The Mankato free press. [volume] (Mankato, Blue Earth County, Minn.) 1879-1924, 1888-03-16
THE AGE OF SWIEDLE.
THE REV. Or. TALMAeE's SERMON
AT THE TABERNACLE.

When q Mans business Life Does Not
Correspond with His Profession, His
Religion Is Humbug--when 1t Is
Right to borrow.
BRooKLYN, March II The hymn sung at
the Tabernacle this morning begins:
A cloud Of witnesses around
Hold thee In full survey;
Forget the steps already trod,
And onward urge thy way
As, last Sabbath, the Rev. 7. De Witt Tai
mage, DID,, the pastor, had baptized by
| sprinkling, he, this morning. baptized by inn
mersion those who preferred this mode, a
baptistry having been built under the pulpit.
| The subject Of his sermon was, ssThe Age of
Swindle,r and the text, Job-Yiii, IA: t'Whose
trust shall be a spiders web" DIR. Talmage
| said:
The two most skillful architects in all the
world are the bee and the spider. The one
| puts up a sugar mandatory and the other
builds a slaughter house for flies. On a
bright summer morning, when the sun comes
out and shines upon the spiders web, be-
decked with dew, the gossamer structure
seems bright enough for suspension bridge
for supernatural beings to cross on. But
alas for the poor fly, which, in the latter
| part OF that very day, ventures on it, and is
| caught and dungeoned and destroyed The
| fly was informed that it was a free bridge,
and would cost nothing, but at the other end
| Of the bridge the toll paid was its own life.
| The next day there comes strong wind, and
away goes the web, and the marauding
! spider and the victimized fly So delicate
are the silken threads of the spiders web
| that many thousands of them are put to-
| gether before they become visible to the
human eye, and it takes 4, 600, 900 of them to
! make thread as large as the human hair.
| Most cruel as we'll as most ingenious is the
spider. A prisoner in the Bastile, France,
had one 20 trained that at the sound of a
violin it every day came for its meal of flies.
Job, the author of my text, and the leading
scientist of his day, had no doubt watched
| the voracious process of this one insect with
another, and saw spider and fly swept down
| with the same broom, or scattered by the
same wind. Alas, that the world has SO many
| designing spiders and victimized flies.
There has not been time when the utter
and black responsibility of many men hav-
! ing the financial interests of others In charge
has been more evident than in these last few
| years.
The unroofng of banks and disappearance
Of administrators with the funds of large
estates, and the disorder amid postoffice
accounts and deficits amid United States
| officials, have made pestilence of crime
| that solemai2cs every thoughtful man and
woman, and ads every philanthropist and
| Christian to psl: What shall be done to stay
the plague! Iaicre is a monsoon abroad, a
| typhoon, a sirocco. sometimes ask myself
| If it would not be better for men making
wills to bcqU;;sh the property directly to
| the executors and officers of the court and
] appoint the widows and orphans a commit
| tee tn see that the former got all that did not
| belong to them. The simple fact is that
there are a large number of men sailing
| yachts and driving fast horses, and members
of expensive club houses and controlling
! country seats who are not worth dollar
| If they return to others their Just
rights. Under some sudden reverse they
| fail, and with afflicted air seem to re-
tire from the world, and seem almost ready
| for monastic life, when in two or three years
they blossom out again, having compromised
with their creditors, thatis, paid them moth
/ ing but regrets, and the only difference be-
tween the second chapter of prosperity and
the first is that their pictures are Murillos in
stead of Kensetts, and their horses go mile
in twenty seconds less than their predeces-
sors, and instead of one country seat they
| have three. / have watched and have no
ticed that nine out of ten of those who fail
in what is called high life, have more means
after than before the failure, and in many of
the cases failure is only strategem to escape
the payment of honest debts and put the
world off the track while they practice a
large swindle. There is something woefully
wrong in the fact that these things are pos
sible.
First of all, l charge the blame on careless,
| Indifferent bank directors and boards having
In charge great financial institutions. 1t
ought not to be possible for a president or
cashier or prominent officer of banking in
stitution to swindle it year after year with
out detection. ! will undertake to say that
if these frauds are carried on for two or
three years without detection, either the
directors are partners in the infamy and
pocketed part of the theft, or they are guilty
of culpable neglect of duty, for which God
| will hold them as responsible as he holds the
acknowledged defrauders. What right have
prominent business men to allow their names
| to be published as directors in a financial
| institution, so that unsophisticated people
are thereby induced to deposit their money
in or buy the scrip thereof, when they, the
published directors, are doing nothing for
Che safety of the institution. 1t is case of de-
ception most reprehensible. Many people with
a surplus of money, not needed for immediate
use, although it may be little further on
Indispensable, are without friends competent
to advise them, and they are guided solely by
the character of the men whose names are
associated with the institution. When the
crash came, and with the overthrow of the
banks went the small earnings and limited
fortunes of widows and orphans, and the
helplessly aged, the directors stood with
idiotic stare, and to the inquiry of the
| frenzied depositors and stockholders who had
lost their all, and to the arraignment of an
indignant public had nothing to say except:
s'We thought it was all right We did not
know there was anything wrong go
ing on" 1t was their duty to know
They stood in a position which de
luded the people with the idea that
they were carefully observant. Calling
themselves directors, they did not direct
They had opportunity of auditing accounts
and inspecting the books. No time to do sol
Then they had no business to accept the posi-
/
men to be directors in great many institu-
tions, and all they know is whether or not
they get their dividends regularly, and their
names are used as decoy ducks to bring others
near enough to be made game Of What, first
of all, is needed is that five thousand bank di-
rectors and insurance company directors re-
sign or attend to their business as directors
| The business world will be full of fraud just
as long as fraud is SO easy. When you arrest
the president and secretary of bank for an
embezzlement carried on for many years,
have plenty Of sheriffs out the same day to
arrest all the directors. They are guilty
either of neglect or completely.
"Oh," some one will say, "better preach
the gospel and let business matters alone. |"
/ reply: If your gospel does not inspire
common honesty in the dealings Of men, the
sooner you close up your Gospel and pitch it
into the depth of the Atlantic ocean the
better. An orthodox swindler is worse than
heterodox swindler. The recitation of all
the cathechisms and creeds ever written,
and drinking from all the communion chal-
ices that ever glittered in the churches of
| Christendom, will never save your soul
| unless your business character corresponds
with your religious profession. Some of the
worst scoundrels in America have been men,
bers of churches, and they got fat ON sermons
about heaven when they most needed to have
the pulpits preach that which would either
bring them TO repentance or thunder them
out of the holy communions, where their
presence was sacrilege and an infamy.
We must especially deplore the misfortune
Of banks in various parts of this country In
that they damage the banking institution,
which is the great convenience Of the CEN
turtles, and indispensable to commerce and
the advance of nations. With one hand it
blesses the lender, and with the other it
blesses the borrower. The bank was born Of
the worlds necessities, and is venerable with