Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-12-21

emergency will come too late, or be dam
| aged In the transportation.
People intending no harm will go shop
ping without any intention of purchase,
overturning great stocks of goods, and in
sisting that you break the dozen. More
bad debts on the ledger More counterfeit
bills in the drawer More debts to pay for
| other people. More meannesses on the
part of partners in business. Annoyance
| after annoyance, vexation after vexation,
| and loss after loss. All that process Will
| either break you down or brighten you up
The Test of Mans Patience.
1t is school of patience. You have
| petulent, and choleric, and angry, and pug
nacious and cross, and sour, and queer, and
they lost their customers, and their name
became detestation.
Other men have been frightened up un-
der the process They were toughened by
the exposure. They were like rocks, all the
more valuable for being blasted. At first
they had to choke down their wrath. at first
they had to bite their lip, at first they
thought of some stinging retort they would
like to make; but they conquered their inn
patience. They have kind words now for
sarcastic filings. They have gentle behavior
now for unmannerly customers. They are
patient nov with unfortunate debtors. They
have Christian reflections now tor sudden
reverSes.
Where did they get that patience? By
hearing minister preach concerning it on
Sabbath? Oh, no. They got it just whe re
you will get tiff you ever get 1t at all
selling hats, discounting notes, turning
banisters, plowing corn, timing roots,
pleading causes. Oh, that amid the turmoil
of pV-Ia
life you might hear the voice OF God say
ing 'In patience possess your soul. Let
patience have her perfect work.
I remark again that business life is
school of useful knowledge. Merchants
do not read many books and do not study
lexlcons.
Business Better Than q University.
They do not dive into profounds of learn
ing, and yet nearly all through their occu-
patious come to understand questions of
finance, and politics. and geography, and
Jurisprudence, and ethics
Business is a severe schoolmistress. If
pupils will not learn, she strikes them over
the head and the heart with severe losses.
You put s., 600 into an enterprise 1t is all
gone. You say, ''That is dead lose" Oh,
no. You are paving the schooling. That
was only tuition, very large tuition-I told
was worth it. You learned things under
that process yon would not have learned in
any other way.
Traders in grain come to know something
about foreign harvests; traders in fruit come
to know something about the prospects Of
tropical productions; manufacturers of Amer
ican goods come to understand the tariff on
imported articles; publishers of books must
come to understand the new law of copy
L.
the winds and shoals and navigation; and
every bale Of cotton, and every raisin cask,
and every tea box, and every cluster of
bananas is so much literature for business
man.
Now, my brother, what are you going to
do with the intelligence? DO you suppose
God put you in this school of information
merely that you might be sharper in trade,
that you might be more successful as a
worldling?
How the knowledge Is to Be Applied.
Oh, no; it was that you might take that
useful information and use it for Jesus
Christ Can it be that you have been deal
ing with foreign lands, and never had the
missionary spirit, wishing the salvation of
foreign people? Can it be that you have
become acquainted with all the outrages in
f1icted in business ,ife and that you have
never llleu 10 10 DcaI tItI NoSpcl
which is to extirpate all evil and correct
all wrongs and illumine all darkness and
lift up all wretchedness and save men for
this world and the world to come?
Can it be that understanding all the intri-
cacies of business, YOU know nothing about
those things which will last after all bills
of exchange and consignments and invoices
and rent rolls shall have crumpled up and
been consumed in the fires of the last great
day? Can it be that man will be wise for
time and fool for eternity.
I remark, also, that business life is
school for integrity. No man knows what
he will do when he is tempted There are
thousands of men who have kept their in
tegrity merely because they never have been
tested. A man was elected Treasurer of
the State of Maine some years ago He
was distinguished for his honesty, useful
ness and uprightness, but before one year
had passed he had taken of the public funds
for his own private use, and was hurled out
Of Office in disgrace.
A Trust the Test of Honesty.
Distinguished for virtue before. Dis
tinguished for crime after You can call
over the names of men just like that, in
whose honesty you had complete confidence,
but placed in certain crises of temptation
thev went overheard. Never so many
a law on the statute book but has some back
door through which miscreant can escape.
All! how many deceptions in the fabric of
goods; so much plundering in commercial
life that if man talk about living life of
complete commercial accuracy there are
those who ascribe it to greenness and lack
of tact. More need of honesty now than
ever before, tried honesty, complete hon.
estv, more than in those times when bust
ness was plain affair and woolens were
woolens and silks were silks and men were
men.
How many men do you suppose there are
in commercial life who could say truthfully,
"In all the sales I have ever made / have
never overstated the value of goods; in all
the sales 1 have ever made 1 have never
covered up an imperfection in the fabric; cf
all the thousands of dollars I have ever
made L have not taken one dishonest farth-
ing?" There are men, however, who can
saw it, hundreds who can say it, thousands
who can say it.
Men Who Have Outgrown Rascality.
They are more honest than when they sold
their first tierce of rice, their first firkin
of butter, because their honesty and integ-
rity have been tested, tried and came out
triumphant
But they remember a time when they
could have robbed partner, or have ab-
seconded with the funds of bank, or sprung
a snap Judgment, or made a false assign
ment, or borrowed illimitably without any
efforts at payment, or got man into a sharp |
corner and f1eeced him.
But they never took one step on that |
pathway of hell fire. They can say their
prayers without hearing the chink of dis |