SUMMER MEETING AT BROOKFIELD. 103 



I well know that there are in our large cities, and even in hamlet 

 :and village, a few bifurcated dudes whose fathers made money by mak- 

 ing soap and candles, perhaps, or by selling shoddy blankets and paper 

 shoes, who claim that the world owes them a living, and they mean to 

 get it in the easiest way possible. For my part I have never been able 

 to discover how the world became indebted to such a class of nonenti- 

 ties ; if any one present can solve the how, I shall be much obliged 

 for the information. Let me include in this category, also, the ladies (?) 

 who resemble Solomon's lilies in that " they toil not, neither do they 

 spin." No ! my friends, labor is not a curse, but the greatest blessing to 

 all mankind; for, trite and stale as you may regard the sentiment, it is 

 true all the same, and can be proven by every honest man, as well as by 

 every inmate of our prisons, that "Satan finds some mischief still for 

 idle hands to do." And as a present reminder let me add also this pro- 

 verb : "There are but three generations between shirtsleeves." So 

 long as this round world moves in her orbit, so long as night follows 

 day, so long as we have the seasons in their courses, so long as we 

 have seed-time and harvest, so long will there be a necessity for labor 

 and service. I quote : 



' 'It has become axiomatic that there are but three ways of getting a living — 

 by working, by begging ofr by stealing. Those who do not work, disguise it in 

 whatever pretty language we may, are doing one of the other two * * * To be 

 an honest consumer, one must be an honest producer." * * * 



"He that will not work, neither shall he eat." 



But let us for a few minutes contemplate a rather extravagent 

 realization of More's " Utopia." Suppose every man and woman could 

 say, " Soul, take thine ease, eat, drink and be merry." There will be 

 no more labor or service, no more worry or fretting about what we 

 shall eat or drink, or wherewithal we shall be clothed; all are happy 

 and content. Just imagine the stoppage of every wheel in the har- 

 vest field, on the railway, in the factory or on the ocean. No more 

 smoke from the tall chimneys, no whistles from factory, steamboat or 

 locomotive. No sound of the builder's hammer or saw or plane. No 

 more newspapers, no cooking or sewing, no mails, no traveling by road 

 or river or rail, no teaching, no editing, no sowing or reaping or thresh- 

 ing or milling or gathering or canning of fruit; and so through all the 

 activiies and ramifications of human labor, mental or physical, as we 

 have it to-day. Would not the world of mankind speedily be a bedlam 

 becoming crazy, or, worse, devilish or devils? No! such a state of 

 affairs can not be. The All-wise and All-sood knew that activity of 

 mind and body were necessary for the best and happiest condition of 

 man. Therefore he placed him in a garden " to keep it and to dress it." 



