The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1899-07-29
why you are not absorbed in gratitude

Ndhdui tllStlc. IeuuIeTS Oh lux NOIl-
lea! Sometimes they get you in COR
ner where you cannot very well escape
without being rude, and then they tell
you all about this one, and all about
that one, and all about the other one,
and they talk, talk, talk. talk, talk talk
After awhile they go away, leaving the
place looking like barnyard after the
foxes and the weasels have been around;
here wing, and there claw, and yon-
der an eye, and there crop. How they
do make the feathers fly!
Rather than the defamtion of good
names it seems to me it would be almost
as honorable and useful if you just took
a box of matches in your pocket and a
razor in your hand and GO through the
streets and see how many houses you
can burn down and how many throats
you can cut. That is not a much worse
business. The destruction of a mans
name is worse than the destruction of
his life. A woman came in confessional
to a priest and told him that she mad
been slandering her neighbors. The
priest promised her absolution on con-
dition of her performing penance. He
gave her a thistle top and said: You
can take that thistle and scatter the
seeds all over the field" She went and
did so and came back. "Now," said the
priest, gather up all those seeds" She
said: II can't" "Ah," he said, 81 know
you can't. Neither can you gather up
the evil words you spoke about your
neighbors." All good men and all good
women have sometimes had detractor
after them. John Wesley's wife whis-
pered about him, whispered all over
England, kept on whispering about
that good man-as good a man as ever
hved-and kept on whispering until the
connubial relation was dissolved.
Jesus Christ had these whisperers
after Him, and they charged Him with
drinking too much and keeping bad
company. "A wine bibber and the
friend of publicans and sinners" You
take the best man that ever lived and
put detective on his track for ten
years, watching where he goes an6
when he comes and with determine
ton to misconstrue everything and to
think he goes here for bad purpose
and there for bad purpose, with that
determination Of destroying him, at the
end of the ten years he will be held de-
spicable in the sight of great many
people
If it is an outrageous thing to despoil
a mans character, how much worse is it
to damage woman's reputation? Yet
that evil grows from century to cen
fury, and it is all done by whispers. A
suspicion is started. The next whis-
perer who gets hold of it states the sus-
picion as proven fact, and many a good
woman, as honorable as your wife or
your mother, has been whispered out of
all kindly associations, and whispered
into the grave. Some people say there
is no hell, but if there be no hell for such
a despoiler of womanly character it is
high time that some philanthropist
build one. But there is such place es-
tablished, and what time they will
have when all the whisperers get down
there together rehearsing things!
Everlasting carnival of mud. We're it
not for the uncomfortable surroundings
you might suppose they would be glad
to get there. In that region where they
are all bad what opportunities for ex-
ploitation by these whisperers. On
earth, to despoil their neighbors some
times they had to lie about them, but
down there they can say the worst
things possible about their neighbors
and tell the truth. Jubilee of whisper
ers. Semiheaven of scandal mongers
stopping their gable about their dia-
bolical neighbors only long enough to
go up to the iron gate and ask some new
conner from the earth: What is the
last gossip in the city on earth where we
used to live?"
Now, how are we to war against this
iniquity which curses every community
on earth? First, by refusing to listen
to or believe whisper. Every court Of
the land has for law and all decent
communities have for law that you
must hold people innocent until they
are proved guilty. There is only one
person worse than the whisperer, and
that is the man or woman who listens
without protest. The trouble is, you
hold the sack while they I'll it. The re-
ceiver of the stolen goods is just as
bad as the thief. An ancient writer de-
clares that a slanderer and man who
receives the SANDER ought both to be
hanged-the one by the tongue and the
other by the ear-and agree with
him.
When you hear something bad about
your neighbors, do not go all over and
ask about it, whether it is true, and
scatter it and spread it. You might as
well go to smallpox hospital and take
a patient and carry him all through the
community, asking people if they really
thought it case of smallpox. That
would be very bad for the patient and
for all the neighbors. Do not retail SIAN
ders and whisperings. Do not make
yourself the inspector of warts, and the
supervisor of carbuncles, and the COM
missioner for street cutters. and the
holder of stakes for dog fight. Can il
be that you. an immortal man; that
you, an immortal woman, can find no
better business than to become a gut