The Maui news. [volume] (Wailuku, Maui, H.I.) 1900-current, 1922-08-25
DISHONESTY COSTS TOO MUCH

Far reaching effects in the moral atmosphere of the Islands must
inevitably result from the John Guild episode. Viewed from the
proper point and under the right light there is seen a lesson which
should be a strong deterrent from pursuit of a similar course of
breach of trust on the part of others but mental attitudes and charac-
teristics so differ that such a lesson will not be accepted by all and
there will be some who will conceive that there is profit to be secured
from dishonesty though followed by dishonor. even that there is a
possibility to escape discovery and subsequent results. Ones acts
react not only upon oneself but upon the whole community that sur
rounds one.
because Guild was able to conceal irregularities for a score of years.
they may do the same, that there will be others who will be deluded
into a belief that the luXuries, comforts and honors that i'll gotten.
money will buy are a fair compensation for the loss of all that should
be dear at the end. 1t is unfortunate that he should have cloaked
his life with an aspect of religion and Righteousness and associated
himself actively in public enterprises connected with the church
and benefacions and charity for there will be those who will criicise
the church and well doing because he hid behind them. When a
man who has posed as a Christian, a church member and as leader
in work for the good of humanity is found to have been false to the
ideals that he had appeared to have espOused there are always those
who will blame the ideals instead OF the offender, the man. And so
it is to be feared some will do in the present instance.
But to return to the other attitude. He who is false to his trust
and misappropriates funds creates for himself then and there a
ghost that will always haunt him, never leaving him, consciously
with him every moment of his waking hours, subconsciously with
him in his broken and ftful sleep. That ghost is fear The man
hangs over his own head a sharp edged sword suspended by a slend-
er hair in danger of breaking every moment. With that ghost and
under that sword he dooms himself to live.
in the happy home circle, he will hear that ghost Whispering
"You will be found out. Perhaps tomorrow, perhaps next eek
you will be found out!' He looks upon wife and children and knows
that when death comes to him, if he avoids discovery until then, the
wealth and comfort they now enjoy, will be theirs no more, the
honored name they now bear will be smirched. He may avoid the
disgrace during his own life but if he does, those innocent ones
will inevitable pay for it when he is gone as their hereitagc from him.
When in a business meeting he is consulted by upright men of
integrity, the ghost rises and points its accusing finger, at him its
lips forming the words: "You fraud! you will be discovered; the
hour of your undoing is near!'
In a social gathering the same ghost taps him on the shoulder
and murmurs in his ear: perhaps this is the last time you will
be in a gathering like this. You will be found out and thrown out,
you moral leper!'
Such is the life of terror and torment one prepares for himself
when he departs from the path of integrity. Every pleasure and
every joy is an apple of SodOm, ashes within, bitterness when he
sets his teeth in it. There is no need to await death for hell, he
lives it daily and his sufemngs were well portrayed in the myth of
Tantalus.
The price of wealth acquired in such way is too great. There
Is no avoiding the inevitable result. Effect must follow cause is the
uQcbanpablp law M ron h canCpc man iDito+oC bo 1ui1Je nc
own life of effects. And those effects make up not only his own
life, they lock and interlock in the lives of others, ever extending,
ever widening, for man cannot live for himself alone and the higher
III the social scale he advances the further out the influence of his
every act reaches.
When discovery comes it is in a sense a relief for he has lived in
anticipation of that moment. Then he has not only to witness the
tumbhng and crashing of the castles he built, not only his own un-
doing, but the misery he has brought to those whom he should have
sought to protect, of those who have loved and trusted him.
Such is the picture that it can be wished will be presented to
every man who is tempted, the one that should rise to view when
there is an inclination to yield and sell honor for a mess of pottage.