Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1891-03-14

room for the useless and vicious than
there is room for the chaf in a bushel
measure which is already filled with
Michigan wheat.
RUINED BY PERNIcIoUS READING.
Why are so per cent. of the criminals
in the iails and pcnitcntiaries of the
UniteI States today under twenty-one
years of agc2 Many of them under
seventeen, under sixteen, under fifteen.
under fourteen, under thirteen. Walk
along one of tho corridors of the Tombs
prison, in New York and loo!k.for your
selves. Bud books, bad newspapers
bewitched them as soon rs they got out
of the cradle. Beware of all those
stories which end wrong. Beware of
all those books which make the road
that ends in pcrdition seem to end in
Paradise. Do not glorify the dirk and
the pistol Do not call the Desperate
brave or the libcrtine gallant Teach
our young people that if they; go down
into tho swanps and marshes to watch
the jacl-o'- lanterns dance on the decay
and rottcnncss, they will catch the ma
laria and death.
15ssN0 hnn'. says.sone one, II am a bust.
mess man, and I have no time to exam
line what my children read. have no
time to inspect tho books that come
into my household" If your children
were threatened with typhoid fever,
would you have time to go for the doc
tor? Would you Lave time to watch
the progress of the diseased Would you
have time for the funeral? In the pres
enco of my God warn yon of the fact
that your children arc threatened with
moral and spiritual typhoid, and that
unless the thing be stopped it will be to
them funeral of body, funeral of mind,
funeral of soul. Three funerals in one
day.
Ny word is to this vast multitude of
young people: Do not touch, do not
borrow, do not buy corrupt book or
corrupt picture. a book VIII decide
mans destiny for good or for evil.
The book you read yesterday may have
decided you for time and for eternity,
or it may DO book thatInay coneinto
your possession tomorrow.
TUE POWER OF A GOOD BOOK.
A good book-who can e1aggerate
its power. benjamin franklin said
that his reading of Cotton Mather's
Essays to Do Cod" in childhood
gave him holy aspirations for all the
rest of Lis life. George Law declared
that biography bo read in childhood
gave him all his subsequent prosperi-
ties A Clergyman, many years ago,
passing to the far west stopped at
hotel. lie saw woman copying somc-
thing from Doddridge's Rise and
Progress. 1t seemed that she lad
borrowed the book, and there were
some things she wanted especially to
remember.
The clergyman had in lis sachcl
copy of Doddrigcs Rise and. Prog
rcss," and SO lie made her a present of
it. Thirty years passed on. Tho
clergyman came that way. and ho asked
where the woman was whom lie had
seen long ago. They said, "Shc lives
yonder in that beautiful house" lie
vent there and said to her, .esyyou
remember luog' She said, no, r Do:
not" lie said, 'Do you remember a
man gave you Doddridge's Rise and
Progress thirty years ago2" "Oh,
yes; I remember. That book saved
my soul loaned the book to all my
neighbors, and they rc;.d it and were
converted to God, and VIC had re-
vival of religion that swept through the
whole community We built q church
and called pastor. You see that
spire yonder, don't you9 That church
was built as the result of that book you
gavc me thirty years ago." Oh, the
power of a good bookl But, alas for
the influence of bad book.
John Angel James, than whom Eng
land never had holicr minister, stood
in his pulpit at birmingham and said:
twenty-five years ago u lad loaned to
me an infamous book. lie would loan
it only fifteen minutes and then had
to give it back; but that book has
haunted Inc like II specter ever since.
I have in agony of soul, on my knees
before God, prayed that he would OBJ
literate FROM my soul the memory of it;
but shall carry the damage of it to
the day of my death" The assassin of
Sir William Russell declared that he
got the inspiration for his crime by
reading what was then new and pop
ular novel, Jack Sheppard" IIomcrs
''Iliad" made Alexander the warrior.
Alexander said so. The story of Alex
ander made Julius Caesar and Charles
XII both men of blood. Have you in
your pocket, or in your trunk, or in
your desk at business bad book, a
had picture, q bad pamphlet In Gods
name warn you to destroy it.
ANOIdE1t WAX
Another way in which we shall fight
back this corrupt literature and kill the
frogs of Egypt is by rolling over them
The Christian printing press, which shall
give plenty of healtlful reading to all
adults. All these men and women are
reading men and women. What are
you readins2 Abstain from all those
books which, while they had some good
things about them lave also an ad-
mixture of evil. You have read books
that had two clements in them-thc
good and the bad. Which stuck to
you9 The bad! The heart of most
people is like q sieve, which lets the
small PARTICLES of gold fall through but