The Lexington dispatch. [volume] (Lexington, South Carolina) 1870-1917, 1898-09-07

own generation. First Of all, let us see
to it that, as far as we can, they have
enough to eat. The human body Is so
constituted that three times day the
body needs food as much as a lamp
needs oil, as much as a locomotive
needs fuel. To meet this want God has
eirdled the earth with apple orchards,
orange groves, wheatfields and oceans
full of fish and prairies full of cattle,
and Notwithstanding this I will under
take to say that the vast majority OF
the human family are now suffering
either for lack of food or the right kind
of food. Our civilization is all askew,
and God only can set it right. Many OF
the greatest estates of today have been
built out Of the blood and bones of un-
requited toll. In olden times, for the
building of forts and towers, the inhab-
itants of Ispahan had to contribute TO-
600 skulls and Bagdad 80, 600 human
skulls, and that number of people were
compelled to furnish the skulls. But
these two contributions added together
made only 100000 skulls, while into
the tower of the worlds wealth and
pomp have been wrought the skeletons
of uncounted numbers of the half fed
populations of the earth-millions of
skulls.
Don't sit down at your table with
five or six courses of abundant supply
and think nothing of that family in the
next street who would take any one of
those five courses between soup and
almond nuts and feel they were IN
heaven. The lack of the right kind of
food is the cause Of much of the drunk
enness. After drinking what many of
our grocers call coffee, sweetened with
.,hat many call sugar, and eating what
many of our butchers call meat, and
chewing what many Of our bakers call
bread, many of the laboring class feel
so miserable they are tempted to put III
to their nasty pipes what the tobacco
mist calls tobacco or 60 into the drinking
saloons for what the rumsellers call
beer. Good coffee would do much i'll
driving out bad rum.
with enough to eat? By sitting down
in embroidered slippers and lounging
back in an armchair, our mouth puck
cred up around Havana of the best
brand, and through clouds of luxuriant
smoke reading about political economy
and the philosophy of strikes? No, no.
By finding out who in this city has
been living on gristle and sending them
tenderloin beefsteak. Seek out some
family who through sickness or con-
junction of misfortunes have not enough
to eat and do for them what Christ did
for the hungry multitudes of Asia
Minor, multiplying the loaves and the
fishes. Let US quit the surfeiting Of
ourselves until we cannot choke down
another crumb of cake and begin the
supply of others necessities. So far
from helping appease the worlds hunger
are those whom Isaiah describes as
grinding the faces of the poor. You
have seen farmer or mechanic put a
scythe or all ak on grindstone, while
some one was turning it round and
round and the man holding the ak bore
on it harder and harder, while the Wa
ter dropped from the grindstone and the
edge of the ak from being round and
dull got keener and keener. So I have
seen men who were put against the
grindstone of hardship, and while one
turned the crank another would press
the unfortunate harder down and hard
er down until he was ground away
thinner and thinner-his comforts thin
ner, his prospects thinner and his face
thinner. And Isaiah shrieks out, "What
mean ye that ye grind the faces of the
poor?"
Battle For Bread.
1t is an awful thing to be hungry. 1t
is an easy thing for US to be in good
humor with all the world when we
have no lack But let hunger take full
possession of us and we would all turn
into barbarians and canuibals and tiends.
Suppose that some of the energy we are
expending in useless and unavailing
talk about the bread question should be
expended in merciful allcviations. /
have read that the battlefield on which
more troops met than OH any other IN
the worlds history was the battlefield
of Leipsic-160, 900 men under Napo-
leon, $50, 900 men under Schwarzeberg.
No, no. The greatest and most terrific
battle is now being fought all the world
over. 1t is the battle for bread. The
ground tone Of the finest passage in cne
of the great musical masterpieces, the
the cry of the hungry populace of Wen
Ma as the king rode through and they
shouted: Bread Give US bread" And
all through the great harmonies of mu-
sical academy and cathedral hear the
pathoS the ground tone, the tragedy,
; of uncounted multitudes, who, with
streaming eyes and wan cheeks and
broken hearts, in behalf of themselves
and their families, are pleading for
bread.
Let us take another look around to
see how we may serve our generation.
Let us see as far as possible that they
have enough to wear. God looks upon
the human race and knows just how
many inhabitants the world has. The
statistics of the worlds population are
carefully taken in civilized lands, and
every few years officers of government
90 through the land and count how
many people there are in the United
States or England, and great accuracy
is reached. But when people tell us
how many inhabitants there are III Asia
or Africa at best it must be a wild
guess. Yet God knows the exact num-
Der of people Oh our planet, and he has
made enough apparel for each, and If
there be fifteen hundred million, fifteen
| thousand, fifteen hundred and fifteen
people then there is enough apparel for
| fifteen hundred million, fifteen thou
sand fifteen hundred and fifteen. Not
slouchy apparel, not ragged apparel,
not insufficient apparel, but appropriate
apparel. At least two suits for every
! bo;no on aarth a simmer Suit and {,