Morning appeal. [volume] (Carson City, Nev.) 1877-1906, 1877-10-21
SUNDAY READING.

the comic actors were spouting tragedy
speeches, the tragedy men were trying to be
funny, the dancers were singing and the sing
ers dancing, ETC. Now there is every Sunday
something in the preachful way in this column
of the MORNING APPEAL. Sometimes the
preacher consents to be dull and prosy, like q
real pulpiteer We have no doubt that if we
were a regularly initiated minister we should
occasionly deal, of Sunday, with things
secular-laying all strictly religious subjects
aside for the time As it is, this preacher
being laymen, he has developed at times,
as he is conscious, more than pulpiteerful
pertinacity to treat of things doctrinal and
theologistic. His parallel is in that spouting
comedian and that singing danseuse, yonder.
But if our pulpit was in church and not a
printing Office we would venture upon a dis
course touching the rotten morals of the time,
as developed in the wide spread failure of
Savings Banks in the United States. There
is good deal in name, after all; and there
are thousands of poor people and people who
are not TO be classified among the poor who
prefer putting their money in a Savings Bank
to placing it in any other kind of banking es-
Enlistment There is sort of imphcitness
in the confidence thus bestowed, which, while
it heighiens the trust imposed, invites cupid
ity, deceit and fraud as no other sort of bank
ing is invited to exercise 1t is discourag-
ing fact that very large proportion of those
whose names are the most prominent in these
Savings Banks are men whose church connec-
lions are conspicuous and much Wanted In
the Eastern States, where the towns and vii
lagos are divided by social partitions which
set off the entire respectable population into
strict sectarians and where it is business sui
eide not to belong to one or the other of the
religious congregations, pious bankers are al
most always the custodians of the savings of
the people Possibly the banks are the better
for this infusion of piety. Possibly the fail
ures would be more frequent and cruel than
even now they are if the restraining grace of
christian dutifulness were not at hand to
check crookedness as well as wickedness.
Ralston wrecked the Bank of California. 1t
was a most stupendous ruin while it was a
ruin. That splendid spendthrift was not in
any sense churchman. His was pagan
mind worshipping pagan splendor and making
its own idols, gorgeous, vast and imposing.
When there was need to reinstate the pros
trate bank another pagan put out giant hand
and by the most mastery effort ever seen in
such direction, he set the shattered house
again upon it's feet. That was Sharon. So
that honors are easy among our pagans. Pos
sibly if Ralston had been christian and a
pious man the great bank would not have
fallen. 1t is also possible that Sharon, after
the bank was PROSTATE, had he been man
of piety and devoutness of character and habit, |
would have been all the better able to should
er his load of twenty millions and carry it out |
of the shadows of insolvency into the glad |
sunshine of soundness and success. But let |
US not fall into the ways and tones of the
mocker. This is not the place for any cyni-
cism or irony, and we have not meant any
But there is a mean, low and sordid tone I'M
DERIVING the laity when churchmembers,
men conspicuous in their attitudes at prayer
meeting and occupants of the more prominent
places among the pews are shown to have
sought the confidence of the ignorant, the poor
and the trusting only to betray, deceive and
rob. The hypocritical character has been po--
trayed In multitude of ways. The Master
knew these mock pious bank Presidents and
Cashiers He was thinking of them when he
denounced woe to the scribes, pharisees and
hypocrites- who despOil widows houses
md cheat the fatherless of their portion Let
Is hear from the pulpit an echo, newly caught
md re-emphasized, of this denunciation of J
he pretensious, the sordid and the sanctimo- {
Nous. Business dealings have no rightful +
citation to religion or professions of piety a
Honesty, as we have been too often shown, is 9
ne thing and religious zeal another The t
ypecrlte brings disgrace upon the pious char il
cter because he seeks association with the t
God men and women and churches. We do il
OF suppose that any amount of preaching
Tould have made Maworm an honest t
ian or changed the current of Pecksniffs f
IMPULSES. But there might be with profit ]
ome plain warnings from the ministers desk
dishonest acts done in the name of religion
I'd under its guise and cloak are in the last Il Il
,gree despicable and cruel. The pulpit l.
ould side with the unwary multitude against q
ese wolves in sheep's. clothing We like u