ESTABLISHED 1844.
GREENSBORO, N. 0., WEDNESDAY, AUGUST 14, 1907.
VOLUME LIX, NUMBER 31.
All communications, whether for publica
tion or pertaining to matters of business,
should be sent to the Editor, J. 0. Atkinson,
Elon College, N. C.
EDITORIAL COMMENT.
When to Stop.—Every man with a weak
ness lives and labors under one fatal delu
sion. It is this—In his own estimation he
knows when to stop.
I met a young man the other day who has
been smoking cigarettes for years. His
whole system is saturated with the intoxi
cating poison, so that when he gets up of a
morning he must needs light a cigarette be
fore dressing. To stop now would almost
run him crazy. Yet that young man said
to me, “I am not what you call a cigarette
fiend. I can stop. If I were to discover that
I was being injured I should stop at once.”
Injured indeed! And rather than do with
out cigarettes a day he would drive twenty
miles to get a package. Injured indeed!
When if he gets from under the influence
of them he could not sleep, and his nerves
tremble like leaves in a breeze. Injured in
deed! When he would not stop the habit
and quit the practice for any thing in the
world. Yet that same young man told me
lie knew when to stop and how many not to
smoke!
I saw a man sometime ago who loved his
liquor. He would have it in moderation ev
ery day without let or hindrance. On spec
ial occasions, and when there was excite
ment, he would drink to intoxication. Ap
proached about the habit, and warned, his re
ply was 4 4 Well I do drink some, but I know
when to stop.” Certaihly. Never saw a
•drunkard in my life that did not have the
notion that he knew when to stop. Every
man with a fatal weakness knows, in his own
estimation, "When to stop. About thfe beet
■evidence under the sun that a weakness has
laid its death grasp upon a man is his decla
ration that “He knows when to stop.” There
begins to be more hope for the man when he
begins to fear that he does not know when to
stop. Every reformation and every conver
sion is preceded by that. The man begins to
.realize that he does not know when to stop.
Mules. We want our friends in various
sections to quit complaining about the price
of Mules.' About the most helpful and hu
mane happening that has struck our farm
ers in many a day is high price of Kate and
Bob. This is not fun, it is fact. We have
been out among farmers some what of late,
and in all our lives we have never seen so
many fat, fine, sleek mules. Your mule own
ers will regale you an hour with the awful
and stupendous and killing price of mules,
and then wind up the conversation by in
viting you out to the stable to see Kate and
Betsey. (It used to be Kate and Bet.)
Did you ever hear of a mule owner invit
ing you to the lot to see his pair “of black
beauties,” in the shape of stalwart mules,be
fore the present high prices came ? Not many
times we fancy.
A man simply cannot afford to keep a poor,
■whiplashed and half-starved mule now. The
price is too high. When neighbor Smitn
•cought up a cool 250 for a mule, put it down
that said neighbor is going to be careful and
kind in the handling of said beast. We do
not know what single event has so much
helped the morals and manners of mule
drivers and mule owners, as the prevailing
high prices. A poor, weather beaten, ill
kept mule is a strain on any man’s morals
(and vocabulary) that tries to keep and
handle one. And every owner knows that
there is no more faithful and resolute beast
than, a well kept
beasts of burden has increased onr humane
ness and enlarged our care and sympathy in
a most marked degree.
Thus do the wheels of fortune turn to
teach us lessons of economy, and of charity,
In a way and manner marked and marvelous
to be hold. When men will not learn kind
ness for kindness sake, Providence teaches
them kindnfess for economy’s sake. Strenu
ous business is shutting up the rum shop and
giving us men of temperance and sobriety.
Competition is driving to the wall the boy
who revels and giving a chance to the boy who
cares and struggles. Sentiment is coming to
have worth and the considerate invites trade
and wins customers. ‘ ‘ Business is business ’ ’
is giving way before the more noble sen
timent, Business is life.
A Great Fine. A few weeks ago United
States Marshels had a merry chase running
down Mr. John D. Rockefeller of the Standard
Oil Company to get him as witness in a cir
cuit court sitting at Chicago. But being ap
prehended and brought to court Mr. Rocke
feller’s chief claim was that “he did not
know. Yes, he was president of the Stand
ard Oil, but only honorary president and had
n<rt been in the president’s office in some
years.” But Judge Landis, of said circuit
court, decided that somebody knew and as an
outcome of proceedings against the Standard,
fined that company $29,240,000. This was
for taking rebates contrary to law, the com
pany being found guilty in 1,462 counts and
the maximum sum of $20,000 'being imposed
for each count. The Gevernment’s case was
gased on the allegation that the Standard
Oil Company had received from the Chicago
and Alton Ry. a rate of six cents per one
hundred pounds of oil shipped from Whiting,
Indiana, to East St. Louis, 111. and St. Louis,
Mo. when the regular and published rate
was eighteen cents per one hundred pounds.
The Standard had induced (?) the Chicago
and Alton Ry. to carry its oil for one third
the price charged others. This was in flag
rant violation of law, and Judge Landis went
to the limit in imposing the fine. There is,
of course, to be an appeal to the higher
courts.
This is said to be the largest fine ever im
posed by any court in the history of the
world, so far as records show. The decision
Tfflay not stand..That Is tb be seen. Btit It
will have a salutary effect we imagine in
causing other corporations and trusts to mind
how they tamper with illegal rebates. The
offending railway is now to be tried, as it
violated the law also, as well as the Standard
in receiving the rebate.
The holiest of all holidays are those
Kept by ourselves in silence .and apart;
The secret anniversaries of the heart.
*A DESTRUCTIVE CRITIC OF 2907.
{To the Reader of 1907.
Dear Brother: Although interested in the
able writings of the higher critics of 1907,
especially in their assumption of having dis
covered something valuable, as if the “his
torical method” were new in studying the
Bible, I confess I became somewhat drowsy
under their monotonous efforts to make the
sacred writings seem to abound in misstate
ments. But I gradually absorbed their
genius and spirit, and seemed to become a
destructive critic, though calling mvself a
higher eritic.
While in this state of mind, sleepy though
I was, I seemed to live rapidly through the
centuries, century after century, until I
found myself moving among scholars who
dated their letters with the numerals, 2, 9, 0,
7.
On seeming to be roused front a semi-con
sciousness, and supposing that a thousand
years had passed from the time I fell asleep
under the dreary chanting about the mistakes
of the Bible, I seemed to be walking among
the fancied alcoves of my library, now in
creased by the additions of a thousand years,
and coming across the following correspond
ence I give you the letters, believing that it
may be interesting to thd* reader to observe
how the reasoning of the future destructive
critic (writing in 2907 of our times in the
spirit in which the destructive critic of 1907
writes of Bible times) will make the condi
tions of our generation to appear.
If we of the year 1907 know something of
the conclusions of the learned gentleman of
2907 to be false, whose letters I now reveal,
or if his modes of reasoning are absurd, or if
he lays stress on insufficient data in his logic,
or, especially, if he is ludicrously given to
denying the statements of eye-witnesses to
the facts which we of our time know to be
true, these faults must not be attributed to
me: for I copy the letters and publish them
exactly as I found them a thousand years
before they were written.
, J. J. Summerbell.)
Dayton, Ohio.
•Copyrighted by The Christian Sun. All
rights reserved.
Kinkade, New Zealand, 15, 8, 2907.
iviy uear uranason:
In my last letter I referred to the imper
fect brain development of the Americans of
1907. But yet I must be fair to them, since
they may have been in advance of some of
the other white tribes: for our investiga
tors have shown that it is likely that some
where near the year 1900 some tribes of
Europeans may have adopted residence on
the surface of the earth instead of among
the branches of trees.
For on the western side of the Pacific
Ocean, at about that time, in some islands
southeast of Asia, there were still tree-dwell
ers.
Also, in Russia, events transpired that
throw much light on the stage of evolution
of man in that section. The czar of that
great empire, Nicholas II., and his wife long
ed for a son. The Russian records show
that in 1903 they knelt at the shrine of St.
Seraphim and prayed for one, and a son was
born to them on the 30th of July, 1904. St.
Seraphim had died about thirty years before,
after a life of austerity among bears, which
he nursed when they were sick. He wore
sandals of bark, lived on bread and water,
and slept in the tops of trees. These facts
are in the official archives of 1903 to 1907.
You will observe, my dear grandson, that
his sandals of bark indicate (by the histori
cal method) that the Russians had not yet
learned how to turn the skins of animals into
leather; and his sleeping in the tops of trees
shows that he belonged to some tribe of
tree dwellers. The Russian archives do not
show whether St. Seraphim -had a tail or
not. That point is left in obscurity.
It is easily seen that the Americans must
have been in advance of the Russians: for
in the territory of the United States there
were no tree-dwellers; although in the south
western part of the land there were still
cliff-dwellers. This fact shows that the
Americans were in advance of the Russians.
For our critics, archaeologists and paleontol
ogists all agree that the Ameri<?answere with
out tails.
But still their reasoning power in 1907
must have been of a low order, to cut down
or pierce mountains for. their traveling, in
stead of using the air with its vast spaces.
These ancient lines of travel to this day de
face the landscape beneath us, as we look
down from our aermobiles.
When we consider that the birds of the air
could be seen by the ancient Americans, sug
gesting to every man of well developed brain
that the air was the space for swift, easy,
economical, safe and cleanly travel, we can
easily see that the Americans of 1907 must
have had little brain power, not to perceive
the advantageous way to travel swiftly and
safely.
The barbarism of the Americans has also
been conclusively demonstrated by our learn
ed men, who all agree that the people of 1907
used coal and wood for fuel, instead of us
ing the heat of the sun, or doing as we now
generally do, utilizing the internal heat of
the earth. How the Americans could be *
blind to these obvious sources of heat, can
not be explained except on the theory that
they had not yet fully reached the develop
ment of human beings. But the records
clearly show that the ancient Americans, as
late as the year 1907, shivered with the
cold in winter and suffered with the heat in
summer; although they must have noticed
that the cold of space above them was great,
and the heat of the earth’s internal fires
was great. Now that our governments have
for centuries maintained an equal tempera
ture at all seasons for all citizens we can
only wonder at the barbarism of the year
1907, when God’s products were seized by
the rich (for they had rich and poor then),
depriving the poor of the common comforts
of life; that is, heat in winter and coolness
in summer.
Another of the difficulties our learned men
have experienced in investigating the condi
tions and events of the years about 1907 has
been the untruthfulness of the writers of that
period, as well as the corruption of it- One
of the most startling instances of universal
Tying we discovered in the accounts of the
destruction of a city of thirty thousand peo
ple, called St. Pierre, situated on an island
Martinique. It seems that the city was ly
ing at the foot of the volcano, called Mont
relee. ine outrageous untrustworthiness ox
the age is seen in the universal statement
made by the writers of that period that all
the inhabitants of St, Pierre were killed
within five minutes by an eruption of that
volcano. Now we all know that no such thing
could occur. It is simply impossible. All
true experience contradicts it. Our own per
sonal observation is that cities of 30,000
population are not built so close to volcanoes
that such destruction could be wrought. Be
sides, we have made dose search on the very
spot; and we do not'find that St. Pierre’s
ruins corroborate the statement of the his
torians of that time. There is a decided lack
of the quantity of ashes and lava, needed to
bury 30,000 people. But it is unnecessary to
give our reasonings, as you only desire a
compact statement of the results of our
searches.
But how far fallen were the morals of the
year 1900 will appear not only in the univer
sal statement that 30,000 people were killed
by Mont Pelee in an instant; but the records
show that the people of that city were as
corrupt as those of any city for a thou
sand years. The majority of the children
were illegitimate: tie . omen on the streets
went half covered; and vice prevailed over
whelmingly. And how materialistic was the
age appears plainly from the fact that no
priest or prophet is recorded as having pre
dicted the destruction of the city, or as hav
ing attributed its destruction to its uni
versal vice. And the very fact that no such
records are found, which abound in connec
tion with most such myths, proves that the
destruction did not occur. Mont Pelee did
not explode, as stated. And the city may
have been injured by fire, and later been
abandoned on account of sanitary reasons,
which it is now too late to discover, on ac
count of the industrial uses to whch we have
put the volcano.
In my next letter I will prove to you the
egotism of the people of the year 1907; that
is, fhe people of America.
Your affectionate grandfather.
Higher Critic.