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Greed of Gain Kills;
S i
ouls Starved to Get Rich
A S 1 U A Sl
By the Rev. Dr. Donald Sage Mackay,
The Rector of the Collegiate Church of St. Nichoias,
Urrrmtts et New York. Sgt o )
:WIOU might as well talk about the mysterious Providence of
e % a suicide as speak of it in the case of any man who, in
: % gaining his world, forfeats his physical life and energy in
5 : the attempt. Is money of so much matter to any man that
f: Y :he should make himself a suicide for that one end?
* & We are living in an age which is steeped in the com
:«——~ mercial spirit. Commercialism has invaded every sphere
* eveppopeadd Of human activity, The professions, the arts, our social
conditions, as well as our business enterprises, are tagged
all over with the money label. The.typical man of the hour is he who
knows the intrinsic value of nothing, but can tell you the selling price of
everything—from the conscience of a politician upward. “What doth it profit
4 man?”’ has come to be the supreme standard of success. “What is there in
it for me?” is the test by which the average man to-day estimates the oppor
tunities of Jife.
Is the surrender of that life of yours, with which God has endowed vou,
a failr exchange for any achievement or success, whether in the realm of
wealth, or fame, or power? As a question of profit and loss what does it
profit any man if he gain the whole world and forfeit his life?
But again, there is the moral side of life, which, in these latter days es
pecially has been ruthlessly sacrificed by €0 many on the altar of material
success, This past year, in American public life, will be memorable in our
history as a year of reappreciated ideals. It has been, in truth, the year of
a great ethical revival, and men who not so long ago sneered at guch things
have been compelled to acknowledge the sovereign authority of conscience
agserted by the woice of the common people. It is not too mueh to say that
the revelations of these past months, following one after another in almost
every branch of commercial and industrial enterprise, shocking as they have
been to the moral sense of the community, kave nevertheless cleansed the
moral atmosphere so that the voung man of today enters npon his publie
career in a more wholesome environment than at any time in the past twenty
five years,
What then shall we do to save this faculty of immmortal life within us'
As a question of profit and loss, the soul of every man is worth saving. How
are you going to save it? I reply, simply by giving it a chance to live., Give
your soul a chance to live. Give it atmosphere so that it can breathe, and
remember that prayer is the atmosphere of the soul. The day that prayer
dies in a man's soul he commits spiritual suicide. Give it room. o that
it can expand; and remember that service for God and your fellowmen will
expand the narrowest soul,
G / i
ambling the Curse of
-
Racing--
.
Racing the Cause of
% G ]
ambling
ss 8 .
¢
CrwvmstninNye By john Gilmer Speed. e e
:“‘.“‘ @MY interd#¥™in eel 16l by A great varfety of peo
ple, while the practice is as old as eivilization, It has al
ways been regarded primarily as a sport, and it is generally
80 looked upon ioday. But in New York the laws that have
been enacted to regulate it put the question of sport in the
©OOO6O background, and declare that its encouragement is “for the
purpose of raising and breeding and improving the breed of
horses.” 'This quotation is taken from the first section of
chapter 570 pf the laws of 1895, This statute is popularly
known as the Percy-Gray law, and it establishes a state racing commission and
regulates the mothods of race meetings within the state. By this law, ana
under the decisions of the courts interpreting it, gambling. thongh distinctly
forbidden, is made permissive. Without such a legal paradox there could be
no bookmaking on the race courses: withoui book making, which enables
those who attend the races to bet on the results, the breeder of horses, the
owners ol racing stables and the proprietors of race courses, are all agreed
that the sport, as conducted at present and for many years past, could not
exint,
Granting this fact, the easy conclusion is that horse racing is conducted
for the sake of the gambling, and that the horses are used merely as part of
the gambling machinery—as a roulette wheel, for instance. The daily news
papers, which give columns and pages day in and day out to the reports of
the races, strengthen this easy conclusion. Much more space is given and
much more emphasis laid upon the doings of the "betting ring” than upon tgy
performaace of the horses that furnish the sport. The reporters, with great
industry and immense exaggeration, tell of the great wagers won and lost:
and the conversion of a “shoe-string into a banl: roll” is evidently regarded as
a greater achievement than breeding or training a stanch race horse or riding
it to a well-earned victory,
This conclusion is easy, but it is not fair. Gambling is the great handicap
to racing—indeed, it is not too strong to sav.that aambling is the curse of rac
ing: but racing is a cause of gambling rather than the desire to gamble is the
cause of racing.—l From The Century.
-
Diet-Cranks
A a——_ W S O
By 0. 5. Marden. }
GOOO 0C O~ T is o wonder some people ever have any health at all
The way to get the most out of one's ability is to trust it,
to believe in it, to have confidence in it. But 'some people
seem to think that the best way to get the best results out
§ of the digestive apparatus is to constantly distrust it, pity it.
eooe o 0 They s'\\'ullm\'. & mouthful of fear and dyspepsia with v\'m“_\'
mouthful of food, and then wonder why the stomach does
00 0e not take care of it.
Before the child can even speak plainly it is taught
to talk about its “poor ‘ittle tummic,” and this nonsense is kept up through
life,
We often hear men talking about taking the best care of their health
when they are really doing the worst thing possible for it, They are the
worst possible enemies of their stomach when they are always talking about
their digestion and expressing a fear -that they cannot eat this and they can
not eat that, when they are thinking all the time about how many hites they
must take of every mouthful of food, and how long they must masticate it
before they swallow it.
What do you mean by taking good care of your body? Just to bathe it,
~2d to weigh and measure your food with the same precision that a drug
#ist would dangerous drugs. concentrating your mind upon what you eat and
thinking about what will hurt you-—that is not taking good care of your body.
Do you wonder that your stomach ache s, that it is inflamed, when you
are all the time thinking about it, worrving sdout it, and expecting that ev
erything vou eat is going to burt you?—¥Mrom Success Magazine.
;6 RIDING THE FROST D
;'a LAKE DAM. :
25eSESes
AN INCIDENT OF EARLY DAYS
IN MICHIGAN. 3
E&WH}
% By T. R LEOY g
They were blamed idiots, both of
'em. But I'm not holdin’ that up
against any man when there's a girl
in the case. Nell was all right, too,
mind yer, as girls go—red hair, full
form, fire an’ all that sort of thing—
but she couldn't play soft. Had to
be things doin’ when she handled
the bow—with her novel-readin’ no
tions of heroes and trusty swords and
ridin’ into death’s ways before you
could kiss the tip of her finger. Oh,
shucks! 1 hate bein’ harsh on the
child, but good men are too blamed
hard to lay your hands on these days,
to want to see them go under before
their appointed time, al] along of a
whim and a little lace. All right,
I'm gettin’ there. The drive had
come down pretty slick that spring,
no serious accidents or nothing, and
we were just holdin’ the logs above
the last dam till we had got enough
water to float them out onto the
home stretch. The boys lied around
in the shade of the cook-house and
chewed their pipes and cursed a
little and waited—thinkin’ on the
settlement only thirty mile away and
’ pay-day just 'round the bend. The
- second day we heard the squeakin’
of wheels and Nell appeared on the
- scene, havin’ buggied out to wish us
luck and with greetings from the
home folk—that's what she said.
I'm guessin’ different, and seed later
I guessed right,
We all jumped to our feet, bein’
mighty starved for the sight of a
pretty face,, but Angus Carmichael
was Johnny-on-the-Spot all right and
had the honor of liftin’ her out and
receivin’ a smile that would ’ave
softened a pike-pole. We were all
right envious of Angus, but’ big Jim
Connors was the only one weak
enough to show it. They’d been run-i
nin’ neck and neck for favors all that ‘
winter and weren't too friendly about
it either. The other boys had long
since dropped out and were just
waitin’ around to hold the coats and
pick up the pieces. Jim butted in
between Angus and the smile and
grabbed her hand so she winced, .
“Right glad ter see yer again.
Nell,” says he. ‘Ain't yer goin’rter
lét me have the pleasure of drivin'
ver back ter the settlement thie af
ternoon? Yer said I eould sometime
and I'm not needed here jest now,
You know.” :
Nell looked up at him out of the
points of her eyes: ‘Maybe, Jim,
we'll see.” i
. Angus was lookin’ sort of pale in
~Bpite of the tan. “‘She's alggag,
Jiomisede, Umubut of courd el
nows what she ‘wants, and I'll step
aside if she says the word.”
Connors swung ’round quick,
blazin’ mad. *'Go to blazes, you! and
- mind yer own business!” His fists
~were stuck out in Carmichael's face.
and we looked for things happenin’
right there. Nell did too, I guess,
for the look of scorn on her face
when Angus jest gave a gasp and
stepped back wasn't pretty to see.
“I'm thinkin® yer didn’t hear
straight, Mister Carmichael,” she
said softly. "I wouldn't be feelin’
safe with a coward at the reins!”
“No, I'm not a coward, Nell, and
ver know it. If Jim wasn't a heap
sight better man with his fists than
1 be he wouldn't be so free with his
speech. Now ask him if he feels like
runnin’ the dam with me or no and
we'll see whose scared.”
We held our breath when we
heard that, for though Connors was
abolit the best man on a log in the
province, mnot barrin’ Carmichael
either, the devil himself couldn’t do
the trick and live. Nell knowed it
as well as we did, but by Jimminy
she jest stood there with the hot sun
flamin’ on her red hair and a little
smilg on her face that said plain as
day: “Will yer let him dare yer,
Jim?”
Yer could hear the throbbin' of
the dam comin’ up under ver very
feet, though it was really round the
bend below, and it didn’t sound pretty
ter Jim's ears as we could see. He
pulled the battered felt off his head
and mopped his forehead with a red
bandanna, but I guess none of us felt
mwuch sympathy for him, seein’ as
he'd got himselt into the hole.
There was a twenty-eight foot head
of water behind the dam. Then
there was a sluice sixty foot leng
and ten wide where the water ran
smooth and swift as greased light
ning, till it shot out on the apron
and was carried some eighty feet far
ther over a ledge of rocks. Near the
lower end of the apron the water
was that shallow that though a small
log would shoot out straight and drop
into the pool below almost horizontal,
the big sticks would drag and tip
and go over head first and not rise to
the suctace for a couple of hundred
feet Pelow.
The pool was as ugly a bit of wa
ter as I've ever seen. Boilin’ and
eddyin’, and chock full of undertows
that would drag a human body down |
among the jagged rocks on the bot-!
tom and sweep it back under the
apron and spit it out hundreds ot‘
feet below in a condition that weren't
pretty to see, |
As Angus had given the dare, he
had to go first, and the rest of us
climbed out onto the’ rocks close to
the water as we could get, with pike
poles and ropes tor life-savin’ duty,
Nell stood on the top of the hank
- where she could see good and pizin.
A small spot of red burnt in each
cheek and her eyes were shinin’ bril
liant.
“Take a rough, solid-barked log,
Angus,” vells out Boss Murray. “It'll
give yer a better grip if she dives,
and for God’s sake hang on to it till
she clears the eddies! We'll git you
then.”
“I'll keep on the sunny side of her,
Jack, don’t worry,” and Angus runs
lightly out on the loose floatin’ logs
that are held back by a boom from
goin’ through the sluice. He picks
one out, pushes it through a gap
where the chain joins a couple of
the boom logs and jumps aboard.
“*Ain’t ver goin’ ter use a pole?”
hollers Terry.
*“Naw—by-bye!” and we see the
blamed goat is runnin’ it empty
handed.
The log now began to step along
lively and entered the upper end of
the sluice. As it dipped to the in
cline, Angus bent forward with his
fingers touchin’ the rough bark and
his eyes on the boilin’ caldron below
him. He sure looked cool and steady
crouchin’ there, while the log rocked
from side to side and plunged
through the sicty foot of sluice. At
the foot of this where the water
struck the less steep apron, the back
surge made a wave that jumped up
most eight feet high. As the timber
struck this, Angus leapt into the air,
cleared most of it and lit on his stud
again as fine as you please,
Murray yells, ‘“Pretty work!” and
then we holds our breath.
The log as it neared the end of
the apron begun to drag, but be
cause of the weight on the back end
didn’t go over perpendicular as we
feared. It shot far out, dipped sharp
and plunged into the roaring mess
of yellow water.
But Angus kept his head, you bet!
At the last moment he threw himself
flat on the log and wrapped his arms
and legs around it, and crash! they
‘disappeared, and the foam swished
over. He told us later that it weren't
much fun down ther. He seemed to
be goin’ right on down tohades, while
the currents tore and bit and
wrenched, and pieces of bark and
chips and sawdust cut and bruised
him every place at once. And his
one little thought all the time was
jest to hold on till he bust and trust
in God.
After a few years of this sort of
thing he begun to see sky-rockets
and hear cannon crackers and then
a flood of sunlight hit him in the
face and he knew he'd come back to
the family.
I reckon it was nigh as long a time
to us as to him before the log hove
in sight and we were allowed to
move our lungs again. We certainly
let out one Indian ear-splitting yell |
that made the noise of the dam sound |
pale. Angus climbed right side up,}
sprang onto a jutting log and walked
ashove and into our arms. ;
Nell stood up there and waved her
serghief at him. but his eyes were so
w‘wt&fi& h:" -rgékon “eMaidnt
see it, for he never so much as
glanced in her direction. 4
The first words he said were:
“Don’t let Jim try it, boys! God
ain’t goin’ to give two return tickets
to hades, and that’s certain!” |
“You're too late,” says Little Bill,
“he's a-comin’ now.” o
And he was all right, with his hair
blowin’ back and his face white as
milk—slickety-pelt down the sluice,
till he struck the wave, made a spring
that miscarried somehow and fell
plump on his back three feet behind
the log. Didn't look any too cheer- ‘
ful for Jim, just then! San
The rest of the way down they
didn't change their positions none,
though Jim kept clutchin’ wildly at
the log beyond his reach, knowin’
that he didn’t have no chance for life
if he didn’t get it. We couldn’t do
nothin'—jest watch!
Then the stick shot into the shoaler
water and dragged just a bit, and as
it went over we seed Jim catch up
and clutch the log, then his hands
slipped, his arms straightened out
with a jerk and beth of ’em sunk be
neath the foam.
» Well, we were right certain he had
got a grip and again stopped breath
in’ and waited for the log to show up.
After a time it did saunter to the
surface and we seed a hand clingin’
to a projection on the side of the
timber, and then slip off.
Angus hitched a rope around him
and jumped into the pool and made
a desperate fight to get out, but in a
couple of strokes he was jerked clean
under and we started pullin’ him
back again. Yer can imagine our
amazement when we discovered we
were draggin’ the two of them in!
The blame ecross-currents had ham
mered Jim plump into Angus’ arms
and couldn't get ’em apart again.
Well, Connors was pretty nigh all
in and we lugged him off to the bunk
house, but Angus was as chirp as a
sparrow after we'd poured a little
stimulant down his gullet. We were
crowdin’ around shakin’ hands with
him and congratulatin’ him when Nell
pushes through, lookin' mighty
ashamed of herself and rather scared,
too. .1 guess she'd been gettin’ a
bigger dose of real life than she had
bargained for.
“I'm right proud of you, Angus,”
she begun gentle, ‘‘and reckon I
spoke a little too quick a few mo
ments ago. I ain't forgot what I
promised you, and am ready to start
whenever you say.” c
. “Thanks, Nell,” says Carmichael,
lookin' her straight. ‘I knows yer
didn't mean what yer said, but the
truth is I'm all tuckered out after so
much excitement and bathin® and
guess I'll let one of the other fellows
drive yer back to the settlement.”
Angus turned and walked up the
bank.—From the Outing Magazine,
The Story of an Ancient Mine.
By HERBERT W. HORWILL, M. A.
The modern graduate of a technical
school who has specialized in mining
would probably be cble to give a sat
isfactory list of tHe most important
recent publications on his own sub
ject. It is not so certain that he
would be ready with an answer to
the question: What is the earliest
recorded description of mining opera
tions in the literature of the ancient
world? He would naturally excuse
his ignorance by the plea that the
scientific portions of the ancient
slassics are of no practical service
to-day, and that, such as they are,
ihey belong properly to the domain of
the philologist or the antiquarian.
As it happens, the passage in question
does not occur in a technical book
or indeed in an out-of-the-way and
obsolete volume at all, but in a poet
ical composition which is easily ac
cessibie, which is still read by a large
number of persons, and which is sup
posed to be more or less familiar to
every man possessing a fair general
education—the Eooix of Job.
The fact that this most interesting
passage is so little known is largely
due to the obscurity of its translation
in the Authorized Version. One
might easily read through the twenty
eighth chapter of Job in that version
without the least idea that it con
tained a detailed account of the pro
cesses by which the miner earns his
livelihood. The first two verses, it is
true, point to something of the kind,
but at the third the writer appears to
diverge into a not too intelligible
panegyric of Divine omnipotence as
shown especially in floods and eéarth
quakes. Turn to the Revised Version,
and the puzzle at once becomes a pic
ture. From the ‘first verse to the
eleventh inclusive we are now able to
follow an exact description of the
metheds employed by the ancient
miner, and still pursued in the main
wherever there is discovered a de
posit worth working.
The key to the whole intarpreta
tion is in the meaning of the word
“he” in the third verse. In the old
version it appeared to denote God;
the Revisers apply it to man. Ac
cordingly, the passage refers not to
Divine omnipotence but to human en
terprise. “Man,” we read, “setteth an
end to darkness, and searcheth out
to the furthest bound the stones of
thick darkness and of the shadow of
death.” Here we see the miner with
his lantern bringing light into a re
gion hitherto sealed from man’s gaze
and searching not only near the sur
face, but, as “stones of thick dark
ness” seem to indicate, the very
gloomiest recesses of the earth's in
terior. ;
“He breaketh open a shaft away
from where men sojourn; they are
forgotten of the foot that passeth by;
th.eymWAwinz
to and fro.” " This Is¥severely scien
tific, but it is poetical also. As Dr.
Samuel Cox has said, the writer
brings out, in a few deft strokes, “the
pathos of the miner's life and occupa
tion—its peril, its loneliness, its re
moteness even from those who stand
nearest to it.” The ancient poet had
probably in his imagination the wil
derness of Arabia Petraea, but the
same feature of distance from ecrowd
ed cities has usually been a charac
teristic of the beginnings, at any rate,
of a great mine, whether in Cali
fornia, or in Nevada, or in Australia.
And even if it is not so utterly re
mote from human habitation, the
casual passenger goes on his way ig
norant or oblivious of the burrowing
far beneath his feet, where the miner
“hangs” or “swings” at his work, hav
ing been lowered to the desired spot
by some primitive cross-bar slung be
itween ropes or chains.
The picture is now relieved by a
suggestive parallel. The earth, on its
surface as well as in its recesses, con
tributes to the welfare of man and
supplies a sphere for his industry.
“As for the earth, out of it cometh
bread; and underneath it is turned up
as it were by fire.” Man, the worker
and magician, both cultivates the soil
that it may yield him his food, and
pierces far below in quest of hidden
treasure. The second clause of the
verse is generally interpreted as a
reference to the Egyptian method of
removing ore by “fire setting,” i. e.,
by lighting a fire at the base of the
rock to be removed so that the heat
might split the harder pertions and
make cracks in which a chisel or pick
could be inserted. The value of the
miner’'s finds is next indicated. “The
stones thereof are the place of
sapphires, and it hath dust of gold,”
or, as the marginal rendering gives it,
“he winneth lumps of gold.”
There follows a graphic contrast
between the boundless ingenuity of
man and the limited sagacity of the
brute. “That path”—the road which
the miner hews out for himself—*“no
bird of prey knoweth, neither hath
the falcon’s eye seen it; the proud
beasts have not trodden it, nor hath
the fierce lion passed thereby.”
Man's detection of the secret gems of
‘the earth is keener than the acutest
predatory instinet of hawk and vul
ture. His strength in pursuit of his
spoil excels that of the tyrants of the
jungle or the forest. For “he putteth
forth his hand upon the flinty rock:
he overturneth the mountains by the
roots.”
The last phase of the description
reminds us of the cleverness of the
underground explorer in preserving
himself and his operations from dis
aster, and of the persistent thorough
ness of his Investigation. “He cut
‘eth out channels among the rocks:
=nd his eye seeth every precious
thing. He bindeth the streams that
they trickle not (Heb., from weep
‘ing); and the thing that is hid
bringeth he forth to light.” The
miner is here depicted as using
mechanical expedients for preventing
leakage through the roofs or walls of
the passages in which he works, and
as cutting canals to drain away water
that may have percolated through.
An alternative explanation of “he
bindeth the stream from weeping” is
that a reference is intended to the
damming up of the waters in the
river while the auriferous alluvial
gravel is dug out. In either case the
result is that nothing escapes his
scrutiny, and that his energy and
skill are rewarded by the discovery
of the riches he seeks.
The whole passage is thus a strik
ing poetical representation of the art
of mining as practicel in early times,
and, except for the absence of elab
orate machinery and powerful ex
plosives, as still carried on to-day.
And it is a picture with a purpose—
lm impress us with the wondersg
wrought by human enterprise so far
[exceeding the utmost marvels of ani
'mal instinct. As we read further on
jin the chapter, we find that this ex
ulting tribute to the achievements of
man is introduced into the poem that
it may emphasize the limitations of
even his intelligence. The close of
the above description is immediately
followed by the question: “But where
;shall wisdom be found? And where
is the place of understanding?” There
are some darknesses of which man
cannot make an end; some priceless
treasures that baffle even his re
search. Wisdom and understanding,
of far greater worth than rubies,
are neither to be purchased by the
gold the miner discovers, nor are they
to be attained by the exercise of his
most penetrating ingenuity.
The date of the book in which this
remarkable passage occurs is by no
means a settled question among Bib
lical scholars. The traditional view
which ascribed its authorship to
Moses is now generally abandoned.
The majority of modern eritics place
it somewhere between the seventh
and the fourth century B. C., so it
may be accepted as of a sufficiently
remote period to make its description
of the mine one of the earliest, if not
absolutely the earliest, to be found
in any literature. The four metalg
mentioned in the beginning of the
chapter—silver, gold, iroen and brass
(or rather copper, as a more exact
translation would render it)—are
those which were discovered and
worked in the first ages of whieh we
have a record. It is thought that the
writer of this book was best ac
quainted with the mining operations
of the Egyptians, who worked gold
and silver mines in upper Egypt, and
copggg@w:‘quoise mines in Arabia
Petraea o the Sihiatic penfusuia.
There were no mines in Palestine it
self, which explains the faet tha} this
is the only reference to them in the
Old Testament. The Egyptian copper
mines in the Sinaitic mountains are
known to have bheen carried on suc
cessfully as far back as the times of
the early Pharaohs. Shafts, slag
heaps, smelting-places and cther dis
tinct relics of the working of these
mines may be seen to this day in
some of the “wadis,” or channels of
dried watercourses. Many of them
appear to be in the same condition
in which they were left by the Egyp
tian workmen four or five thousand
Yvears ago; “the very marks of their
tools,” it is said, “being so fresh and
sharp in that pure, dry atmosphere,
that more than one traveler has felt,
while looking at them, as though the
men had but knocked off work for a
spell and might come back to it at
any moment.”’—Scientific American.
Newspapers as “Personal” Organs.
In Leslie’s Weekly Charles J.. Bon
aparte, Attorney-General of the Uni
ted States, writes an article on this
subject. Mr. Bonaparie states his
views as follows:
‘*As soon as a paper is recognized
as somebody’s ‘organ,’ as expressing
the views and wishes and opinions of
any particular man or set of men, its
healthful influence as a newspaper is
gone; it may, indeed, have another
kind of influence, for those who con
trol or conduct it may be powerful
men, but its editorial utterances are
simply their ‘open letters.’ In ny
judgment, this is a matter of very se
rious and urgentconcern to the Amer
ican people to-day. Certain of our
newspapers, including some whose in
fluence within my memory—indeed,
within a comparatively few years—
Wwas a power, and a power for good,
in the community, are now firmly and
widely believed to bhe virtually, or
even literally, owned by well known
‘interests’-—or, in other words, hy
wealthy men engaged in far-reaching
enterprises, This widespread and
very confident belief as to such own
ership makes them virtually ‘trade
organs,’ with but little more influence
than the papers published avowedly
as such.”
How Very “Radical.”
They order some things with a
sterner sense of justice in France. In
Paris a Professor having been run
over and killed by a taxicab, the
chauffeur was sentenced to three
months' impriscument and damages
of SIO,OOO were awarded to the vic
tim’s widow, together with SSOOO to
an unmarrvied daughter. Four other
children received SI4OO cach. The
total cost of the accident ta the com
pany was $25,000.-~New York
World. SR
