Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1891-12-21

Again, l remark that business life is
school of patience. In your everyday
life how many things to annoy and to
disquiet Bargains will rub. Com
mercial men will sometimes fail to meet
their engagements Cash book and
money drawer will sometimes quarrel
Goods ordered for special emergency
will come too late or be damaged in
the transportation. People intending
no harm will go shopping without any
intention of purchase, overturning great
stocks of goods and insisting 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 WEAKNESSES on the
part of partners in business. Annoy
ance after annoyance, veXatiOn after
vexation, and loss after loss.
All that process will either break you
down or brighten you up. 1t is school
of patience. You have known men I'M
der the process to become petulant
and choleric and angry and pugna-
cious and cross and sour and queer,
and they lost their customers and their
name became detestation. Other
men have been frightened up under
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 lips;
at first they thought of some singing re-
tort they would like to make; but they
conquered their Impotence. They have
kind words now for sarcastic filings.
They have gentle Behavior now for I'M
mannerly customers. They are patient
now with unfortunate debtors. They
| have Christian reflections now for sud
den reverses. Where did they get that
| patience? By hearing a minister preach
concerning it on the Sabbath? Oh, no.
They got it just where you will get it
if you ever get it at all-selling hats,
discOunting notes. turning banisters,
| blowing corn, timing roofs, pleading
causes. Oh, that amid the turmoil and
anxiety and evaporation of everyday
| life you might hear the voice of God
saying: I'm patience possess your soul.
Let patience have her perfect work"
l remark again that business life is a
| school of useful knowledge Merchants
| do not read many books and do not
study lexicons They do not dive into
profounds of learning, and yet nearly
| all through their occupations come to
| understand questions of finance and
| politics and geography and jurispru-
| dence 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 |
So, 900 into an enterprise. 1t is all |
| gone. You say, THAT is a dead loss"
Oh, no. You are paying the school
ing. That was only tuition-I told |
you it was schoolmistress--but it was
worth it. You learned things under
that process you would not have learned |
in any other way.
Traders in grain come to know some
thing about foreign harvests; traders
in fruit come to know something about |
the prospects of tropical production;
manufacturers of American goods come
to understand the tariff on imported
articles; publishers of books must come
to understand the new law of copy
right; owners of ships must come to
know 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 lit
erature for a 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 success
full as a wording? Oh, no; it was
that you might take that useful in
formation and use it for Jesus Christ.
Can it be that you have been dealing
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 inflicted in business life and
that you have never tried to bring to
bear that Gospel which is to extirpate
all evil and correct all wrongs and
Slunine all darkness and lift up all
t.retchedness 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 q
fool for eternity?
| 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 integrity merely because
they never have been tested. A man
was elected treasurer of the state of
Maine some years ago. He was dis
tinguished for his honesty, usefulness
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 Dis
tinguished for virtue before; distin-
guiShed for crime after. You can can
over the names of men just like that,
in whose honesty you had complete
confidence, but placed in certain crises
of temptation they went overheard.
Never so many temptations to scoun-
drelism as now. Not a law on the
statute book but has some back door
through which a miscreant can escape.
Ali how many receptions in the fabric
of goods; SO much plundering in com
mercial life that if a man talk about
living a life of complete commercial ac-
curacy there are those who ascribe it
to greenness and lack of tact. More
need of honesty now than ever before;
tried honesty, complete honesty more
than in those times when business was
a plain affair and woolens were wool
lens and silks were silks and men were
men.
How many men do you suppose
there are in commercial life who could
say truthfully, I'm all the sales 1 have
ever made [ have never overstated the
value of goods; in all the sales l have
ever made I have never covered up an
in the fabric; OF all the
thousands of dollars [ have ever made
have not taken one dishonest farth-
ing?" There are men, however, who
can say it, hundreds who can say it,