Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1888-03-23

which would either bring them to repent
ance or thunder them out of the holy COM
munions, where their presence was sac
rilege and an infamy.
We must especially deplore the misfor-
tune of banks in various parts of this
country in that they damage the banking
which is the great convenience
of the centuries, and Indispensable to COM
merce 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 the marks of thou
sands of years. Two hundred years before
Christ the bank OF Ilium existed and paid
its depositors 10 per cent. The Bank of
Venice was established in I'LL, and was of
such high credit that its bills were ct a
premium above coins, which were fire.
quently clipped. Bank of Genoa, founded
Amsterdam, 1899; Bank of Hamburg,
founded 1919, its circulation based on
great silver bars kept in the vaults; Bank
of England, started by William Patterson
in 1642, up to this day managing the stu
pendous debt of England; Bank of Scot
land, founded in 1895; Bank of Ireland,
1888; Bank of North America, planned by
Robert Morris, 1771, without whose fnan-
cial help all the bravery of our grand
fathers would not have achieved American
independence. But now we have banks in
all our cities and towns, thousands and
thousands. On their shoulders are the in
terests of private individuals and great
corporations. In them are the great arte-
ries through which run the currents of the
nations life. They have been the re-
sources of the thousands. of fnanciers in
days of business exigency. They stand
vidual, state and national relief. At their
head and in their managementssthere is
as much interest and moral worth as in
any class of men-perhaps more. How
nefarious, then, the behavior of those
who bring disrepute upon this venerable,
benignant, and God honored institution.
We also deplore abuse of trust funds,
because they fly in the face of that divine
goodness which seems determined to bless
this land. We are having the eighth year
of unexampled national harvest. The
wheat gamblers get hold of the wheat, and
the corn gamblers get hold of the corn.
The full tide of Gods mercy toward this
land is put back by those great dykes Of dis
honest resistance. When God provides
enough food and clothing to feed and APP
parel this whole nation like princes, the
scramble of dishonest men to get more
keeps everything shaking with uncertainty
and everybody asking: "What next?"
Every week makes new revelations. How
many more bank presidents and bank
cashiers have been specializing with other
peoples money, and how many more bank
directors are in imbecile silence letting the
perfdy 60 on, the great and patient God
only knowsY My opinion is that we have
got near the bottom. The wind has been
pricked from the great bubble of American
speculation. The men who thought that
the Judgment day was at least 5000 years
off, found it in 1888, 1857. and 1886; and
this nation has been taught that men must
keep their hands out of other peoples
pockets. Great businesses built on Dor
rowed capital have been obliterated, and
men who had nothing have lost all they
had. l believe we are started on q higher
career of prosperity than this land has
ever seen, if, and if, and if.
If the first men, and especially Christian
men, will learn never to speculate upon
borrowed capital. If you have mind to
take your own money and turn it into
kites, to fly them over every commons in
the United States, you do society no
wrong, except when you tumble your help
less children into the poor-house for the
public to take care of. But you have nc
right to take the money of others and turn
it into kites. There is one word that has
deluded more people into bankruptcy and
state prison and perdition than any othe1
word in commercial life, and that is the
word borrow; that one word is responsible
for all the defalcations, and embezzle-
ments, and financial considerations of the
last twenty years. When executors con-
clude to speculate with the funds of an
estate committed to their charge, they do
not purloin, they say they only borrow;
his institution, he does not commit theft,
he only borrows. When the officer of a
company, by flaming advertisement in
some religious papers, and gilt certificates
Of stock, gets multitude of country peo-
pie to put their small earnings into an en-
terprise for carrying on some undeveloped
nothing, he does not fradulently take their
money, he only borrows. When young
man with easy access to his employers
money drawer, or the confidential clerk
by close propinquity to the account books,
takes few dollars for Wall street excur-
sion, he expects to put it back; he will put
it all back; he will put it all back very
soon. He only borrows. What is needed
is some man of gigantic limbs to take his
place at the curbstone in front of Trinity
Church, and when the word borrow comes
bounding along, kick it clean through to
Wall street ferry boat, and if, striking on
that, it bounds clear over till it strikes
Brooklyn heights or Brooklynhill, it will be
we'll for the City Of Churches.
Why, when you are going to do wrong,
pronounce so long word as borrow, q
word of six letters, when you can get a
shorter word more descriptive of the
reality, word of only five letters, the
word steal?
There are times when we all borrow. and
borrow legitimately, and borrow with the
divine blessing. for Christ in his sermon
on the mount enjoins, "From him that
would borrow Of thee turn not thou away. I"
A young man rightly borrows money to
get his education. Purchasing house
and not being able to pay all down in
cash, the purchaser rightly borrows it on
mortgage. Crises come in business when
it would be wrong for man not to ber-
row. But roll this warning through all
the aisles, over the backs Of all these pews,
never borrow TO Speculate; not dollar,
not cent, not farthing. Young men.
young men, warn you by your worldly
prospects and the value of your immortal
souls, do not do it. There are breakers
for their shipwrecks-the
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