The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1886-06-04
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
Second Discourse of the Series
On the Labor Question.
How Employers Ought to Treat Employees
Practical Suggestions Outside the
Question of Better Wages and
Shorter Hours.

Rev. I. Dew lb6 1almage, IN deI1Verlng
his second sermon on the labor question at
Brooklyn Tabernacle, took two texts from
which to illustrate his subject, as follows:
nye bite and devour one another, take
heed that ye be not consumed one of an
other.-[GaI v, Is.
Look not every man on his own things;
but every man also on the things of others.
philippians it,, 4
The labor agitation will soon quiet. The
mills will again open, the railroads re-
sumo their traffic, our National properties
again start. OF course the damage done
by the strikes can not Immediately be re-
paired. Wages win not be so high as they
were. SpasmodicalIy they may be high
er, but they will drop lower. Strikes,
whether they are right or wrong, always
injure Iaborers more than they do capital
lists. You will see this in the starvation
of next winter. Boycotting and violence
and murder never pay. They are differ
ent stages of anarchy. God never blessed
murder. The worst use you can put man
to is to kill him. Blow up tomorrow all
the country seats on the banks of the Hud-
son, and all the fine houses on Madison
square, and Brooklyn heights, and Bunker
hill, and RittenhoUse square, and Beacon
street, and all the bricks and timber and
stones will just fall back on the bare
hands of American labor. The worst
enemies of the working classes of the
United States and Ireland are their
demented coadjutors. The assassina-
tions of Lord Frederick Cavendish
and Mr.. Burke in Phoenix Park, Dub
lin, Ireland, in the attempt to avenZe the
wrongs of Ireland, only turned away from
that afflicted people millions of sympa-
Al
House of Commons in London had only
this effect-to throw out of employment
tens of thousands of innocent Irish people
in England. In this country the torch put
TO the factories that have discharged
hands for good or bad reason; obstruc-
tions on the rail in front of mid
night express trains, because the offenders
do not like the president of the company;
strikes on shipboard the hour they were
going to sail, or in printing offices the
hour the paper was to go to press, or in the
mines the day tn e coal was to be delivered,
or on house scaffollings 80 the builder fails
in keeping his contract-au these are only
a hard blow on the head of American la
Dor, and cripple its arms, and lame its
feet, and pierce it's heart. Traps sprung
suddenly on employers, and violence,
never took one knot out of the knuckles of
toll, or put one farthing of wages into
callous palm. Barbarism will never cure
the wrongs OF civilization. Mark thatl
But gradually the damages done the la
borer by the strikes will be repaired, and
some important things ought now to be
said.
The whole tendency of our times, as you
have noticed, is to make the chasm be-
tween employer and empIoye wider and
wider. In olden time the head man of the
factory. the master builder, the capitalist
the head man of the firm worked side by
side with their employees, working some
times at the same bench, dining at the
same table; and there are those here who
can remember the time when the clerks of
large commercial establishments were ac-
customed to board with the head men of
the firm.
All that is changed, and the tendency is
to make the distance between employer
and employe wider and wider. The ten
dency is to make the employe feel that he
is wronged by the success of the capitalist
and to make the capitalist feel:
"Now my labOrers are only beasts of
burden; must give so much money for so
much drudgery, just so many pieces of sill
yer for so many beads of sweat"
In other words, the bridge of sympathy
ing was well described by Thomas Car
lyle when he said:
Piugson, of st. Dolly Undershot, buc-
caneer-like says to his men: "Noble spin
ners, this is the hundredth thousand we have
gained wherein mean to dwell and plant
my vineyards. The hundred thousand
pound is mine, the daily wage was yours.
Adieu, noble spinners; drink my health
with this groat each, which give you over
and above"
Now what we want is to rebuild that
bridge of sympathy, and put tire trowsl
to one of the abutments to- day; and ]
preach more especially this morning 10
employers as such, although what / hare
to say will be appropriate to all who are in
the house.
The outrageous behavior of a multitude
of Iaborers toward their employers dtiring
the last three months, behavior infamous
and worthy of most condign punishment,
may have induced some employers 20 neg
Iect the real Christian duties tFat they
owe to those whom they employ. There
fore want to say to you whom / confront
face to face, and those to wFOm these
words may come, that all ship-Cwners, all
capitalists, all commercial firms, all mas
ter builders, all housewives aFe bound to
be interested in the entire welfare of their
subordinates. Years ago some one gave
three prescriptions for becoming million
aire:
1. Spend your life in getting and keep
ing the earnings of other people.
2. Have no anxiety about the worri-
ments, the losses, the disappointments of
others.
g. Do not mind the fact that your vast
wealth implies the poverty Of a great many
people.
Now there is not a man in my
audience who would consent to go out
into life with those three principles to earn
a fortune. It is your desire to do your
whole duty to the men and women in your
service.
First Of all then, pay as large wages as
are reasonable and as your business viii
afford. Not necessarily what others pay,
certainly not what your hired help say
you must pay, for that is tyranny on the
part of labor unbearable. The right of
laborer to tell his employer what he must
pay, implies the right of an employer to
compel man into service whether he
viii or not, and either of those ideas is
despicable. When any employer allows
lAboreT to say what he must do or have his
business ruined, and the employer submits
to il, he does every business man in the
United States wrong and yields to
principal which, carried out would dis
solve society. Look over your affairs and
put yourselves in Imagination in your la
borer's place, and then pay him what be-
fore God and your own conscience you
ought to pay him.
"God bless yousD are well enough in
their place, but they do not buy coal nor
pay house rent, nor get shoes for the chill
drsn. At the same time, you. the en-
ployer, ought to remember through what
straits and strains you got the fortune by
which you run your store or factory. You
are to remember that you take all the
risks and the emplove takes none, or