Owingsville outlook. [volume] (Owingsville, Ky.) 1879-192?, 1898-03-31

thropists and Christian workers,
Ia recognize the feet that there
are these Atlantic AID Pacific surgeS
of hereditary evil rolling on through
the centuries. say of course, a man
can resist this tendency. Just as in the
ancestral line mentioned in the first
chapter of Matthew. You see in the
same line in which there was a wicked
Rehoboam and a desperate Manassas.
there afterward came pious Josiah
and glorious Christ. liui my friends,
you must recognize the fact that these
influences go ON from generation Ia
generation. | am glad Ia know
however, that a river which has pro-
ducrd nothing hut mia>ma for a hun
drrd miles. may after awhile turn the
wheels of factories and help support
industrious and virtuous populations;
and there are family lines which were
poisoned that are brnedictiou now.
At the last day il will bc found ont
that there are men who have gone
clear over into all forms of iniquity
and plunged into utter abandonment
who before they yielded To the first
temptation resisted more evil than
many a man who has been moral and
upright all his life.
Iiut. surprising now. that in this age,
when there are 81 many good people,
that | come down into this audience
aud select the very best man in it, l
do not mean the man who would style
himself the best, for probably hc is a
hypocrite; but | mean the man who
before tod i really the best. will
take YOU ont from all your Christian
surroundings. viii nut YOU in a de-
rravcd home. will put you in a
cradle of iniquity. Who is bending
over that cradle? An intoxicated
mother Who il that swearing in the
next room? Your father. The neigh
hor> come in Ia talk, and their jokes
are uuclean. There is not in the house
a Bible or a moral treatise, hut only
few scraps of an old pictorial.
After awhile You are old enough Ia
get out of the cradle, amt Won are
struck across the head for naughtincs~,
hut never in any kindly manner repri-
mand,d. After awhile You are oil
enough To 90 abroad. and you are sent
home without any spoil You are whip
ped until the blood comes. At IL years
of age You go out To fight Your own
battles in this world. which seems Ia
carr no more for You than the dog that
has died of fit under the fence.
You are kicked and cuffcd and buff
fcted. Some day, rallying your cour-
70. Won resent some wrong. \ man
SAYS: Who are You" | know who you
are. Your father had free lodgings at
Sing sing. You mother, She was up
for drunkenness at the criminal court
Get out of the way, you lowlived
wretch" My brother, suppose that had
been the history of Your advent. and
the history of YOUR earlier surround
ings, would you have been the Chris
tian man YOU are to-day, seated in this
Christian assembly? | tell you nay.
You would have been a vagabond, an
outlaw. murderer on the scaffold
atoning for your crime. All these con-
siderations ought To make ms mcrciful
in our dealings with the wandering
and the lost
Again. have To remark, that in our
estimation the misdoing of people who
have fallen from high responsibility
and usefulness, we must take into con-
sidcration the conjunc;ion OF circum-
stances. In nine cases out of ten the
man who goes astray does not intend
any positive wrong. lie has trust
funds. lie risks part of these funds
in investment lie says, Now. if l
should lose that investment | have of
my own property five times as much,
and if this investment should go
wrong | could easily make it up: |
could five times make il up" With
that wrong reasoning he goes on and
MAKE : an investment. and it does not
turn out quite a. well as he expected.
and he makes another investment, and
strange to say at the same time all his
other affairs get entangled, and all his
other resources fail. and his hands are
tied. Now he wants to eNtricate him
sell. lie goes a little further on in the
wrong investment lie takes plunge
further ahead, for he wants to save his
wife and children. he wants TO save his
home. he wants to save his member
ship in the church. lie takes one more
plunge and ali is lost.
Some morning at 10 o'clock the bank
door is not opened. and there is a card
on the door signed by an officer of the
bank, indicating there is trouble, and
I the name of the defaulter or the de-
frauder heads the newspaper column
and hundreds of men say: Good for
him." hundreds of other men say:
lin. glad he's found out at last;''
/ hundreds of other men say: Just as
/ told you" hundreds of other men
say: I'VE couldn't possibly have been
/ tempted to do that-no conjunction of
circumstances could ever have over
thrown me-; and there is a superabund-
ance of indignation, hut no pity. The
heavens full of lightning but not one
drop of dew. If God treated us as So
ciety treats that man we would all
7 have been in hell long ago,
Wait for the alternating circum-
stances. Perhaps he may have been
: the dupe of others. Before you let all
the hounds out from their kennel to
maui and tear that man, find out if he
has not been brought up in a CONNER.
cial establishment where there was a
wrong system of ethics taught; find
out whether that man has not an ex,
/, extravagant wife who is not satisfied
with his honest earnings, and in the
temptation to please her he has gone
into that ruin into which enough
men have fallen, and by the same
temptation, to make a procession OF
many miles. Perhaps some sudden
sickness may have touched his brain
and his Judgment may be unbalanced
lie is wrong, he is awfully wrong. and
he must be condemned, but there may
be mitigating circumstances. Perhaps
under the same temptation you nigh
have fallen. The reason some men dc
not steal 5000, 900 is because they do no
get a chance! Have righteous indigna
tion you must about that mans con
duct. but temper it with mercy.
But you say: Il am sorry that tn,
innocent should suffer-" Yes, l am
too-sorry for the widows and orphans
who lost their all by that defalcation
l am sorry also for the business men
the honest business men, who have hat
their affairs all crippled by that defal