The Baltimore County union. [volume] (Towsontown, Md.) 1865-1909, 1886-02-27
ssThey say anu .-v
A. T. c., in Newport ". J. Mercury.
"The ignoble mind
Loves ever to assail with secret blow
The loftier, purer beings of their kind"

disturbs it. Its ravages are great, almost
incalculable. 1t slays regulations, poi
sons, dishonors and defiles the splendor
of the most estimable form. 1t has no
name, being a mere figure of speech, a
very word. 1t is composed of but one
phrase and is called 'zAey say
'Do you know such an one7' is often
asked, and the person pointed out.
NO; but they say he has had strange
adventures and his family is very un-
happy
Are you sure2'
mo, 1 do not know anything about
it, but they say
'This young woman, so brilliant, SO
much admired. Do you know her?
NO. 71ey S..y she 10 accomplish
ed coquette and to be summed
sBut she appears SO shy and reserved.
Certainly; but they say
do not trust that gentleman. Be
on your guard
Bah! His fortune is immense. See
what an immense establishment he has !
'Yes, but they say he is very much
involved
'Do you know the fact7
No; but they say
This they say is heard in every re-
lation of life. 1t is deadly mortal and
not to be grasped. 1t goes hither and
thither, strikes and kills manly honor,
female virtue, without either sex being
ever conscious of the injury done.
Of all the ills and maladies and dis
tempers which flesh is heir to- few,
indeed, are SO dangerous and deadly,
and none so insiduous, as SANDER. The
dark insinuation, the equivocal expires
sion, the half,suppressed sentence, the
low whisper-these, with their appro-
pirate accompaniments of looks, winks
and nods-are the execrable weapons
with which the quiet, smooth-tongued
slanderer does his work of desolation
and death. An unguarded expression
often serves as foundation for the most
poisonous ISLANDERS.
Did he attack you openly you could
guard against the assaults, and, if you
should fall, fall fighting manfully in de-
fence of your honor and reputation.
But no! The blighting inuendo is pass
ed from one to another until the whole
town is in possession of it, with all its
snow w-ball-like accumulation, and all the
way along the blasting secret has travel
ed under the protection of confidential
secrecy, so that the injured and, per-
haps, ruined subject of the slanderer is
the last to have the doleful tidings
sounded in his ears, and, by this
time the fatal stigma has fastened upon
him with such weight of suspicion that
it may be impossible in whole life
time to cast off efectually the foul as
sertion.
When we say that our own expert
mental knowledge of the weakness of
our nature and its liability to error when
best guarded should teach us to deal
charitably with our less fortunate fel-
lows, the sentiment will find ready re-
sponse in every rational mind. But how
sadly, deplorably deficient in all the
nobler impulses of our nature must they
be who, prompted by malice or gored
by envy, stab at the fair name of the
innocent and delight in poring over the
mangled regulations of those whose only
crime is that they have been marked as
victims by the scandals of the commu-
nifty. How lamentably at variance with
all that should characterize weak, sin
full, fallen man! How boldly, unblush
ingly confronting all the heavenly pre-
cepts given us to redeem our fatal apos-
tasy! How insolently defying all mo-
tives of right; how grossly perverting a
nature stepped in sin and perverseness
since it had a being! But, strange as
it may seem, there's not community
can boast of exemption from the SLAM
derer.
of human crimes that IS " Wholly without
excuse it is SANDER. The impetuosity
of youth and the ravages of years alike
refuse to plead in extenuation f.thls
blistering stain upon the human charac-
ter, Even the deliberate murderer has
a plausible motive; the theft is lured
by the hope of ill-gotten gain, and al
most every species of human depravity
as manifested in unkind actions to our
fellows, offer its reward; but the SLAM
derer, unbidden by necessity and unre-
Quilted, save by the keen remorse of a
guilty conscience, rushes blindly, mad
ly along in the work of human degreda-
ton. There is no character pure enough,
there is none degraded enough, to es-
cape the withered blast of slander.
There are no virtues can elevate the in,
nocent above its pestilential breath
there are no vices yet learned that can
sink their votaries beneath its groveling
wanderings; but all,-all from the ex-
tremes of virtue to the extremes of vice,
are embraced in its theatre corporations.
evil for evil is a ready dictate O
our own perverted nature. 1t seems te
be an inherent principle implanted with
in US, that grows with our growth anC
ripens with our years unless subdued by
the influence of proper education. l
accords with the impulse of our untu
tored passions and pleads its right t.
supremacy with boldness and perse
verance that but often prevail. But tn
human breast in which rankle the ele
ments of SANDER, and from which it
polluted and pulluting breath emits,
stranger even to that poor charity tina
withholds evil until injuries call to b
avenged. 1t glories not unless glutte
with the anguish of its victims or Grim
soned by the blood of the reputation
it has plunged into unmerited obloqu
and shame. The murderer is a Christian
the foe friend, the robber a sain
compared with the moral turpitude
the saintly-seeming slanderer who, wit
the tt99lp tt99pSglass K rs qfapaIygRsJl Gopehdndsa. .hea'
BeSy-It is only those who have chara'
ter and principle themselves that al
qualified to praise character in other
What does it avail for deceitful m;
% rra;ce truthfulness in another, for