The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1896-1929, 1897-07-15
IN SWEET CHARITY.
SHALL ONE ACT DAMN?
YEARS VS.. FIVE
MINUTES.
Some Rambling Thoughts.
BY "NEMo."

BY "NEMO."
Copyrighted by Dave & Tabor.)
Is there not In your neighborhood
person whose past has blot..on it, and
whose name is mentioned with q look
OF holy horror by cronies when together
for chat? It is of such persons
would write this week, and may my pen
be dipped in power for the task.
II man commit crime, be given a
fair trial, be found guilty, and be con-
demned, what becomes of him? He
goes to prison and works out his SEN
tence. And then? Then he is guilt
less in the eye of the law, and he is as
though he had done no wrong thing
His retention in prison has expiated
his crime he is a pure member OF
society. But what says society through
yoas? The answer by deeds is this
"The stain of that wrong shall stay on
him forever he shall be hampered in
every way; he shall be prevented from
getting an honorable position by med
dlesome tongues reviving the story of
the past he shall be bounded by the
voices of those who say, I am holier
than thou he shall be made to feel
that the world is too small for him to
hide himself, and the grave too shallow
to purify him; for the stigmata of
crime shall fasten even on his children !
after him."
If man commit sin and no one
knows it, he Is as pure as the unsullied
snow In the eyes of the world but If it
be known, though he weep over it un-
til its very substance is washed away
by the flood OF grief, though he agonize
with regrets, though he spend his last
effort to right wrong, yet in every
nelghborhood are those whose memo
ries are long as death or whose hearts
are hard as adamant, whose cool, cal
cuIating ways save them from sin or
whose clever concealments save them |
from discovery, these Pharisees, I say,
will summon the ghosts of a mans past
from the grave, though it all be buried
deep beneath accumulated years of re-
morse and unhappiness. Like mythic-
al ghouls and real hyenas, these lovers
of carrlon will dig till they find the
treasure they seek, the sin spot; and
they rejoice with howlings that all the
world can hear.
If life of probity be lived for 25
years or more, and the deeds of good
be plentiful as grain in harvest time
if the citadel of character be held by |
keen conflict with evil, until some
weary moment of sloth, and evil then |
rush In through : unguarded spot, /
though only tor a few moments, the
world through the deeds of the world,
says that the years of probity count for
naught: Thereafter the spot shall be
larger than the character it is on, the
fragment be larger than the whole, the
five minutes of evil blot out the whole
memory of quarter of century OF
good. An earthquake rends in a mo-
ment the works put up by a patient
process of accretion, and there is moth
ing then but dust and disaster where
beauty stood before and SO Is it with
the dazed man who is the sufferer from
the moral upheaval of bitterness and
uncharity in community. One mo-
ment he rightly stands before them all,
worthy OF confidence and recognized as
a power Tor good, the next moment his
character lies bruised and mangled,
never to be we'll again SO far as the
Levites and Pharisees care, never to
live and move and haye full being
again unless some barred-out Samaritan
with goodness, far excelllng that OF
C00S6 dlOOl OuCO, SOAAN0 w SAAN AS~~S~O
with sympathy and love.
If IA girl kept Intentionally Ignorant
of herself, by those who train her, and
who know not the difference between
ignorance and purity, makes fau1 pas
under the stress of feelings that she
does not understand and the pleadlngs
of the man who ought to be worthy
of trust, then her own kith and kin too
often turn on her like ravenlng beasts,
driving her out into the world to fur
ther wrong doing and certain destruc-
ton. Upon her head, fair and mex
perienced, are visited the sins OF omls-
sion committed by those who raised no
warming voice to tell of the pitfalls of
life.
IF the All-Father takes note OF the
tall Of sparrow, and tenderly bears
with our misdeeds, giving soiace to the