The Lake County star. [volume] (Chase, Mich.) 1873-current, 1874-04-02
Integrity In Business.

This brings us to the consideration
of those investments, which are not
only the most solid and lasting in
themselves, but which underlie and
guide all others that give durable sat
isfactiOn to human nature. These
are investments in moral principles.
Property in moral principles is "reap'
property in higher sense than any
legal sense; but these principles are
only truly possessed when organized
into virtues, and then they are good
for both worlds.
Let any man invest himself in JUS
tice, firmness, simplicity, moderation,
truthfulneSs, disinterestedness and
charity, and he will quickly realize
the truth of the Chinese prOverb,
that-"Virtues if they do not give
talents, supply their place." Virtues
act on the intelligence primarily, by
prompting the selfscrutiny, which re-
suits In self-knowledge. The misery
and fret of life proceed from immOd-
crate desires. appetite, passions, ego
tism and cOnceit, run away with the
mind, corrupt all its processes of
thought, and doom it equally to ig-
nOrance of self, and ignorance of the
real character of the vicious or fiimsy
externals of life, for which, as well as
to which, 1t madly abandOns itself.
The sublime. thought in the parable
of the PrOdigal Son, is compressed in
the simple words, "when he came to
himself."-when exhaustion of all
the pleasures of sensuality, had
brought him back to the awful per-
sOnality, lodged in his breast, from
which he had been violently swept
in the tumult and storm of his riot.
In the same way men learn from
the revulsiOns of other forms of sell
abandOnment-frOm commercial pan
les, from mortified political ambition,
from failures in achieving fame in
the pursuits of literature, from all
forms of debauch, selfish, sensual or
mental-what is intrinsic and in
destructible I'm themselves. Escaped
for a time from the realities of their
being and investing their life in de.
lusiOns, the period inevitably comes,
when they are compelled to confront
the rebuking spirit within, and stand
convicted of folly as well as sin.
The virtues are then remOrsefully
recognized as the only sure possess
siOns. 1t is seen that these teach
economic principles, and give to bus
iness all 1T has of permanency by
giving it all it has of honesty. 1t is
seen in short, that the peculiar COM
binatiOn of virtues which Is called
integrity, is the source of the peculiar
combination of faculties, we call wis.,
dom. 1t is thorough integrity of ma
ture, which implies integrity of
affairs of state, integrity of senti-
ment, understanding, reason and
imagination. 1t Is this, which is
especially needed In an age like ours,
whose activity and intelligence run
so furiOusly in the direction of in
dustrial and commercial occupations,
that nothing less than the most aus
tere ethics can overcome the frightful
temptations 10 excess or to fraud, by
which those occupations are beset.
We trust the country will not be
compelled to learn through aseries OF
regularly recurring panics that vir-
tues, ideal in their spiritual essence
and power, but tremendously actual
I'm the consequences which follow
their violation, are in their immense
utility, the most practical of all
-things.-1fidIand MOntIy.