Connecticut western news., 1896-05-21

wish to engage you in conversation while you are engaged i'll your regular employment Politely suggest to such them during business hours Nothing would please them so we'll as to have you renounce your occupation and as- sociate with them. Much of the time they lounge around the doors of engine houses, or after the dining hour stand upon the steps of a fashionable hotel or an elegant restaurant, wishing to give you the idea that that is the place where they dine. But they do not dine there. They are sinking down lower and lower day by day. Neither by day nor by night have anything to do with idlers,
 Before you admit a man into your ac- quaintance ask him politely, What do you do for living?" If he says, Moth ing: am a gentleman, look out for him. He may have very soft hand and very faultless apparel, and have high sounding family name, but his touch is death. Before you know it you will in his presence be ashamed of your work dress. Business will become to you drudgery. and after awhile you will lose your place, and afterward your respect ability, and last of all your soul. Idle ness is next door to villainy. Thieves, gamblers, burglars, shoplifters and as- sassins are made from the class who have nothing to do. When the police go to hunt up and arrest culprit, they seldom go to look in at the busy carriage factory or behind the counter where dili- gent clerks are employed, but they go among the groups of idlers. The play is going on at the theater, when suddenly there is scuffle in the top gallery. What is it? A policeman has come in, and leaning over has tapped on the shoulder of young man, saying, II want you, sir" He has not worked during the day, but somehow has raked together shilling or two to get into the top gallery. He is an idler. The man on his right hand is an idler, and the man on his left hand is an idler.
 Sin Breeding Idleness-
 During the past few years there has been great deal of dullness in business. Young men have complained that they have little to do If they have nothing else to do. they can read and improve their minds and hearts These times are not always to continue. Business is waking up, and the superior knowledge that in this interregnum of work you may obtain will be worth $50, 900 of capital The large fortunes of the next 20 years are having their foundations laid now by the young men who are giving themselves to self improvement. went into store in New York and saw five men, all Christians, sitting round, saying that they had nothing to do. It is an outrage for Christian man to have nothing to do Let him go out and visit the poor, or distribute tracts, or go and read the Bible to the sick. or take out his New Testament and be making his eternal fortune. Let him go into the back office and pray.
 Shrink back from idleness in yourself and in others if you would maintain right position Good old Ashbel Green at more than so years of age was found busy writing, and some young man said to him: Why do you keep busy? It is time for you to rest He answered, 'I keep busy to keep out of mischief. No man is strong enough to be idle.
 Are you fond of pictures? If so. will show you one of the works of an old master. Here it is: II went by the field of the slothful and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding, and loi it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone wall was broken down. Then I saw and considered we'll looked upon it and received instruction. Yet little sleep, little slumber, little folding of the hands to sleep. So shall thy poverty come as one that traveleth and thy want as an armed man. l don't know of another sentence in the Bible more explosive than that. It first misses softly, like the fuse of a cannon, and at last bursts like 54 pounder The old proverb was right "The devil tempts most men, but idlers tempt the devil '
 A young man came to a man of 90 years of age and said to him, How have you made out to live so long and be so vell?" The old man took the youngster to an orchard, and, pointing to some large trees full of apples, said, 1T planted these trees when was a boy, and do you wonder that now I am per mitted to gather the fruit of them?" We gather in old age what we plant in our youth. Sow to the wind, and we reap the whirlwind. Plant in early life the right kind of a Christian character, and you will eat luscious fruit in old age and gather these harvest apples in eter- nifty.
 Pleasure Seeking.
 I urge you to avoid the perpetual pleasure seeker. believe in recreation and amusement God would not have made us with the capacity to laugh if he had not intended us sometimes to in- dulge it. God hath hung in sky and set in wave and printed on grass many roundelay, but he who chooses pleas ure seeking for his life work does not understand for what God made him. Our amusements are intended to help us in some earnest mission. The thun- dercloud hath an edge e1quisitely pur- pied, but with voice that jars the earth 1t declares, ''I go to water the green fields. The wild flowers under the fence are gay, but they say, ''We stand and to refresh the husbandmen in their incoming" The stream sparkles and foans and frolics and says: II go to baptize the moss. I lave the spots on the trout. I slake the thirst of the bird. turn the wheel of the mill rock ir my crystal cradle muckshaw and water lily" And so. while the world plays it works Look out for the man who al- ways plays and never works
 You will do well to avoid those whose regular business it is to play ball, skate or go a-boating. All these sports arc grand in their places- I never derived so much advantage from any ministerial association as from ministerial club