The Opelousas journal. [volume] (Opelousas, La.) 1868-1878, 1869-09-25
The Meamese Vice.

| June, thus preacnes, ana we nave pleas
ure in lending him our pulpit to repeat
a part of his discourse. "1'here are two
or three marked peculiarities in the vice
of calumny. In the first place, consid-
ering the mischief it does, there is very
little punishment to the person practis-
ing it. Personal vices are dearly paid
for even in this world; and most Of us
learn, through bitter experience and by
dire remorse, the sin and mischief of our
wrong doings. Then there is the thor
ough ignorance, for the must part, on
the part of the calumniator; of the mis-
chief and misery that he causes by CAL
umny. A good, easy man, or one who
believes himself to be such, may have
been steady propagator Of injurious re-.
ports deeply affecting other people; and
the poor man goes down to his grave in
the confident belief that he has been a
most exemplary member of society. The
most unfortunate fact about calumny ia.
that you seldom witness the sufferings
you create by calumniating. Your other
cruelties you know about, and often see
the issue Of them; but the sgonies you
cause by every form of calumny, detrac.
ton, disparagement and erroneous state
ment, rarely comes to your knowledge,
or to the knowledge of any human being,
except the person who is illuminated.
A certain humorist is wont to contend
that the sum of misery in~human life is
always the same. He says the sum of
forces in the material world is always
the same. the~anaptit7 of motion is al.
ways the same, ant so is the amount of
human misery 1t is vain that you urge
against him that everything has become
milder in the world; that wars are con-
Quoted with less cruelty and less destruc-
ticn Of property that religious persecu-
tion has, comparatively speaking ceased
to exist; that there is an immense ad-
vance in medical skill !; and that, gener-
ally, humanity in the ascendant. He is
pleased to admit your statements but
contends that all these good things are
counterbalanced by more sensit;veness
on the part OF the human race, and by
their caring more and more for what is
said and written about them; and also
that there is 60 much more talking and
80 much more writing. 10 short, he
maintains that the progress of calumny,
and th' severity with which it is felt,
will always counteract any advantages
that are gained for the human race. A
strange thing, he observes, is this-that
the less truth there 10 in The calumuy.
the greater are the sutferings of the per.
son calumuiated. You would think
he says, that when a man hears that
something has been said or written of
him that does not apply to him, any
more tLan it would to the inhabitaut of
another planet, he would not take the
calumny to heart. But no; this only
makes him more furious and more vexed.
If it did apply, he could then bear it, as
he should deserve it; and so in this case
the pointless arrow inflicts the severest
wound Eoealists have exhausted their
energies in denouncing the vices of de-
traction and backbiting. With the ex-
ception of St. Paul's words about charity
which embrace the whole subject, per-
haps the mos: practical remarks that
have been made upon it are those which
have been made by the writer who goes
by the name OF Thomas Kempis. AZ
ter denouncing the evil of uttering in
furious statements known to be false,-
which. however, is comparatively rare
he goes on to say that you should not
soon pour out to the ears of others those
injurious reports even that you do be-
lieva-n