New Ulm weekly review. [volume] (New Ulm, Minn.) 1878-1892, 1890-04-23

With sicknesses and bloat with designations.
and, pushed to the precipice this life, they
will try to hold back, and cry for help, but
no help will come; and they will clutch their
gold to take along with them, but it will be
snatched from their grasp and runners
and drnymen and bookkeepers who
saw behind the scenes, will bear testi-
mony to their nefarious deeds, and some vir-
tuous soul that once stood aghast at the
| splendor and power of these business men
will say: Alas! this is oil that is left of that
great firm that occupied block with their
merchandise and overshadowed the city with
their influence, and made righteousness ard
truth and purity fall under the CALLING fire OF
avarice and crime. =
| While we admire and approve of all acute
ness and tact in the sale of goods, we must
condemn any process by which fabric or
product is represented as possessing valua
which it really does not have. Nothing but
sheer falsehood can represent as perfection
boots that rip, silks that speedily lose their
/ lustre calicoes that Immediately wash ont.
stoves that crack under the first hot fire,
books insuficiently bound, carpets that un-
ravel old furniture rejuvenated with putty
| and glue and sold as having been recently
manufactured, gold watches made out OF
brass. barrels of fruit, the biggest apples on
the top, wine adulterated with strychnine,
hosiery poorly woven. cloth of domestic
m anufacture shining with foreign labels i'm
ported goods represented as rare and hard
to get, because foreign exchange is so high,
rolled out on the counter with matchless dis
play. Imported indeed! but from the factory
in the next street, A pattern already I'M
fashionable and unstable palmed off as a
new print upon some country merchant who
has come to town to make his first purchase
OF dry goods and going home with large
| stock OF goods warranted to keep.
Again. business men are often tempted to
make the habits and customs ofother traders
their law of rectitude. There are CONNER
clal usages which will not stand the test of
the last day. Yet men in business are apt
to do as their neighbors do. If the m ajority
OF the traders in any locality are lax in prin-
clple, the commercial codein that community
Will be spurious and dishonest. 1t is hard
thing to stand close to the law of right
when your nexE-door neighbor bynhis
looseness OF dealing is enabled to sell goods
at cheaper rate and decoy your Gust TONER'S
OF course you who promptly meet all your
business engagements, paying when you
promise to pay, will find it hard to COM pete
with that merchant who is hopelessly in
debt to the importerforthe good spurchased,
and to the landlord whose store he occupies,
and to the clerks who serve him.
There are a hundred practices prevalent in
the world of traffic which ought never to be-
come the rule for honest men. Their wrong
does not max your right. Sinneve becomes
a virtue by being multiplied and admitted
at brokers board or merchants exchange
Because others smuggle few things i'm
passenger trunks because Others take usury
when men are in tight places, because others
deal in fancy stocks, because others palm
on worthless Endorsements, because Others
do nothing but blow bubbles do not, there.
lore, be overcome by temptation. Hollow
pretension and fictitious credit, and COM
merclal gam bling may awhile prosper, but
the day Of reckoning cometh, and in adj
dltlon to the horror and condemnation of
outraged communities, the curse of God
Will come, blow after blow Gods will for
ever and forever is the only standard of
right and wrong. and not commercial ethics.
Young business man, avoid the first bust
ness dishonor, and you will avoid all the
rest. The captain OF a vessel was walking
near the mouth of a river when the tide was
low, and there was a long, stout anchor
chain, into one of the links Of which his foot
slipped, and it began to swell and he could
not withdraw it. The tide began to rise.
The chain could not be loosened nor filed off
i'll time, and q surgeon was called to ampu-
tate the limb, but before the work could be
done the tide rolled over the victim and his
life was gone And [ have to tell you, young
man, that just one wrong into which you
may slip may be a link of a long chain of cir
cumstances from which you cannot be extri-
Gated by any ingenuity Of your own, or any
help from others, and the tides will roll over
you as they have rolled over many. When
Pompey, the warrior, wanted to take posses
sion OF the city, and they would not open
the gates, he persuaded them to admit sick
soldier. But the sick soldier after awhile got
we'll and strong, and he threw open the gates
and let the devastating army come in. One
wrong admitted into the soul may gain
strength until, aftera while, it filings open
all the avenues of the immortal nature, and
the surrender is complete.
Again, business men are sometimes tempt
ed to throw off personal responsibility upon
the monied institution to which they belong.
Directors in banks and railroad and iinsur;
ance companies sometimes shirk personal
responsibility underneath the action of the
corporation. And how often, when some
banking house or financial institution ex-
plodes through fraud, respectable men in the
board ofdirectors soy: "Why, thought all
was going on in an honest way and am
| utterly con founded with this misdemeanor''
! The banks; and the fire and life and marine
insurance companies, and the railroad com.
panies. will not stand up for Judgment in the
| last day, but those who in them acted right
eously will receive, each for himself, reward,
and those who acted the part OF neglect or
tri ,kery will, each for himself, receive con-
demnation. Unlawful dividends are not
clean before God because there are those as
sociated with you who grab just as big pile
as you do. He who countenances the
/ dishonesty of tho firm. or of the corpora
| ton, or OF the association, takes upon him
self all the moral liabilities If the fin ancial
institution steal, he steals If they go into
| Wild speculat1ons, he himself is gambler
II they needlessly embarrass creditor. he
| himself is guilty of cruelty, If they swindle
the uninitiated, he himself is q defrauder.
No financial institution ever had a money
vault strong enough, or dividends large
enough, or credit stanch enough, to hide the
Individual sins of its members. The old
/ adage, that corporations have no souls, is
misleading. Every corporation has as many
| souls as it has members.
| Again, many business men have been
tempted to postpone their enjoyments and
| duties to q future season ofentire leisure.
/ What sedative the Christian religion would
be to all our business men if, instead of post
poning its uses to old age OF death, they
would take it into the store or factory or
worldly enga gements now 1t is folly to go
amid the uncertainties of business lite with
no God to help A merchant in New Eng
land village was standing by a horse, and
the horse lifted his foot to stamp it in pool
OF water and the merchant, to escape the
| splash, stepped into the door of an insurance
agent, and the agent said, Il suppose you
1 have come to renew your fire insurance."
sOh, said the merchant, Il had forgotten