The times and democrat. [volume] (Orangeburg, S.C.) 1881-current, 1886-04-15
ABosT.oN METAPHYslciAN's THEORY

Two sturekeepers-The Clergyman Who
Drsws-Efects Of Evil Thoughts.
In a Boston course of metaphysics
which J. am now undergoing the chief
metaphysicker asks of his class questions
like these: "Why, when two stores are
opened on the same street, and near each
other, aad both alike as to quality of
goods kept, does one succeed and the
other fail? Why will one be crowded
with cuGtomers and the other be bare Of
them?' Thus he answers: Because
one storekeeper has an inviting mind and
the other hasn't. Because, separate and
apart from business, one storekeeper
really likes to see people and be agreeable
to them for the sake of making them
feel pleasant, and the other doesn't. Be-
cause customers feel the thought of the
inviting mind agreeably, and that of the
uninviting mind disagreeably.
Because, according to the present
school of Boston metaphysics, thoughts
are things, like many other things that
can't be seen or touched, but neverthe-
less they are very fine, impalpable, in
tangible, airy, subtitle things, and all of
us have within us an almost unknown
and certainly unnamed sense that feels
things as they come from the people
about us, and this feeling will be agree
able or disagreeabie according to the
nature of the thought felt. The store
keeper who feels mean inside, who
doesn't care straw whether you are
suited or not, or who only cares to suit
you for the sake Of the custom he may
get of you, won't make you feel and
can't make you feel as pleasant as the
one who, with all the desire to draw GUS
tom, has genuine wish that the ham,
butter and eggs you buy of him will do
you good, and rather than they should
not would at heart prefer you should buy
them elsewhere, though he lose your
CUSTOM"
But our metaphysican goes further,
much further. Indeed, dare scarcely
tell how far he does 60. He says that
clergymen are popular and draw for the
same reason that the storekeeper does.
That is, if the minister be really glad to
see his flock, be they few or many, he
sends out to them from his pulpit agree
able thought. If he be perfunctory,
mechanical sort of preacher, who has in
reality no interest in his calling, and is
only in it because, being an "apt scholar
and able to load his memory heavily
with so-called facts and figures, his pa
concluded he should go into one of the
alearned professions" or thought that
for the honor and renown of the family
one of the boys should shine (or try to)
in the pulpit, and therefore put him
through perfunctory course of divinity,
when the boy would rather have been
blacksmith, or blackleg, or something
Of the sort, why, then, as the metaphys-
ical or rather natural result, he can only
when ir. the pulpit send out a black
smith, or biackleg, or otherwise order of
thought, no matter how much he may
Try to cover it up with good words and
sentiments.
He says also that our thoughts can
reach people long way off, and so may
theirs reach us and make us feel pleasant
or unpleasant, as they are good or other
wise, and that any amount of tins sort OF
unconscious telegraphing is constantly
going on about us. Say that person is
Jealous or envious or otherwise down on
YOU, and doesn't want you to succeed In
any enterprise, then you will feel that
though; it will depress you; you won't
know why or wherefore. It's just the
same as though one of those diabolical
so-calIcl friends ever stood in front OF
you while engaged in some undertaking,
saving: You'll fail. It's all nonsense
you're :rying to do that. You amt got
it in ycu!" And the possible misfortune
is that the thought of friend or enemy
may at last discourage you and blindyou
as to your real ability. Because a
current of thought that you live much
amongst, or even a current that is di-
rected on you, may make you see and
Judge things exactly as the person send
ing it sees and judges them. Say you
live or associate among people who are
hostile or prejudiced against some par
ticular friend of your own who is absent
one whom you know to be square and
honest. Do your best you may find your
view of that friend more or less colored
BY their prejudice, and his CT her possible
little failings or peculiarities so magni-
fed and exaggerated that you will find
yourself at last seeing him or her in the
same light and with the same prejudice,
though in the depths of your soul you
feel or fear you may be wrong.
So says our metaphysician. He says
also that thousands of people give way
before the constant pressure and fretting
of envious, jealous or otherwise ugly
thoughts directed on them by another or
others and get so discouraged by it as to
be at last able to make no further eff1-
cient effort in what they want to accom-
plish, out that there's no need of their
being so fattened out by it, for the rea-
son that if they did but even suspect the