Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1901-08-10

| Then give me the mallet and the chisel
and will cut an honest epitaph, Here
. lies the victim of dissipating associa-
! tions,"
Another test by which you can find
| whether your secret society is right or
wrong is the effect it has on your secu-
lar occupation I can understand how
through such an institution man can
| reach commercial success. know
some men have formed their best busi-
ness relations through such a channel.
\ If the secret society has advantaged
you in an honorable calling,it is a good
| one, but has your credit failed? Are
bargain makers now more anxious
how they trust you with a bale of
goods? Have the men whose names
were down in the commercial agency
AL before they entered the society
been going down since in commercial
standing? Then look out. You and
every day know of commercial estab-
hshments going to ruin through the
social excesses of one or two members,
their fortune beaten to death with
ball players bat or cut amidships with
the front prov of the regatta or going
down under the swift hoofs of the fast
horses or drowned in the large pota-
tions of cognac or Monongahela That
secret society was the Loeb Earn.
Their business was the Vile de Havre
They struck, and the Vile de Havre
went underi
In the Last Hours.
Which would you rather have in
your hand when you come to die, a
pack of cards or Bible? Which would
you rather have pressed to your lips
In the closing moment, the cup of Bel
shazzarean wassail or the chalice OF
Christian communion? Whom would
you rather have for your pallbearers,
the elders of a Christian church or the
companions whose conversation was
full of slang and innuendo? Whom
would you rather have for your eter-
nal companions, those men who spend
their evenings betting, gambling,
swearing, carousing and telling vile
stories or your little child, that bright
girl whom the Lord took? Oh, you
would not have been away so many
nights, would you, if you had known
she was going away SO soon? Dear
me, your house has never been the
same place since. Your wife has never
frightened up. She has never got over
it. She never will get over it. How
long the evenings are with no one to
put to bed and no one to whom to tell
the beautiful Bib'e storiesl What
pity 1t is that you cannot spend more
evenings at home in trying to help her
bear that sorrow! You can never
drown that grief in the wine cup. You
can never break away from the little
arms that used to be flung around
your neck when she used to say,
Papa, do stay with me tonight, do
stay with me tonight" You will never
be able to wipe away from your lips
the dying kiss of your little girl The
fascination Of a bad secret society is so
great that sometimes man has turned
his back on his home when his child
was dying of scarlet fever. He went
away. Before he got back at midnight
| the eyes had been closed, the under
taker had done his work. and the wife,
worn out with three weeks watching,
lay unconscious in the next room
! Then the returned father comes up
stairs. and sees the cradle gone, and he
says, what is the matter?" On the
judgment day he will find out what
was the matter.
oh, man astray, God help you! /
am going to make a very stout rope
will take v ~ small threads and wind
| them together until after awhile they
become a ship cable. And I am going
to take some very small delicate
threads and wind them together un-
| til they make a very stout rope L
will take all the memories of the mar
riage day-a thread of laughter, a
thread of light. a thread Of music, a
| thread of banqueting. a thread of con-
gratulation-and twist them together,
and 1 have one strand Then I take a
| thread of the hour of the first advent
| in your house. a thread of the dark
ness that preceded and a thread of the
| beautiful scarf that little child used to
wear when she bounded out at even
| tide to greet you, and thread of the
| beautiful dress in which you laid her
away for the resurrection, and then Il
! twist all these threads together, and +
have another strand Then 1 take a
/ thread of the scarlet robe of a suffer-
| ing Christ, and a thread of the white
| raiment of your loved ones before the
| throne, and a string of the harp cheru-
| bic, and a string of the harp seraphic.
and 1 twist them all together, and II
have third strand '-Oh," you say,
''either strand is enough to hold fast
| world." No. 1 will take these
| strands and / will twist them together,
not to the communion table, for it
shall be removed; not to pillar of the
| organ, for that will crumble in the