Custer chronicle. [volume] (Custer City, Black Hills, D.T. [S.D.]) 1880-1890, 1889-03-23

tNDl'Nf Joe ~
riches and 1 will keep my poverty and rep
utation."
The president of the American congress
during the American revolution, Gen
Reed, was offered 10. 600 guineas by for
eign commissioners if he would belray
his country. He replied: Gentlemen
| am a very poor man. but tell your kinl
he is not rich enough to buy me-" Blu,
why go 80 far, when you and l, if VIZ
move In honorable society, know meI
and women who by all the concentrated
force Of earth and hell could not be
bribed. They would no more be bribed
than you would think Of tempting an an.
gel OF light to exchange heaven for a pit.
TO offer a bride is villsiny, butitis 4 very
poor compliment TO the man to whom j,
is offered.
have not much faith in those people
who go about Dragging how much they
could get If they would only sell out.
Those women who complain that they
are very often insulted need to under.
stand that there is something In their
carriage to invite insult. There are men
at Albany and at Harrisburg and at
Washington who would no more be APP
preached by a bride than a pirate boat
with a few cutlasses would dare to attack
a British man-of-war with two banks of
guns OF each side loaded to the touch
hole. They are incorruptible men, and
they are the few men who are 10 a "
the city and save the land. Meanwhile,
my advice is to all people TO keep out of
politics unless you are ~invulnerable to
this style Of temptation. Indeed, if you
are naturally strong, you need religious
buttressing. Nothing but the grace Of
God can sustain our public men and make
them what we wish. l wish that there
might come an old fashioned revival Of
religion, that ii might break out in on.
gress and in the legislatures, and bring
many Of the leading Republicans and
Democrats down on the anxious seat of
repentance. That day will come, or
something better, for the Bible declares
that kings and queens shall become nurs-
ing fathers and mothers to the church,
and if the greater in authority, then cor
tainly the less.
My charge also to parents is, remem-
Der that this evil of bribery often begins
IN the home circle and in the nursery.
Do not bride your children. Teach them
to do that which is right, and not because
of the 10 cents or the orange you will
give them. There is a great difference
between r%ewarding virtue and making
the profits thereof the impelling motive.
That man who is honest merely because
honesty is the best policy" is already a
moral bankrupt.
My charge is to you. in all departments
of life, steer clear Of bribery, all of you.
Every man and woman at some time will
be tempted to do wrong for compensation.
The bride may not be offered in money.
1t may be offered in social position. Let
us remember that there is a day coming
when the most secret transaction Of pri-
vate life and Of public lite will come up
for public apprehension. We cannot
bride death, we cannot bride sickness,
we cannot bride the grave, we cannot
bride the judgments Of that God who
thundeIs against this sin.
''Fiep' said Cardinal Beaufort, "fie'
can't death be hiredp is money nothingI
must I die, and 80 rich? if the owning of
the whole realm would save me, | could
money" No, death would not be hired
then he will not be hired now. Men of
the world often regret that they have to
leave their money here when they go
away from the world. You can tell from
what they say in their last hours that one
of their chief sorrows is that they have
to leave their money. | break that de.
fusion. | tell that bribe taker that he
will take his money with him. God will
wrap it up in your shroud, or put it in
the palm Of your hand in resurrection,
and there it will lie, not the cool, bright,
shining gold ss it was on the day when
you sold your vote and your moral prin-
ciple, but there it will lie, a hot metal,
burning and consuming your hand for
ever. Or, if there be enough Of it for a
chain, her il will fall from the wrist
c~lanking the letters of an eternal cap
tivity. The bride is an everlasting pos
session. You take it for time, you take
it for eternity. Some day in the next
world, when you are longing for sym
pathy, you will feel on your cheek a
kiss. Looking up you will find it to be
Judas, who took thirty pieces Of silver as
a bribe and finished the bargain by put
ting an Infamous kiss on the pure cheek
of his divine Master.
Another wrong use of money is seen in
the abuse Of trust funds. Every man
during the course of his life, on a larger
or smaller scale, has the property Of
others committed to his keeping. dc is
80 far q safety deposit, he is an admins
TRAITOR, and holds in his hand the interest
of the family of a deceased friend Or
he is an attorney, and through his Gus
tody goes the payment from debtor to
| creditor. or he is the collector for . bust
ness house which compensates him for
the responsibility or he is a treasurer for
a charitable institution and he holds aims
contributed for the suffering; or he is an
| official of the city or the state or the ma
| ton, and taxes, and subsidies, and salar
les, and supplies are in his keeping. 1t
is as solemn q trust as God can make IT.
1t is concentrated and multiplied conf
dences. On that man depends the sup
port of a bereft household, or the morals
of dependents, or the right movement of
a Thousand wheels of social mechanism.
A man may do what he will with his
own, but he who abuses trust funds. in
that one act commits theft, f%alsehOod,
perjury and becomes, in ali the intensity
of the word, a miscreant. How many
widows and orphans there are with moth
ing between them and starvation but a
sewing machine, or held up out Of the
vortex of destruction simply by the
thread of a needle, red with their own
heart blood. who q little while ago had,
by father and husband, left them a com
potency. What is the matter? The
administrators or the executors