The Penn's Grove record., 1892-04-01

fOttSf ChNSVHtipbs w.
whether he comes from Apostle Raul or
Apostle Judas. They have q way OF meas
uring a gnat until it is larger than a Gamer.
Again, my subject photographs all those
who are abhorrent of small sins while they
are reckless in regard to magnificent tnelts.
You will find many a merchant. VINO WINE
he is so careful that he would not take a yard
of cloth or a spool of cotton from the counter
without paving for il, and who II a bank
cashier should make a mistake and send in a
roll of bills five dollars too much would dls-
patch a messenger in hot haste to return the
surplus, yet who will go into stock company
IN which after awhile he gets control OF the
stock and then waters the stocf ana MAKES
5000 600 appear like S20l,OW. be stole only
SlO0,OO by the operation, Manyof the men
OF fortune male their wealth in that way.
One of those men engaged in u unright'
eous acts, that evening. the evening OF tne
very day when he watered the stock, viii
lind a wharf rat stealing an evening newspa-
per from the basement doorway, and VIII go
out and catch the urchin by the collar and
twist the collar so tightly the poor fellow
cannot say That it was thirst for knowledge
that led him to the dishonest act, but grip
the collar tighter and tighter, saying: II
have been looking for you a long while. You
stole my paper four or five times, haven't
you? You miserable wretchp And then
the old stock gambler, with a voice they can
hear three blocks, will cry out, Police, po-
lice!n
nat same man, the evening of the day on
which he watered the stock, will kneel with
his family in prayer and thank God for the
prosperity of the day, then kiss his children
good night with an air which seems to say;
II hope you will all grow up to be as good
as your fatherp Prisons for sins insectils
in sisa but palaces for crimes drpole4aSian-
No mercy for sins animalcule in proportion,
but great leniency for maStodon iniquity.
1t is time that we learn in America that
sin is not eXcusable in proportion as 1t de-
clares large dividends and has outriders in
equipage. Many a man Is riding to perdi-
ton position ahead and lackey behind. To
steal a dollar is a gnat: to steal many thou
sands of dollars is a camel. There is many a
fruit dealer who would not consent to steal
a basket of peaches from a neighbours stall,
but who would not scruple to depress the
fruit market: and as long as | can remember
we have Neard every summer the peach crop
of Maryland is a failure, aud by the time the
crop comes il the Misrepresentation makes a
difference of millions OF dollars. A man
VINO would not steal one peach basket steals
fifty thousand peach baskets.
Any summer go down into the Mercantile
library, in the reading Rooms, and see the
newspaper reports of the crops from all parls
of the country, and their phraseology is very
much the same, and the same men wrote
them, methodically and UNANIMOUSLY carry
ing out the huge lying about the grain crop
from year to year and for a score of years.
After a while there is a corner" in the
wheat market, and men who had a contempt
for a petty theft will 6urgiarize the wheat
bin OF a nation and commit larceny upon the
American corncrib. And men will sit in
churches and in reformatory institutions try.
ing to strain out the small gnats of scoundrel.
ism, while in their grain elevators and in
their storehouses they are fattening huge
camels which they expect after awhile to
swallow. Society has to be entirely recon.
structed on this subject. We are to find
that a sin is inexcusable in proportion as it
is great.
/ know in our time the tendency Is to
charge religious frauds upon good men.
They say, "Jh, what a class Of frauds you
have in the Church of Goi in this day" and
when an elder of a church or a deacon or a
minister of tine Gospel or a superintendent
Of a Sabbath school turns out a defaulter
what display heads there are in many of the
newspspers-great primer type; five line
p~ica-"Another Saint Absconded," 'Cler-
icai Scoundrelism," Religion at a Dis
count" Shame on the Churches" while
there are a thousand ~scounlrels outside the
church to where there is one inside the
church, and the misbehavior of those who
never see the inside of a church is SO gre 1t it
is enough to tempt a man to become a Chris
ian TO get out OF their company.
But in all circles, religious ami irreligious,
the tendency is to excuse SIN in proportion
as it is mammoth. Even john Milton in his
paradise Lost" while he condemns Satan,
gives such a grand description OF him you
have hard work to suppress your admira-
ton. Oh, this straining out of small sins
like gnats, and this gulping Town great in
louities like camels.
This subject does not give the picture of
Of one or two persons, but Is a gallery in
which thousands Of people may see their
likenesses. For instance, all these people
who, while they would not rob their neigh
Dor of a farthing, appropriate the money
and the treasure of the public. A man has a
house to sell, and he tells mis- customer It is
worth $50, 900. Next day the assessor comes
around and the owner says it Is worth SIS
boo. The Government of the United States
took off the tax from personal income,
among other reasons because 50 few people
would tell the truth, and many a man with
an income of hundreds of dollars a day made
statements which seemed to imply he was
about to be handed over to the over seer OF
he poor.
Careful to pay their passage from Liver
pool to New York, yet smuggling in their
Saratoga trunk ten silk dresses from Paris
and a half dozen watches from Geneva,
Switzerland, telling the custom house officer
nm the wharf, "There is nothing in that
trunk but wearing apparel" and putting a
five dollar gold piece in his hand to punctu-
ate the statement.
Described in the text are all those who are
narticular never to break the law of gram
mar. and who want all their language an
elegant specimen of syntax, straining out all
the inaccuracies of speech with a fine sieve
of literary criticism, while through their
conversation go SANDER and innuendo and
n~rofanity and fRlsehooi larger than a whole
caravan OF camels, when they might better
fracture every law OF the language and
shock their intellectual taste, and better let
verb seek in vain for its ~nominative, and
every noun for its government, and every
nreposition lose its way in the sentence, and
adiectives and participates and prououns get
into a grand riot worthy Of the Fourth ward
on election day, then to commit a moral iu-
accuracy. Better swallow a thousand gnats
than one camel
Such persons are also described in the
text who are very much alarmed about
the small faults OF Others and have no
alarm about their WI great transgres-
e;ons There are in every community and
in eyery church watchdoys who feel caisJ
upon to keep their ayes on others and
growl, They are full Of suspicious. They
wonder if tina man is not dishonest, II that
man il not ~unclean, il there is not something
wrong about the other man. They are al.
WAYS the first to hear OF anything wrong.
MIXTURES are always the first to smell car
rion. They are self appointed detectives. I
Law this down as a rule without any excep-
tisn-that those people who nave the most
faults themselves are most merciless in their
watching of others. From scalp of head to
sole Of foot they are full of jealousies and
They spend their life in hunting for musk.
rats and mud turtles instead of hunting for
Rocky Mountain eagles; always for some
thing mean instead of something grand.
They LOOK at their ~neighbors imperfections
through q microscope, and look at their own
imnerfections through a telescope upside
down. Twenty faults OF their own do moi
hurt them half so much as one fault of some
body else, Their ~neighhor's imperfections
ara like gnats and they strain them out.
their own imperfections are like camels, and
they swallow them.
But lest any might think they escape thu
scrutiny Of the text l have TO tell Won wa
ali come under the divine satire when wa
make the questions of time more prominens
than the questions OF eternity. Come now
let us all &c into the confessional. Are not
ali tempted to make the question, Where
shall / live now greater than the
question. Where shall | live forever.
How hal | get more dollars herep greater