Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1886-11-01

| prOIOunOS, YET through tue IOTCe vi Cil
cumstances they get intelligent on ques'
tions OF politics, and finance, and geog'
raphy, and jurisprudence, and ethics.
Business is hard schOolmistress. II
her pupils will not learn in any
other way, with uumerciful hand she
smites them on the head and on the heart
with inexorable loss. You went into some
business enterprise, and five thousand
dollars got out of yaur grasp. You say
the five thousand dollars were wasted. o.
no! that was only intuition. Expensive
schooling, but it was worth it. MisfOr
tune, with hard hand, comes upon maj
and wakes him up, and by the very force
of circumstances business men get to bC
intelligent. Traders in grains must know
about the foreign haryests. Traders IL
| fruits must know about the prospects o.
tropical production. Manufacturers oI
American goods must know about tht
tariff on imported articles. Publishers o
books must know the new law Of copy
right. Owners ofships come to understand
winds, and shoals, and navigation. And
cask, and every tea box, anC
every cluster of bananas, becomes
literature to our business men. Now
! WHAT IS THE USE
of all this intelligence unless you give II
to Christ? Do you suppose that God gives
you these opportunities of Frightening up
your intellect. and of increasing your
knowledge merely to get larger treasures
and grander business? o, no! Can it
be that you have been learning about
foreign lands and people that dwell under
other skies, and yet have no missionary
spirit? Can it be that you have been
learning the follieS, and trickerieS, and
hOllowness of the business world, and yet
you are not trying to bring to bear upon
them this Gospel which is to correct all
abuses, and abolish all ignorance, and
correct all mistakes, and arrest all crime,
and irradiate all darkness, and lift up all
wretchedneSs? Can it be that, notwith-
standing your acquaintance with the in
tricacies Of business, you are Ignorant oi
these things which will last the soul long
after bills of exchange, and commissions,
and invoices, and consignmentS, and rent
rolls have crumpled up and consumed III
the fires of Judgment day?
Again: God intended business life to be
to YOU a school of Christian integrity. Nc
aye of the world ever offered so many in.
ducements for scoundrelism as are offered
now. There is hardly a statute on the law
books that has not some back door through
which miscreants can escape. How many
deceptions in the fabric of goods! Com
mercial life plies the land with trickeries
| innumerable, and there are so many peo-
pie in Brooklyn and New York who live a
life of plunder, that when man proposes
straightforward, honest business, it is al
most charged to greenness and want Of
tact: All! my brethren, this ought not tC
be. But have to tell you that it
REQUIRES MORE GRACE TO BE HONEST
NOW
than it did in the days of our fathers,
when business was plain, and there were
no stOck-gamblers, and wOOlen was wooden,
and silk was silk, and men were men.
How rare is it that you find n man who
can from his heart say: II never cheated
in trade | never overeStimated the value
of goods when was selling them. | never
covered up defect in fabric. | never
PLAYED upon the ignorance of a customer,
and in all my estate there is not one dis
honest farthing." There are those who
can say it, They never let their integrity
bow or cringe to present advantage. They
are as pure aud Christian to-day as on the
day when they sold their first tierce OF
rice or their first tirkin of butter. There
were times when they could have robbed
/ hnN a hSnnnInI
with tie funds of bank, when they could
have sprung snap Judgment, when they
could have borrowed illimitably, when
they could have made false assignment,
when they could have ruined neighbOr
! for the purpose Of picking
up some of the Fragments but
they never took one step on
that pathway of hell fire. Now they can
! pray without being haunted with the
chnk of dishonest gold. Now they can
read the Bible without thinking Of the
day when, with lie on their soul, they
kissed the book in a custom house. Now
they can look into the laughing faces OF
their children without thinking of orphans
left by them pennileSs and hOuScleSS. Now
they can think of death without having
their knees knock together and their hearts
sink, and their teeth chatter, because there
is a Judgment where all deirauders and
Jockeys, and trickSters, and charlatans
shall be doubly damned. Now tn ey can
read in the Bible without tlinching: AS
the partridge sitteth on the eggs and
hatcheth them not, so he that getteth
riches and not by right, shall leave them
to the midst of his days, and at the end
shall be fool" Alas! if any of you, for
the purpose of getting out of temporary
embarrassment, dare to sell you soul, or
anv portion of it. You may wake up in
the midst of embarrassment and say:
ZONE ONE Is LOOKING.
This transaction may be little out of
the way, but it is only once only once"
On that one occasion you not only wreck
your spiritual nature, but YOU despOil your
business prospects,. You put one dishon
est dollar in an estate, but it willnOt stand.
You may Sinka dishonest dollar in the
very depths of the earth, and you may
roll on the top of it rocks and mountains,
and on the top OF those rocks and noun
tains you may put all the banks and mon
eyed institutions, pjling them up heaven
high; but that one dishonest dollar down
in the depths of the earth will begin to
rock and heave, and upturn itself until it
comes to the resurrection of damnatiOn.
Yon cannot hide q dishonest dillar.
In the review of this subject there are
two or three things l want to say,
and the first is, let us
have larger sympathy for business men.
| think it is a sham that in our pulpits
we do not oftener preach on this subject,
and show that we appreciate the sorrows,
and struggles, and temptations, and trials
of every day life Men who toll with the
hands are very apt to be suspicious Of
those who move in the world OF traffic,
and think that they get their money idly,
and that they give no equivalent. Men
who raise the corn, and wheat, and rye,
and oats are very apt to think that grain
merchants gets easy profits. The fist is
very apt to be jealous of the brain. Plato
and Aristotle were so opposed to all kinds
of merchandise, that they said commerce
was the curse of the earth, and they rec
commended that cities should never be
built any nearer the seacost than ten miles
But We have become wiser
than that and you know