The Hickman courier., 1877-11-02
InlernntionnI snndny.schooI I.e..pn..
= Torn Gloss

| Dec. 2a-Paul's Last Words; I'D Tim. 4;
| Dec. @i-ReNiew, or lesson seiecta q tAH school.
= Torn Gloss
The papers of this city publish the fact
that d. D. Spencer (they also cal atten-
ton to the fact that this man hs the
''D. D." at the wrong end of his nane-
| this, however, is of small account) was
at the time >absconded, leaving the
state savings institution, of which he hd
the charge, a wreck and a ruin, an aso-
ciate member of the Young Mems Chri-
tian association, of Chicago. No one, {
course, will think of holding the associa
tion responsible for what Mr.. Spencer
while enrolled upon its list of members
should please to do. The fact, however
IS provocative of commentary, all the
same.
Perhaps the first thought suggested is
/ that the cloak a man wears can never,
with any fairness, be made responsible
| for whatever things he may choose to
hide under it. 1t may suit him to select
for his purpose the very best cloak he can
find, or at les can command. 80 far as
he has reasonto suppose that people viii
Judge him by this outer garment, he will,
of course, aim to have in it the very best
testimony possible to his gentility and his
title to respect 1t is, to be sure, no
great sign of sagacity, to judge man by
his cloak, yet that is what very many
people in this world do. When they get
taken in, they should remember that it
is not the cloak that chooses the man,
but the man who chooses the cloak, and
that he, not it, is responsible for the sor
of man it j, made 70 cover.
1t seems very like a truism TO remari,
for another thing, that mans CLOAK is
not the man. At the same time, it is
exactly one Of the things which. agreed
to by everybody, are practically believed
by very few. There is many man
Aourishing his way through the world
with nothing under the sun to recon-
mend him but his fine cloak And even
the worldly-wise are often sadly taken in.
There was poet, once, who wrote, The
aqa's the man." This me poet going
up from his farm. to Edinbz,rgh Was
fascinated by the fine cloaks he saw the
rich, the noble and the fashionable wear
ing; sacrificed his rustic independence,
which became hin so well, at the altar
of the gay world, and became from that
day discontented, a dissipted and a
ruined man. Religion is not fine cloak,
but it Is an eminently respectable one.
Simply as trorn, however, it never com
municates respectabiIity. Jesus saw
around Him a most pretentious array of
these habiliments. \ touch of His fin
ger tore them into shreds, and Scribes
and Pbarisees crept from His presence
with the viIeness they had 50 diligently
cloaked and displayed in all its offensive
ness. A man does not become religious
by pretending to be 50. Alas, that such
thousands and thousands should keep on
deceiving themselves with the hope that
in some way the cloak, after all, may
answer for the man.
Then, how certain it must be that
sooner or later, the cloak, which is a
cloak mereK will be torn. 1t is not ins
the nature. of things that mere preten-N
sions should, in the end, or for any long
period, be found to avail. There is not
an error, not falsehoOd, not a shallow
pretension, not any face or form of hy-
lT1t Ior no
posed as just what it IS Events of this
present life even, demonstrate and fore
shadow the certainty of this truth. If
one were to write down in a list the
names of those men, in official or busi
ness lille, who, in the last two years
have had their ClOaks of pretensions not
only torn, but utterly stripped away, and
then been made to stand naked and
ashamed under the eye of a scornful
world, he would be astonished to see how
the catalogue would grow under his
hand. What long array of names, be-
smirched beyond all hope of cleansing
And the disclosures came about in an
operation of laws as ,inexorable as fate
Concealment, even in this world, is, after
all impossible. Very few pretenders fail
to be, sooner or later, found out Are
not the awful revelations of the last day
herein anticipated and foreshadowed ?
What millions on millions of torn cloaks
must hang in the wardrobe of eternity
A true mans cloak may sometimes be
torn. He wears it, not for concealment,
but because it is the garment natural
and becoming to him. 1t may be torn.
Good men suffer rough, treatment some
times Happy they who have no
anxiety on this point. The outer gar
ment may suffer from the brambles that
line their way through life. Hostile
bands may seize them, and even rend
away the cloak. Temptation may pluck
at them, and they may flee away with
the garment left behind them. Slander
may rob them of both the cloak and the
coat also, No matter. That which does
not coura concealment need never fesa
disclosure. The true man and the true
| Christian has wherewith to enwrap him
self though all else be rent away. To
him it is granted to be " arrayed in fine
linen, clean and white; for the fine linen
is the righteousness of saints. - Chicago
! Standard.
A Mr. Brown of Tonawanda, is build
| ing raft of pine logs, at Niagara. with