The Richmond palladium. [volume] (Richmond, Ind.) 1855-1875, 1869-05-18
Beneficient by Machinery.

We suppose that there must be organ
izations for doing good. At all events
there is host of them in the aggregate,
and not a few in every sect. But it is
not as inspiring as it is well known that
their working officers are apt to lose all
| the juices of benevolence and to become
absorbed in the machinery. just as a
politician is in danger of degenerating
into partizan, wire puller, and trick
ster, so is professional philanthropist
| Ii. e., q man who makes his living in
| connection with some benevolent enter
prise) liable to forget the end in the
means, and almost to do evil that good
may come We have known of courses
pursued by officers Of ecclesiastical So
cieties to further their ends, which in
! the mercantile world would have been
regarded as dishonorable as an Erie
swindle or Albany sale of legislators
But then almost everything, editing in
cluding, has dangerous tendency.
More good should be done in person,
| if not less by organized agencies. Help
| is twice as helpful if it come through
living medium. with the warm hand, the
loving eye, and the sympathetic voice.
Good done in this way, no matter how
narrow its sphere may seem, is sure of
| immortality and immortal extension
This was the Saviour's plan, who went
| about doing good, and healing all that
were oppressed of the devil, for God
was with him.
| He who limits himself to organized
agencies in doing good, misses the
sweetest and most precious returns OF
charity; for in its exercise life mingling
with life makes it ever more blessed to
| give than to receive
Take the cases of some noted philan-
thropists and berefactors. They strain
every nerve, and adopt the hardest meth
DDS to be rich. They regard all their
subordinates, aud even the partners, as
mere machines for making money.-
These employers are not humanized with
the glow of fellow feeling, nor do they
show any anxiety for the welfare of their
| helpers. of whom their may be hundreds,
| each one encircled with human interests,
common humanity, and affording the
| best opportunity for unobtrusiyc Chris
tian kindness in word or in deed. How
many souls might be warmed, and how
many homes frightened by such en-
ployers! But no, business is business
and it will never do to meddle with the
affairs of your clerks. Many man
who has been loud in his opposition to
slavery treats his human help as kind
hearted farmer would never treat his
cattle.
And then after long, a hard, and
hardening life-a desert of lost oppor-
tunities-come the grand finale-a mag
nifcent grant, in the old business way,
to some wholesale charity. This is good
as far as it goes, but it is infinitely bet
ter day by day to keep the milk of hu-
| M in hnc hxy
acts of sympathy and helpfulness to our
fellow creatures for the love of God and
'our brother also Thus we not only
make ourselves children of our father in
heaven, but we help to make the heaven
ly family larger. And the devil never
| whispered colder, crueller lie through
human selfshness than that this is in.
compatible with success in business
Where is there greater burlesque o.
| benevolence, Shakespeare or the Bible
being Judge, than callous, stern man,
who for more than half q century has
ground human interests, and all sorts of
poorer stuff, in his mill. sending off at
the last car load of his compound to
some other concern which is run on the
'chraity' principle2
The quality of mercy is not strained,
1t droppeth as the gentle rain from
heaven
"A new commandment give unto you
that ye love one another Church Union.