his word as cheap as his work.
The merchant, assailed by dishonesty on
every side, strikes out to defend himself,
and broken banks and exploding firms
and gambling speculations make panic
inevitable. The great corporations con-
tain the flower Of this iniquity, and doz-
en- respectable men as a board of direct
ors" will commit iniquities and oppres-
sions of which either would be ashamed in
his private affairs. Thus the rich, know
ing that they have been obliged to fight
to gain their money, have SO little sense
of public obligation in its use, and classes
are set against each other, each fully
aware of its own sins.
OF course this dishonesty vitiates all
other professions and the sons and daugh-
ters Of people that cheat in labor will give
Us sham instruction in school corrupt
legislation in the senate, literature hat
reads best while seen on the wall in pass
ing, and Gospel according to the fash
ion in the church Let not the farmer,
the mechanic and day-laborer accuse the
men higher up Of this dishonesty; they
have created it by their own untaith .ul-
ness. If the primitive employmonts OF
life are honestly performed, those that
grow out of them will be of like character
Thousands of the servant girls and day
workers who this winter will shiver and
starve have done all they could to bring
on this panic by unfaithful and dishonest
labor, by extortion and extravagant ex-
penditure in prosperous times. There is
untruth enough in our New York labor
yet to produce a general financial explo-
sion every quarter Of a century. All pro-
fessions are involved in it; and as con-
sequence Free Labor does not exist
In proportion as industry is untrue to
the eternal laws of rectitude, does it de-
scend to the enslavement of the less clev-
er by the more clever. When we can
honor each other SO much that we regard
every attempt at sham or knavery as an
objectionable insult to human nature, we
shall begiu to realize that GLORIOUS lber-
ty" which only rectltude confers. Any
man. whether sweeper of streets or
president of railroad; any woman,
whether cook or an artist, who Sights
work or wrongs a customer in any way, is
to that extent laboring to enslave the hu-
man race; and whoever in the hun.blest
walk Of industry is faithful, is doing his
utmost to emancipate society through the
whole world.
A radical reform in such particulars
could not fail to be accompanied with an
advance in beauty, Our industry would
take a.more graceful shape; our life of
toll would be less angular, coarse aud uu-
congenial, and an increased appreciation
of elegance appropriate to every produc-
ton would every where make itself known
And through the State more cheerful
atmosphere and unostentatlous lovellness
would mark the growth of that industrial
freedom which puts off at once the stolid,
sullen gloom of the slave, and the gruff
coarsene5s of the boor, and clothes itself
in the natural and graceful department of
the freeman.
i And this system of intelligent, honest,
graceful Free Labor, would place our peo-
pie on higher spiritual plane of exist
encc; and it would then be understood,
that the end of man is not "bread alone, .
but manhood in its greatest sense. Then
the folly that toll is degrading would be
silenced by the comprehension of the true
purpose of effort. 1t would be under
stood that the end of all professions is to
acquire power and opportunity to cult
vate the highest qualities of our nature
that day-laborer may obtain this privi-
lege, and Legislator can do no more
and that men are not to be honored ac-
cordiug to the work they do, but accord
ing to the use they make of the power