The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1897-12-02
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
Agricultural, Commercial, Mechan-
ical and Ecclesiastical Lies.
a Pointed Discourse on the Sins OF the
acknowledgement sensations and fre-
yarications in Business-So-
cial Eaisehoods.

for honesty in all that is said and done.
The text is:
A certain man named Ananas. with Sap
phira his wife. sold Il possessi on, etc.-Acts,
V. lilo.
A well-matchcd pair, alike in ambi-
ton and in falsehood, Ananlas and
Sapphire. They wanted reputation
for great beneticence, and they sold all
their property, pretending to put the
entire proceeds in the charity fund,
while they put much of it i'll their own
pocket. There was no necessity that
they give all their property away, but
they wanted the reputation of SO do
ing. Ananias first lied about it and
dropped down dead. Then Sapphire
lied about it, and she dropped down
dead. The two fatalities a warning to
all ages of the danger of sacrificing
The truth.
There are thousands of ways Of tell
ing lie. A mans whole life may be
II talsehood and yet never with his lips
may he falsify once. There is way
of uttering falsehood by look, by man
ner, us we'll as by lip. There are per-
sons who are guilty of dishonesty of
speech and then afterwards say may
be-" calling it a white lie, when no lie
is that color The whitest lie ever told
was as black as perditiOn. There are
those so given to dishonesty of speech
that they do not know when they are
living. With some it is an acquired sin,
and with others it is natural in
trinity. There are those whom you
will recognize as born liars. Their
whole life, from cradle to grave, Is
filled up with vice of speech. Misrep-
reservations and prevarication are as
| natural to them as the infantile
disease, and are sort of moral
Group or spiritual scarlatina. Then
| there are those who in after life have
opportunities of developing this evil,
and they go from deception to decep-
ton, and from class to class, until they
are regularly graduated liars. At
times the air in our cities is filled with
| falsehood and lies cluster around the
| mechanics hammer, blossom on the
merchants yardstick, and sometimes
| sit in the door of churches. They are
| called by some fabrication, and they
are called by some fiction, You might
call them subterfuge or deceit, Or ro-
nance, Or fable, or representation,
or delusion; but as | know nothing to
be gained by covering up God-defy-
ing sin with "a photographers blanket,
| shall call them in plainest vernacu-
lar, lies. They may be divided into
agricultural, commercial, mechanical,
social and ecclesiastical.
First of all, speak of agricultural
falsehoods. There Is netting in the
presence of natural objects that has a
tendency to make one pure. The trees
never Issue false stock. The wheat
fields are always honest. Rye and oats
never move out in the night, not pay
ing for the place they occupy. .'orn
| shocks never make false assignment
Mountain brooks are always current
The gold of the wheat fields is never
counterfeit. But while the ten
dency of agricultural life is tC
make one honest, honesty il
not the charac teristlc of all who
come to the city markets from the
country districts. You hear the
creaking of the dishonest farm Wagon
in almost every street in our grea
citieS-a farm wagon in which there
is not one honest spoke, or one truth
full rivet, from tongue to tail-board
Again and again has domestic econ
omy in our great cities foundered OF
the farmers tirllin. When New Yorl
and Washington sit down and weeE
over their sins, let Westchester county
and the hborhoods around THU
capital sit down and weep over theirs
The tendency i'll all rural districts i:
to suppose that sins and transgression:
cluster in our great cities; but citizens
and merchants long ago learned tina
| it is not safe to calculate from TIN
character of the apples on the top 0
the farmers barrel what is the charac
ter of the apples all the way down to
ward the bottom. Many of our citi
zens and merchants have learned tina
it is always safe to see the farme
measure the barrel of beets. Milk can
are not always honest. There ar
. those who, in country life, seem t
think they have a right to overreacI
. grain dealers and merchants of al
!. styles. They think 1t is more hon
. orable to raise corn than to dea
: in corn. The producer some
!. times practically says to tn
> merchant: You get your none
!. easily, anyhow" Does he get it easily
: While the farmer sleeps, and he ma
. go to sleep. conscious of the fact tina
. his corn and rye are all the time pro
; crossing, and adding to his fortune c
= his livelihood, the merchant tries t
: sleep, while conscious of the fact tina
. at that moment the ship may be drivin
on the rock, or Il wave sweeping owe
the hurricane-deck spelling his goods
! or the spectators may be plotting
monetary revolution, or the burglar
may be at that moment at his none
safe, or the fire may have kindled o
the very block where his store stand.
Easy, is it? Let those who get thei
living in the quiet farm and barn talk
the place of one of our city merchant
and see whether it is so easy. 1t
hard enough to have the hands bli!
tered with outdoor work, but it