The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1878-05-16
Evil Communications.

Evil Comm indications.
There are persons who, like the knights
.rrant of past days, seem to feel that their |
mission is to right existing wrongs. The |
way in which they propose to do it is to |
make them the theme of social inter-
course, the subject of infinite talk. OIL
course they never can lack material to
work upon. The newspapers abound in
t, political circles overflow with it, every
le 9hbor's family will afford it, in some
orm and degree.
Our Saviour SAYS Judge not, that
re be not judgedi" Now, of course, He
did not mean that we should have no
opinion respecting men and their actions,
Or that we should refuse, at the call of
1t is an every day duty, which He Him
self recognized, to decide questions of
right and wrong, whose decision will
involve some about us in condemnation.
But this is a very different thing from
over social crimes and evils, or
sitting down cynlcally to form adverse
Judgments of our fellows, taking refuge
in the shadow of principle.
A conscientious man feels that he
must defend the right, and therefore he
must condemn wrong-doeTs. A cynic
feels that he must condemn every body,
and he rejOices that truth bears him out
in it. Now, it is the spirit in which we
contemplate what transpireS around us
that reacts to fit the seal of our judgment
on ourselves. tive are secretly gratified
with recitals of vice and crime which,
protesting to loathe, we eagerly devOur
with our rolls and coffee, the fact is,
though we seem to be condemDing crime,
we are nourishing the incipient criminal
within U.S. Inproportion as these things
have a fascination for US, they have
drawn us down to their own corrupt
level.
It is in vain that we hatter ourselves
that we look upon these disclosures Of
crime and corruption with indignation
and loathing. We can not altogether
loathe that which we desire to cOntem>
plate; we can not altogether hate that
whose details have pleasing fascination
for US. It is curious to see with what
assumed superiority some declaim against
popular vices when we perceive, from
their secret attitude, that the principle
result of the process Is their own degrad-
alton. evil communications corrupt
good manners"
But, if one who makes himself 9 self
constituted censor does not become I'M
charitable and evil~,ninded, he is almost
sure to become a confirmed gossip, and
few fates in the world, outside of the
lunatic asylum, are more to be dreaded.
Can anything be more utterly diluting
to the thought, and weakening to the
entire moral nature than the empty and
feelingless clatter of carping tongues
Does anything more efectually expel
from the soul AL pure afinities for noble
things, all royal delight in truth, al
sweet and holy conceptions of virtue and
excellence, than this everlasting semi.
scornfnl talk about a neighbours dress
household management, social aspira
tions and religious sins? One might q:
well expect to obtain mental discipline
! from wandering in a boiler-shop, as to
| hope for any good to himself or anybody
| from the sort of animadversion that seems
/ to be the most pleasing occupation Of
| the average gossip. If we would benefit
our neighbor, let us tell him of his fault
If we would curse ourselves, let US hold
up the image OF his ImperfectiOns before
our minds, to be photographed thereon
Alas for the poor gossip; doomed, by
/ high degree, to fill his mind with the
husks that the swine did eat !" In
/ tellectual starvation and moral disease
stare him in the face If his talk doe
not ruin innocent regulations, as it vii
be more than likely to, it will belittl'
| and degrade his own intellect and heart
| If it does not destroy any other person
power to do good, it effectually cripple
and dissipates his own. If it does no
make any one else to be hated and shun
ned, it will make him unweicOme anC
/ odiOus He sacrifices all good and raj
things to a duty made of brown pape
ard saw dust. Or, like the deludeC
children of Judah, who consumed eli
offspring in the copper embrace of a red
hot Moloch, he burns his treasure to
senseless and cruel god.
Trifies, indeed, these themes of GOSSIP
sometimes are, but trihing is seriou
business. Trihes they may be, but tn
business OF one who deals in tTifes make
him trifer a spendthrift of life's sum,
days, a squanderer of its glorious oppoI
tunities, bankrupt in its nobler virtues
and ignorant of its truest joys. There i
a sense in which we are to be deeply ant
lively interested in that which con
Germs our brother man. He is neither
! Christian nor a friend who will no
watch over his neighbours interests, AM
seek, from motives OF charity, to promot
his happiness: Am l my brother
keeper ?" was the sneering Tetort of on
who had proved himself his brother
murderer. There is a generic relation
between the casting-of of the sacre'
obligations of a common brotherhood
and the staining OF our hands with
brothers blood. The man who care
nothing for his brother is cousin~germal
of the murderer, And Whosoeve
hateth his brother Is a murderer"
The difference is wide between on
who holds himself ready to reprov
wrong in q spirit of kindness, forgiv
injury, sympathize with weakness, ant
help infirmity; who has a noble purpos
steadily held, TO interest himself for tn
sake of helping; and one who mOuses il
the affairs of others urged on by curiosity
a censorious spirit or corrupt heart.
Christ died because, knowing hu
mainly, His tender interest and sublim
sympathy could not but express an
pour themselves out in an infinite sac
rifice. But, for all we know to the COZ
trary, the priest and the Levite, who, o.
the road to Jericho, evaded the poor fe
low in his distress, may have been tn
most unsparing critics of wrong doing i
Jerusalem, and ring-leaders OF the cit
gossip. For philippics against evil ar
no certain evidence of moral ineorrupti
bility; and those who most loudly an
heartlessly denounce the sins of Others
are the very ones to reproduce ther
themselves Chicago Standard.
Sunshine or cJ0ud-Wkich?
1t should never be forgotten that th
preachers tone is contagious. The ke
which he strikes in his sermon is almOs
sure to be the KEYNOTE of the congregi