Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1886-05-07

molly water. There is no man in tho worIa
eAeept cue Christian that has a right to
ie'i an untrammeled glee. Hei is promised
everything is to be for the best here. and
ne IS on the way to a delight which win
AXE all the professions with noln,
branches, and all the orchestras. harnad
and cy inhaled and trumpted. to exnress
"Oh," you say, II have 80 much trouh,a -,
Have you more trouble than Pan, had,
what does he say: "%sorrowful, yet al.
ways rejoicing. Poor, yet making many
r,ca. Having nothing, yet possessing all
things" ga
The next laughter mentioned in the Bible
That shall speak of, is the FOOLS laughter.
or the expression of sinful merriment.
solomon was very quick at smile: when
he makes a comparison we all catch II.
what is the laughter of a fool like? He
says: ut is the cracking of thorns under
a pot" The kettle is swung, a bunch of
brambles is put under it, and the torch ia
applied to it and there is a great noise and
a big blaze and a sputter and a quick ex.
tlnguishment; then it is darker than it was
before. FOOLS laughter. The most mis-
cradle thing on earth is a had mans fun,
There they are-ten men in a bar
room; they have at home wives,
mothers, daughters. The impure Jest
starts at one corner of q bar.
room and crackle, crackle, crackle it goes
all around. In five hundred such outlaws
there is not one item of happiness. They
all feel bemeaned if they have any con.
science left. Have nothing to do with men
or women who tell immoral stories. l have
no confidence either in their Christian
character or their morality.
So, all merriment that springs out of the
defects of others-caricature of a lame foot
or a curved spine of q blind eye or a deaf
eal-will be met with the judgments of
God either upon you or your children.
Twenty years ago in this city l knew a
man who was particularly skillful in nil
tating the lameness of a n%eighbor. Not
long ago a son of the skillful mimic had
his leg amputated for the very defect
which his father had mimicked years be-
fore. l do not say it was a Judgment of
God; I leave you to make your own in
ference. So, all merriment born of dissipa-
ton, that which starts at the counters of
the drinking restaurant, or from the wine
glass in the home circle, the maudlin sim
per, the meaningless joke, the s%aturnalian
gibberish, the paroxysm of mirth about
nothing that you sometimes see in the
fashionable club-room or in the exquisite
parlor at twelve o'clock at night,
are the cracking of thorns under a
pot. Such laughter and such sin end in
death. When I was a lad a hook came
out, entitled, "Don Jour's Patent Ser
mons" 1t made a great stir, a very wide
laugh, all over the country, that book did.
1t was a caricature of the Christian minis
try, and of the word of God and of the
Day of Judgment. Oh, we had a great
laugh! The commentary on the whole
thing is that not long ago the author of
that book died in poverty, shame, debauch-
cry, kicked out OF society and cursed of
Almighty God. The laughter of such men
is the echo Of their W damnation.
The next laughter that 1 shall mention
as being in the Bible is the laugh of Gods
condemnation: "He that sitteth in the
heavens shall laugh" Again: "The Lord
will laugh at him." Again: 81 will laugh
at his calamity" With such demonstra-
tion will God greet every kind of great
sin and wickedness. But men build up
villainies higher II higher. Good men
almost pity God because He is so schemed
against by men. Suddenly q pin drops
out of the machinery of w~ickedness, or a
secret is revealed, and the foundation be-
G ms to rock, and finally the whole thing is
demolished. What is the matter?: l will
tell you what the matter is. The crash Of
ruin is only the reverberation of Gods
laughter.
On Wall street there are a great many
good men and a great many fraudulent
men. A fraudulent man there says: II
mean to have my million" He goes to
work, reckless of honesty, and he gets his
first one hundred thousand dollars. He
gets after awhile his two hundred thou
sane dollars. After awhile he gets his
five hundred thousand dollars. "Now,"
he says, ~ have only one more move to
make and l shall have my million" He
gathers up all his resources; he max
that one last grand move; he fails and
loses all, and he has not enough money
left to pay the cost of the car to his home.
People can not understand this spasmodic
revulsion. Some said it was a sudden
turn in Erie Railway stock, or in Western
Union, or in Illinois Central; some said it
was Jay Ouiu III Sdlu ~ a Ou0 SpOSe
ulator, some said it was another. They
all guessed wrong. l will tell you what it
was: "He that stitch in tine heavens"
laughed.
A man in New York said he would be
the richest man in the city. He left his
honest work of chairmaking and got into
the city councils some way, and in ten
years stole fifteen million dollars from the
city government. Fifteen million dollars.
He held the Legislature OF the State of
New York in the grip Of his right hand.
Suspicious were aroused. The grand jury
presented indictments. The whole land
stood aghast. The man who expected to
put half the city in his vest pocket
goes to Blackwell's Island, goes to Ludlow
street jail, breaks prison and goes across
the sea, is rearrested and brought back
and again remanded to Jail and died
there. Why. "Iie that stitch in the
heavens" laughed.
Rome was a great empire; she had Hor-
ace and Virgil among her poets; she had
Augustus and Constantine among her EN-
perors. But what mean the defaced Pan
tbeon and the Forum turned into "a cattle
market and the broken-walled Coliseum
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