News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1882-10-12
HONESTY AS A POLICY.
HOW 1T DIFFERS FROM THAT
OF PRINCIPLE.

HOW IT DIFFERS Fhch INA
OF PRINCIPLE.
The Rev. DIR. ColIyer on the IDsiT
cerity of Some Religious Appear
ances-Our National Currency.
San honest and good heart" Luke
viii, Is. This was the text chosen by
the Rev. DIR. Collyer for his Sunday
morning discourse in the Church of the
Messiah. The preacher began:-"1t il
said that Numa built temple in the
early days of Rome and appointed {
solemn worship in it to this end-that
men might learn to speak and &C
honestly. And 1 have wondered now
and then whether this might not still bt
the primal purpose for which al
churches are founded and all worship
established by those who would stant
for the living truth and the truest lif,
in our Christian lands, and whether al
our creeds and confessions should no
| begin with this article:-1 believe ii
ultimate and absolute honesty So tha
when we build church of any name il
shall be the instance of all honesty III
the building and shall stand as firm as
its foundations after 700 years as on the
day of it's dedication. When we collect
money for such a purpose take care
above all things that so far as our
knowledge will serve us no man shall
help us out of his ungodly gains, as the
Bishop of Manchester said, to pave his
way to heaven. In the conception we
can all form of ultimate and absolute
honesty this is more essential than 1t Is
to build the church-that it shall be
done by honest men. If this church of
my day dreams wanted to blazon texts
over its pulpit and along its walls these
would be the texts:-Let us walk
honestly as the day; provide things
honest in the sight of gil men.
"I have wondered what better things
we could do for our great schools and
universities than to establish chair in
each of them and call master whose
business it she uld be to teach not ethics,
let us say, but honesty, and not the
theory, but the thing as it lies among
the deep foundations of our human life
and tips all the pinnacles. A man who
would nourish noble impatience on
the proverb on which we seem to set
such store--that honesty is the best
policy - and say, with Archbishop
Whately, he who acts on that principle
alone is not an honest man. Who
would meet the question squarely which
is springing like an evil weed in the
heart Of the youth of our time (and of
most times, for that matter, that l ever
read of)-' Can a man live and prosper
who will onlp tolerate this ultimate and
absolute honesty Meet the question
squarely and say, I cannot promise
what you would call prosperity but if
you cannot live honestly in this world,
you had better die and go to another,
and your going on those terms will be
all the proof you need that you will get
there"
After adYerting to the influence such
"a teacher would have uPon youths in
inspiring them with the belief that an
honest mans the noblest work of God,
he reverend gentleman continued: -
Nor can I doubt what ground one
should take to show that such pur-
pose as this pushed to the front in our
schools and churches, and in our homes
also must be of the purest and most
pregnant worth. It could not be the
ground that the lack of honesty in word
and deed is shaking our modern life to
its foundations, or that the disease OF
dishonesty, ftful once and abnormal,
has now become chronic and threatens,
in no long time, to become a plague
The true ground to take is the
positive, that ultimate honesty is the
solution of the problem. What shall we
do to be saved from this curse and plight
of insincerity in word and deed? 1t is
so primal and essential that your able
burglars will etill have honest pistols
and rifles, and when such men propose
to break your bank they get tools so
good that they shame most of those used
by honest men.
If, again, it is mere fraud in nineteen
cases out of twenty the man who takes
away your wealth by wholesale is apt
to be marked among his neighbors for
piety and usefulness. He superintends
a Sunday school; he can talk in the
meetings like saint he is deacon IN
his church he is most generous of all
men in his giving. especially to the
things that are reported in the papers.
He is of the pattern of one of the mana
gers Of that great bank in Glasgow,
who robbed thousands of widows and
orphans but gave $4,000 to the Lord
These men and all their kind dress them
selves in the pure and spotless robes OF
an honesty which surpasses before th9y
can take the plunder, and in a piety
which may not be questioned; it is the
only way open to their purpose.
Shall we turn to the things that are
of the most primal moment to us as
nation, we insist on this ultimate and
absolute honesty as their first condi-
ton. Take our gold as it comes from
the mint-the ultimate standard of
values. We never question the weight
of the alloy, but if it should be debased
by single grain by any party in power
there would be revolution. The nation
says in this final token OF its integrity
what Theodoric the great said when ad-
vised by his Cabinet to debase the coin
of his realm "That which bears my
image must not lie." Take our paper.
The reason why we can get all the
money we want at so low rate is that
there can be no question any longe
about their honest face. We have
fought that battle and won it. So great
is this honesty that, like our love, il
shall Lide multitude of sine. You
shall be an atheist, an infidel, a scorner
of things we reverence, a miser, blgot;
but if when you die your fellows with
one consent shall begin to say, He
was honest as the day; he never held an
unclean dollar in his hand; he came to
his belief or misbelief or unbelief hon.
estIy, and held it in pure sincerity,
then that one primal quality shall atone
for all the rest in the great general
Judgment and the great common heart.
C1EANTNa TP.-At GreenVille, s, O.,