The progressive farmer. [volume] (Winston, N.C.) 1886-1904, 1893-05-16
run Evil OF MONEY GREED.
The Essay that Won the Prize at the A.
& M. College, Recently. Read
by ]. C.. Dey, Currituck
County, N. c.

Mr. PRESIDENT, LADIES AND GENTLE
MEN:-Money is one of the greatest fac
tors in our civilization. 1t is the great
object of endeavor, the great cause of
discontent. and one of the great sources
Of danger. Money is power. 1t rep
resents the printing press, the school,
the college, the church, and all evan,
gelizing machinery. DR.. Josiah Strong
saws that with the aid of money the
same man may, at the same moment,
be founding an academy among the
Mormons, teaching the Mexicans,
building a home missionary church In
Dakota, translating the Scriptures In
Africa, preaching the Gospel 1 China,
and uttering the precepts Of ten thou
sand Bibles in India. With the aid OF
money, a man may be to day a bar
tender. fit for that and nothing more,
to morrow a millionaire, next day, be-
cause "Mammon wins his way where
seraphs might despair" a Governor or
United States Senator. Money builds
grog shops in New York, gambling
dens in France, and carries on the lot
terry business in Louisiana it makes
I'D states for nomin ating conventions,
and enables one man to control the
votes of a whole city; it helps to fill
both houses of Congress, and to frame
and pass the laws by which the people
must be governed.
The power Of money is tremendous.
1t is more dangerous than dynamite.
The victims of saint seducing gold"
are numberless. Howard Crosby says
that the danger that threatens the up
roofing of society, the demolition of
civil institutions, the destruction of
liberty, and the des )lation of all is that
which comes from mammon worship.
Ever since the beginning of the
worlds history, the love of money has
been growing IN the hearts of men, un-
til today, mammon worship is one of
the chief vices of the age; ever since
greed of gold sold our Saviour, and
ratified for his garments, it has cruciied
every form of virtue between thieves.
What we call religion is, to a great
many, only an affair Of fashion and
empty ceremony, their hearts are not
in it, but their real religion is business.
Heine has said of the average man of
this age: His counting house is his
church, his desk is his pew, his ledger
is his Bible, his stock in trade the holi-
est of the holy, the bell of the exchange
his summons to prayer, his gold his
god, and credit his faith" This is put
ting it too strong, but we have I'm
doubtedIy developed a larger proper
ton of men of whom the above
is a faithful picture than any other
Christian nation, men to whom Agas-
siz's remark, Il am offered five hun
dred dollars a night to lecture, but I
decline all invitations, for I have no
time to make money" is simply incom-
prehensible; it dazes them.
Money greed is a great evil. Leav-
ing out of sight, for the time being, it's
possible effects on those who are pos
sessed of the disease, it has still, with
reference to other people, a very dan
gerous force.
Among the chief evils is it's tendency
to ignoble honest labor. Parents who
think more of money than they do of
their offspring, foster the idea that
their son must be rich, and that at
once. Shall the promising lad be ap-
prenticed to his uncle, the blacksmith
The sisters think the blacksmith so
very very smutty, the mother shrinks
from the ungenteelness of his swarthy
labor, the father, prudentially weigh
ing the matter deeper, finds that the
uncle has spent his whole life in &C
cumulating his property. These sagac-
ious parents, wishing the tree to bear
it's fruit before it has ever blOssomed,
regard the long delay of industrious
trades as a serious objection to them.
The son, then, must be a merchant, a
lawyer, or a broker, and one of these
only as an opening to speculation. And
the chances are that a boy is ruined.
The love of money frequently ruins
the second generation. The children
of rich parents are apt to be reared in
Incidence. The ordinary motives to
industry IRE wanting, and the tempta-
tions to sloth are multiplied. Beecher
asks this question: Why should he
labor, who may command universal
service, whose money subsidies the
inventions of art, exhausts the luxur-
les of society, and makes rareties COM
mon by their abundance9 Only the
blind could not see that the love of
money, handed down from the parent
to the child, and ruin run in the same