The midland journal. (Rising Sun, Md.) 1885-1947, 1895-10-11
New Wine in Old Bottles.

New Wine in Old Bottles.
And no man putteth new wine into old bottles,
else the new wine will burst the bottles. and be
spilled, and the bottles shall perish.-Luke V, 81
There are many wise sayings, or par
ables, in the scriptures like the above and
many devout Bible readers remain ignor-
ant of the truths they conceal by confin-
ing them to the time and place when and
where thew were first uttered, in place of
applying them to all ages and everywhere.
Every season had its new vintage, and
new goat skin bottles must be provided
to hold it, for to put the new wine into
the old skins which had been used the
wear before was to risk losing the wine, as
the old bottles or SKINS having been
weakened by time and use, we're liable to
burst, while they were perfectly safe for
keeping the old wine, in which fermenta-
ton had ceased.
This simple, natural law, which was
cited in the case of the wine, applies with
like force to moral, social and economic
conditions The ever restless human
mind is constantly evolving new condi-
tons in the social economy which must
be adapted to our environments. Society
must adapt itself to the new conditions,
or suffer the consequences, as putting the
new wine into the old skin bottles was
liable to produce disastrous results.
Herein is the great trouble found in i'll
Producing necessary changes. The old
methods are stubbornly adhered to and
the attempt persisted in to adjust the new
condition to them. The new wine is con-
stantly put into the old bottles, which
were prepared by their fathers and grand
fathers This large class of persons argue,
these bottles were prepared by our fathers
and served their purpose we'll, they don't
seem to be any worse from wear, we have
grown to love them from use and associa-
ton from infancy, and why not use them
and adapt these newfangled methods to
them, or else put away the newfangled
ideas and inventions and go along in the
old way which we have become accus-
toned to and which served our fathers so
we'll?
If we turn back the pages of history we
find these fathers had just such strug-
gle to establish the methods which are so
dear to their sons. The old timers fought
as relentlessly against the innovations of
their day which are now revered and
called old. They were new bottles then
prepared for the wine of the new vintage
progressive thought. Every year brings
to our moral vineyard new crop of
grapes, whose vintage as i'll the old time
must be stored in new bottles. Every
cycle of society, or generation, brings to
the surface new inventions, new systems,
new methods, which call for great changes
in the old practice and modes of conduct
ing business, that must be conformed to
or risk the consequences of putting new
wine into old bottles.
five apply these principles and the
wisdom of the parable of the bottles and
wine, to the business of every day life we
at once see how imperative it is to pre-
pare new methods or adjust our practice
TO suit the changes that the ever aspiring
thought OF the human mind is bringing
forth, as the vine brings forth a new
fruitage every year. What farmer would
think of putting halfa dozen men into
grass field with scythes to cut it down by
the old painful process? On the contrary
he will put boy on moving machine
to which is hitched pair of horses, who
will accomplish with ease as much as
those half-dozen men who sweat and toll
and grim. We have but to apply this
simple illustration of mind over matter to
every branch of productive industry to
comprehend the new environments which
surround society and thrust their disturb
ing forms into our civilization Society
must adjust itself to these new conditions
or perish. There is no such thing as going
back to the past. The old vines bear 10
grapes, but the new branches bring forth
the new grapes.
AS the evolution in mechanics demands
a new adjustment of labor so the evolu-
ton in economics effecting the State is
calling in thunder tones for new adjust
iment in political methods. The crafty
and INSCRIPTIONS who reap where they
SOW not have taken advantage of the
changes wrought by the inventive genius
of the age to seize upon and claim these
new inventions under the divine right of
personal property, the right by which
every man claims the fruits of his own
labor, and by virtue of that assumed right
this class is rapidly turning large masses
of the race out to perish for the want of
sustenance and shelter. Men and women
are going downwards toward the beasts Of
the field and their march is strewn with
frightful crimes every grade, with want,
misery, suffering and death by violence,
suicide, famine and exposure. The new
wine has been put into old bottles and