The Pacific commercial advertiser. [volume] (Honolulu, Hawaiian Islands) 1856-1888, 1877-04-21

of encouragement from sunrise TO sunset, nor
from January to December. But when any
thing goes wrong-a streak of dust on the
counter, or a box with the cover of-thunder
showers of scolding. Men imperious, capricious,
cranky toward their clerks-their whole manner
az much as to say " All the interest / have in
you is to see what 1 can get out of you"
Then there are all the trials of incompetent
wages, not in such times as these, when if a
man gets half a salary for his services he ought
to be thankful but L mean in prosperous times.
You remember when the war broke out and all
merchandise went up, and merchants were
made millionaires In six months by the simple
rise in the value Of goods. Did the clerk get
advantage of that rise? Sometimes, not al
ways. / saw estates gather in those times,
over which the curse Of God has hung ever
since. The cry of unpaid men and women in
those stores reached the Lord of Sabaoth, and
the Indignation of God has been around those
establishments ever since, rumbling in the car
riage wheels, flashing in the chandeliers, glow
ing from the crimson upholstery, laundering
In the long roll of the ten-pen alley. Such men
may build up palaces Of merchandise heaven
high. but after a while a disaster will come
along, and will put one hand on that pillar, and
throw itself forward until down will come the
whole structure, crushing the worshipers as
grapes are mashed in a wine-press.
Then there are boys in establishments who
are ruined-in prosperous Establishments
ruined by their lack of compensation. In how
mduN PROSPEROUS elDEcS II UuS DetH v II ld6t
twenty years, that boys we're given just enough
money to teach them how to steal Some were
seized upon by the police. The vast majority
of instances were not known. The head of the
firm asked Z" Where is George now - 9 : Oh,
he isn't here any more" A lad might better
starve to death on a blasted heath than take
one farthing from his employer but woe TO
that employer who unnecessarily puts a tempta-
ton in a boys way. There have been great
establishments in these cities building marble
palaces, their owners dying worth millions and
millions and millions, who made n vast amount
Of their estate out of the blood and muscle and
and nerve of ~halfpaid clerks. l mean men who
have gathered up vast estates at the expense
of the people who were ground under their
heel. Oh" say such merchants, eff you
don't like it here, then go and get a better
place" As much as to say "IYe got you
in my grip and 1 mean to hold you you can't
get any other place" Oh, what q contrast we
see between such men and those Christian
merchants of Brooklyn and New York who to-
day are sympathetic with their clerks-when
they pay the salary, acting in this way This
salary that L give you is not all my interest in
you. You are an immortal woman | am in
terested in your present and your everlasting
welfare L want you to understand that if | am
a little higher up in this store, L am beside you
in Christian sympathy"
Go back thirty years to Arthur Tappan's
store IN New York-a man whose worst enemies
never questioned his honesty. Every morning,
he brought all the clerks and the accountants
and the weighers into a room for devotion.
They sang. They prayed. They exhorted.
On Monday morning the clerks were asked
where they had attended church on the previous
day, and what the sermons were about. 1t
must have sounded strangely, that voice of
praise along the streets where the devotees of
Mammon were counting their golden beads.
You say Arthur Tappan failed. Yes, he was
unfortunate like a great many good men but
| understand he met all his obligations before
he left this world, and l know that he died in
peace of the gospel, and that he is before the
throne of God to-day-forever blessed. If that
be failing, l wish you might all fail.
There are many young men in this city-yea,
In this housewife want O word of encourage
ment, Christian encouragement. One smile of
good cheer would be worth more to them to-mor-
row morning in their places of business than a
present of $4,000 ten years hence. L remem-
Der the apprehension and tremor of entering a
profession. L remember very well the man who
greeted me into the ecclesiastical court with the
tip ends of the long fingers of the left hand and
l remember the man who took my hand in both
of his, and said {" God bless you, my brother;
you have entered a glorious profession be faith
full to God, and he will see you through" Why,
1 feel this minute the thrill of that Misunderstanding,
though the man who gave me the Christian grip
has been in heaven fifteen years. There are old
men here to-day who can look back to forty
years ago, when some one said a kind word to
Now, old men, pay back what you got
then. 1t is a great art for old men to be able to
the young. There are many young
people in our cities who have come from inland
counties of our own State, from the granite hills
Of the North, from the sayannas of the South,
from the prairies of the West. They are here to
their fortune. They are in boarding-houses
everybody seems to be thinking of him
They want companionship and they want
encouragement. Give it to them.
word is to all clerks in this house, Be NIGH
than your temptations. a Sandwich Islam
der used to think when he slew an enemy, all
the strength of that enemy came into his own
right arm. And L have to tell you that every
misfortune you conquer is so much added to your
moral power. With omnipotence for a
ever and the throne of God for a fulcrum you
AN move earth and heaven. While there are
other young men putting the cup of sin to their
Ups, stoop down and drink out of the fountains
If God, and you will rise up strong to thresh the
The ancients used to think that
pearls were fallen rain-drops which, touching the
surface Of the sea, hardened into gems, then
to the bottom. | have to tell you to-
lay that storms of trial have showered imperish-
bile pearls into many a young mans lap.
o young man, while you have goods to sell,
emember you have a soul to save. In a hospi-
al a captain, wounded a few days before, got
and in the midnight hour he sprang
'ut on the floor of the hospital, thinking he was
n the battle, crying: "Come on, boysI For
yard Charged All he was only battling
he specters of his own brain. But it is no i'm
ginary conflict into which L call you, young
nan, to-day. There are ten thousand spiritual
oes that would capture you. In the name of
up and at them. After the last store has been
losed, after the last bank has gone down, after
he shuttle of the quick feet ON the Custom
louise steps has stopped. after the long line of
merchantmen on the sea have taken sail of flame,
fter Brooklyn and New York and London and
Jenna have gone down into the grave where
'hebes and Babylon and Tyre lie buried, after
he great fre-bells of the judgment day have
at the burning of the wOrld.-on that day,
II the affairs of banking houses and stores will
up for inspection. Oh, what an opening
{ account books. Side by side. the clerks and