Fisherman & farmer. [volume] (Edenton, N.C.) 1887-19??, 1894-08-17
Again. fnordfnate fashion is the foe of all

| tears into q go handkerchief and tnen CIV
ing two cent piece to the collection, thrust
ing /: under bills 50 people will not know but
| it was so goldpiece. One hundred do
| lars for incense to fashion two cents for
| God. God gives Us ninet- cents out ofevery
! dollar. The other ten cents by cOmmani or
| His Bible belong to Him. Is not God liberal
according to His tithn0 system laid down
| in the Old Testament? Is not Go liberal in
! giving us ninety cents out of dollar when
| He takes but ten? We do not like that. We
want to have ninety-nine cents for ourselves
| and one for God.
Now ! would great deal rather steal ten
| cents from you than from God. think one
| reason why great many people do not get
| along in worldly accumulation faster Is be-
cause they do not observe this divine rule.
God says, ''Well, if that man IS not satisfied
with ninety cents of a dollar, then L Will
take the whole dollar, and | will give it TO
| the man or woman VINO IS honest with Me.
| The greatest obstacle to charity in the Chris
| tian church TO-DAY is the fact that mon eX-
| pend SO much money on their table, ami Wo-
men SO much on their dress, they have got
nothing left for the work of God and the
worlds betterment. II my first settlement
at BeIleville, N. j., the cause Of missions
was being presented one Sabbath, and plea
for the charity of the people was being made,
when an old Christian man III the audience
lost his balance AMI said right out IN the
midst of the sermon, ''Mr. Talmagc, how arc
Gus causes when our families dress as they
dO?" | did not answer that question. 1t
was the only time in my life when I hal
nothing to say.
Again. inordinate fashion is distraction to
public worship. You know very we'll there
are a good many people who come to church
lust rs they go to the races-tO see who will
come out first. What fiutter it makes in
church when some woman with extraorli-
nary display of fashion comes in "What Il
love of bonnet = says one. "What per-
feet fright - says 500. For the most merci-
less critics in the world are fashion critics.
Men and women with souls to be save pass
ing the hour in wondering where that man
got his cravat or what store that woman
patrOniZ"s.
In many of our churches the preliminary
exercises are taken up with the discussion
Of wardrobes. 1t is pitiable. Is it not won
derful that tho Lord does not strike the
meeting houses with lightning? What dis
traction of public worship! Dying men and
and women, whose bodies are soon to be
turned into DUST yet before three worlds
strutting like peacocks, the awful question
of the souls destiny submerged by the ques-
ton of navy blue velvet and long fan train
skirt, long enoug to drag up the church
aisle, the husbands store, office, shop, fac
tory, fortune and the admiration of half the
people in the building! Men and women
come late to church to show their clothes.
People sitting down in a pew or taking up a
hymnbOOk, all absorbed at the same time in
personal array, to sing:
Rise my soul, and stretch thy wings;
Thy better portion trace.
Rise from transtory things
Toward heaven, thy native place.
adopt the Episcopalian prayer and say,
"Good Lord, deliver us -
Insatiate fashion also belittles the intel
lect. Our minds are enlarged or they dwin-
die just in proportion to the importance OF
the subject on which We constantly dwell.
Can you imagine anything more dwarffnS to
the human intellect than the study of fash
ion? I see men on the street who, Judging
from their elaboration, must have taken two
hours to arrange their apparel. After few
years of that kind of absorption, which one
of McAllisters magnifying glasses will be
powerful enough to make the mans charac-
ter visible? They all land in idiocy.
[ have seen men at the summer watering
places, through fashion, the mere wreck of
what they once were. Sallow of cheek.
Meagre of limb Hollow at the chest. Show
ing no animation save in rushing across a
room to pick up lady's fan. Simpering
along the corridors the same compliments
they simpered twenty years ago. A New
York lawyer at United States Hotel, Sara
toga, within our hearing, rushed across a
room to say to a sensible woman, "You are
as sweet as peaches p The fools of fashion
are myriad. Fashion not only destroys the
Yet, my friends, have given YOU only the
mi!der phase of this evil. 1t shuts great
multitude out of heaven. The first peal Of
thunder that shook Sinai declared, "Thou
shalt have no other God before Me" and
YOU will have to choose between tho go ldess
OF fashion and the Christian God. There
are a great many seats in heaven, and they
are all easy seats, but not one seat for the
devotee of fashion. Heaven is for meek and
quiet spirits. Heaven is for those who think
more of their souls than of their bodies.
Heaven is for those who have more Joy in
Christian charity than in dry goods religion.
Why if you, with your idolatry of fashion,
should somehow get into heaven, you would
be for putting French roof on the ''house
of many mansions" Give up this idolatry
of fashion or give up heaven. What would
YOU do standing beside the Countess OF
Huntington, whose Joy it was to build
chapels for the poor, or with that Christian
woman of Boston who fed 1909 children of
the street at Faneuil Hall on New Years
Gay giving out as Il sort OF dOXOlogy at the
end of the meeting pair of shoes to each
one of them, or those Decreases of modern
society who have cOnSGcratGd their needles
to the Lord, and who will get eternal reward
for every stitch they take?
Oh, men and women, give up the idOiatry
of fashion The rivalries and the competi-
tjOns of such q life are a stupendOuS wretch
edness. You will always find some one with
brighter array and with more palatial resi-.
dence, and with lavender kid gloves that
make tighter fit. And if you buy this thing
and wear it you will wish you had bought
something else and worn it. And the frets
of such life will bring the crows tect to
your temples before they are due, and when
you come to die you will have miserable
time. have seen men and women of fash
ion die, and I never saw one of them die
we'll. The trappings off, there they lay on
the tumbled pillow, and there were just two
things that bothered them-a wasted life AMI
coming eternity. l could not pacify them,
for their body, mind and soul had been ex-
hausted in the worship of fashion, and they
could not appreciate the gospel. When I
knelt by their bedside, they were mumhling
out their regrets and saying: so God! o
GodF Their garments hung up in the
wardrobe, never again to be seen by them.
Without any exception, so far as my mem
ory serves me, they died without hope AMI
went into eternity unprepared.
The most ghastly deathbeds on earth are
the one where a man dies Ofdelrium tremens
and the other where a woman dies after hav-
ing sacrificed all her faculties of body, mind
and soul in the worship OF fashion. My
friends, we must appear in Judgment to an
swer for what we have worn on our bodies a5
we'll as for what repentences We have exer-
cised with our souls.
On that day see coming in Beau Brum-
mel of the last century, without his cloak,
like which all England got cloak. and with
out his cane, like which all England got
cane, without his snuffbox, like which all
England got a snuffbo1-he, the fop of the
ages, particular about everything but MS
morals, and Aaron Burr without the letters
that down 10 old age he showed in pride TO
prove his early wicked galIantries, an Ab-
salon without his hair, and Marchioness
Pompadour without her titles, and Mrs.
Arnold, the belle of Wall street. when that
was the center of fashion, without her frip-
peries Of vesture.
And in great haggardness they shall go
away into eternal expatriatjOn, while among
the queens of heavenly society will be found
Vasnti, who wore the modest veil before the
palatial pacchanalians, and Handah, who
annually made a little coat for Samuel at the
temple and Grandmother Lois, the ances-
tress of Timothy. who initiated her virtue,
and Mary, who gave Jesus Christ to the
world, and many of you, the wives and
mothers and sisters and daughters of the