The national leader., 1889-03-30

months all the estate goes into the
stock-gamblIng rapids of Wall Street.
How often it is that you have known
the man to whom trust funds were
committed taking them out of the saw
ing bank and from trust companies and
administrators, turning old homesteadS
into hard cash, and then putting the
entire estate into the vortex of specula-
ton. EmbeZzlement is an easy word
to pronounce, but it has ten thousand
ramiicatlons. There is
NOT CITY THAT HAS NOT SUFFERED
from the abuse of trust funds. Where
is The courthouse, or the city hall, or
the Jail, or the post-office, or the hos
p;tal, that in the building of it has not
had a political job2
Another remark needs to be made,
and that is that people ought not to 60
into places, into business, or into posi-
lions
WHERE THE TEMPTATION IS
MIGHTIER
than their character. If there be large
sums of money to be handled. and the
man is not sure of his own integrity,
you have no right TO run an unSea-
worthy craft in a euroclydon. A man
Can tell by the sense of weakness or
strength in the presence OF bad op-
pOrtunity whether be is in a safe place.
How many parents make an awful mis-
take when they put their Toys in bank
ing houses and stores and shops and
factories and places of solemn trusts,
without once discussing whether they
can endure the temptation. You give
the boy plenty of money, and have no
account of it, and make the way down
become very. easy, and you may put
upon him pressure that he cannot
stand. There are men who go into
positions full of temptation, consider
ing only that they are lucrative posi-
tiohS.
An abbot wanted to buy piece of
ground, and the owner would not sell
it, but the owner finally consented TO
let it to him until lie could raise one
crop, and the abbot S0Wed acornS,
A CROP OF TWO HUNDRED YEARS!
And l tell you, young man, that the
dlshonesties which you plant in your
heart and life will seem to be very in
significant, but they Will grow up until
they will overshadOW you with horrible
darkness, overshadow all time and all
eternity. 1t will not be a crop for two
hundred years. but crop for everlast-
ing ages.
l stand this morning before many
who have trust funds, 1t is a compli-
ment to you that you have been
so intrusted, but l charge you, III
. I,n Of HoI p1 .rrnrlI lo
careful; lie us careful of the property of
others aS you are careful of your own.
Above all, keep your own private ac-
count at tie bank separate from your
account as trustee of an estate, or truS-
tee of an institution. That is the point
at which thousands Of people make
shipwreck. They get the property of
others mixed up with their own prop
erty. they put{it into investment, and
away it all goes, and they cannot return
that which they borrowed. Then comes
the explosion, and the money market is
shaken, and the dress denOunceS, and
the Church thunderS expulsion. You
have no right to use the property OF
others except for their advantage, nor
without consent, unless they are minors.
IL " 1V1 IhOlA COAOC1lO JOu III tiiSAA
property as we'll as you can, and it is all
lost, you are not to blame; you did the
best you could; but do not come into
the delusion which has ruined SO many
men, of thinking because a thing Is III
their possession, therefore it is theirs.
I ou have
A SOLEMN TRUST
that God has given you. In this vast
assemblage there may be some who
have mlsappropriated trust funds. Put
them back, or, if you have so hOpelessly
involved them that you cannot put them
back, confess the whole thing to those
whom you have wronged, and you will
sleep better nights, and you will have
the better chance ior your soul. What
a sad thing it would be if, after you are
deal, your administrator should find out
from the account-books, or from the
lack of vouchers, that you were not
only bankrupt Ill estate, but that you
lost your soul.
Oh! is itnot high time that we preach.
ed
THE MORALS OF THE GOSPEL
right beside the faith of the gospel?
Mr.. Froude, the celebrated English
historian, has written of his own coun-
try these remarkable works: ''From
the great house in the city of London
to the village grocer, the commercial
life of England has been saturated with
fraud. So deep has it gone that I. strict
ly honest tradesman can hardly hold
his ground against competition. You
can no longer trust that any article you
buy is the tn ng which it pretendS 10
be. We have false weights, false
measures. cheating, and shoddy every
where. And yet the clergy have seen
all this grow up in absolute Indifference.
Many hundreds of sermons have
heard in England, on the divine mission
| Of tho olorov nj, hichonS and iuctifica