Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1898-04-02

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pity. Do not sit with the lip curled in
scorn and with an assumed air of angelic
innocence looking down upon such moral
precipitation. You had better get down
on your knees and first pray Almighty
God for their rescue and next thank the
Lord that you have not been thrown
under the wheels Of that Juggernaut.
Besct by Temptation.
In Great Britain and in the United
States in every generation there are
tens of thousands Of persons who are
fully developed criminals and incarcer-
ated. / say in every generation. Then
suppose there are tens of thousands Of
persons not found out in their criminal
ity. In addition to these there are tens
Of thousands OF persons who, not posi-
lively becoming criminals, nevertheless
have criminal tendency. Any one of
all those thousands by the grace Of
God may become Christian and resist
the ancestral influence and open new
chapter of behavior, but the vast ma
icrity of them will not, and it becomes
az men,. professional, unprofessioual
ministers of religion, judges of courts,
philanthropists and Christian workers,
to recognize the fact that there are these
Atlantic and Pacific surges of hereditary
evil rolling on through the centuries.
/ say, of course, man can resist this
tendency, just as in the ancestral line
mentioned in the first chapter of
Matthew. You see in the same limo in
which there was a wicked Rehobonm
! and desperate Manassas, there after
ward came a pious Josiah and a glorious
Christ. But, my friends, you must recog-
nize tho fact that these influences go on
from generation to generation. am
glad to know, however, that a river
which has produced nothing but miasma
for 100 miles may after awhile turn the
wheels of factories and help support in
dustrious and virtuous populations, and
there are family lines which were poi
soned that are a benediction now. AT the
last day it will be found out 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 man who has
been moral and upright all his life.
But supposing now that III this age,
when there are so many good people,
that come down into this audience and
select the very best man in it. / do not
mean the man who would style himself
the best, for probably be is hypocrite,
but mean the man who before God is
really the best. / will take you out
from all your Christian surroundings. l
will take you back to boyhood. will
put you in depraved homo. l will put
you in q cradle Of iniquity. Who is
bending over that cradle? An intoxicat-
ed mother. Who is that swearing in the
next room? Your father. The nelghbors
come in to talk, and their jokes are IN
olean. There is not in the house Bible
or moral treatise, but only few
scraps of an old pictorial
/. After awhile you are old enough to
get out of the cradle and you are struck
across the head for naughtiness, but
i.ae7er in any kindly manner reprlmand-
ed. After awhile you arc old enough to
go abroad, and you are sent out with o
basket to steal. If you come home with
out any spoil, you are whipped until the
blood comes. At 10 years of age you go
out to fight your own battles in this
world which seems to care no moro for
YOU than the dog that has died of tit
under the fence. You are kicked and
cuffed and bulfeted Some day. rallying
your courage, you resent some wrong.
A man says: "Who are you? l know
who you are. Your father had free lodg-
ings at Sing Sing. Your mother, she
was I'D for drunkenness at the criminal
court. Get out of my way, you low lived
wretchr'' My brother, suppose that had
been the history Of your advent and the
history of your earlier Surroundings
would you have been the Christian man
you arc today, seated in this Christian
embly? tell you nay. You would
have been vagabond, an outlaw, O
murderer on the scaffold atoning for
your crime. All these considerations
ought to make US merciful in our deal
ings with the wandering and the lost.
Consider tho Sinner.
Again. have to remark that in our
estimation the misdoing of people who
have fallen from high responsibility and
,,eofnIness we must take into considera-
ton the conjunction of circumstances.
In nine cases out of ten q man who goes
astray does not intend any positive
wrong. He has trust funds. He risks q
mart of these funds in investment. He
says "Now, if should lose that invest
ment have of my own property five
times as much, and if this investment
should 20 wrong l could easily make it
I'M: l could five times mako it up "
With that wrong reasoning he goes on
and makes the investment, and 1t does
not turn out quite as we'll as he expect
cd, and he makes another investment,
and, strange to say, at the same time all
his other affairs get entaugled and all
his other resources fail and his hands
are tied. Now be wants to extricate
himself He goes little further on in
the wrong investment. He takes a
nlunge further ahead, for he wants to
save his wife and children, he wants TO
save his home, he wants to save his
membership in the church He taxes
one more plunge and all is lost.
Some morning at 10 o'clock the bank
door is not opened and there is card
on the door signed by an officer OF the
bank, indicating there is trouble, and
the name of the defaulter or the de-
frauder heads the newspaper column
auu hundreds Of men say, Good fol
him." hundreds of other men say, I'm
glad he's found out at last" hundreds
of other men say, "Just as l told you;
hundreds of other men say, 1--WE coulo
not possibly have been tempted to dc
that; no conjunction of circumstances
could ever have overthrown me, ano
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