750 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



December, 1918 



OUR HOMES 



A. I. ROOT 



If I regard iniquity in my heart, the Lord will 

 not hear me. — Psalms 66:18. 



Righteousness exalteth a nation; but sin is a 

 reproach to any people. — Prov. 14:34. 



We have made a covenant with death, and with 

 hell are we at agreement; when the overflowing 

 scourge shall pass thru, it shall not come unto us ; 

 for we have made lies our refuge, and under false- 

 hood have we hid ourselves. — Isaiah 28:15. 



T HAVE re- 

 J. peatedly 

 said, during 

 the years that 

 are past, that 

 when our Gov- 

 ernment would 

 break loose 

 from the liquor- 

 traffic, the war 

 would come to 

 an end; and 

 during these se- 

 V e r e struggles 

 during recent 

 times I have 

 been more and 

 more impressed 

 that our first 



text, "If I regard iniquity in my heart, 

 the Lord will not hear me," can be applied, 

 and was intended to apply, to nations as 

 well as to individuals. In all these years 

 since our own Civil war, our own country 

 has been " cherishing iniquity " by con- 

 senting to receive " revenue " from the 

 liquor-traffic. It has seemed to me that it 

 was duplicating on a large scale w'hat some 

 of our policemen have been doing in letting 

 the saloon-keeper go on with his hellish 

 traffic if he would give the policeman a cer- 

 tain sum of money every month ; or, if you 

 choose, as has recently been brought to 

 light, where a woman of the street paid 

 " hush money " to the police, once in so 

 often, for turning their heads the other 

 way when plying her trade. This is putting 

 it pretty strongly, I know ; but is it not true ? 

 The brewers and saloon-keepers are just 

 now, as I write, wasting their money (at 

 least I hope they are wasting it) by putting 

 liquor advertisements in periodicals that 

 will accept them, telling that our Govern- 

 ment is going to lose — I forget how many 

 millions — by cutting off the revenue that 

 has been helping (?) to keep things going 

 for so many years, by shutting down not 

 only the distilleries but the breweries as 

 well. Why, a recent advertisement in one 

 of our ciity dailies had the audacity to 

 claim that the city could not pay the 

 teachers of the schools the raise in their 

 salaries that they really ought to have con- 

 sistent with the times unless they have the 

 revenue from the saloon-keepers and 

 brewers. Did you ever? The idea that all 

 the schools and colleges, and I am not sure 

 but the advertisement mentioned churches 

 also, can not be kept up without the help 

 of the traffic in beer! Well, just now we 

 can praise the Lord because our Govern- 

 ment has decreed that the breweries shall 



be closed up 

 December 1, 

 1918. Some of 

 the said brewers 

 in the nearby 

 city of Cleve- 

 land are making 

 a pitiful protest. 

 Among other 

 things, one 

 brewer declared 

 that he has just 

 put in some new 

 up-to-date and 

 very expensive 

 machinery,, and 

 this is going to 

 be a dead loss if 

 there is no pros- 

 pe"t of the ban being lifted very soon. How 

 did it hapi3en that he went ahead and pvt 

 in said machinery at such a time as this? 

 Election day is just before us. The cut- 

 ting off of the breweries and distilleries is 

 the result of vigorous protests from the 

 people of our nation; and I feel sure that 

 more vigorous protests are going to be the 

 result of this coming election. It just now 

 begins to transj^ire as never before that 

 the voice of the people is going to rule; 

 and, thank the Lord, there are more good 

 people in our land just now than the vici- 

 ous and the bad. Yes, praise the Lord, I 

 think I may safely go further and say there 

 are more good people in the whole wide 

 world, than vicious and bad. This war has 

 brought about an awakening and a stirring- 

 up ; and not only China, but even poor 

 wicked Germany is beginning to consider 

 our second text — "Righteousness exalteth a 

 nation ; but sin is a reproach to any peo- 

 ple." 



Now where does our strange third text 

 come in — "We have made a covenant with 

 death, and with hell are we at agreement," 

 etc.? Years ago I used this same text and 

 applied it to a single individual — a deluded, 

 good-for-nothing person — a man who can 

 best be described by the second verse in the 

 fortieth Psalm: "He brought me up also 

 out of a horrible pit, out of the miry clay, 

 and set my feet on a rock." Well, it just 

 occurred to me a few days ago that this 

 other strange passage might also refer to a 

 nation as well as individual. I hunted it 

 up in my Bible, and went into Huber's 

 private office and asked for his attention a 

 minute. Then I read it to him out of the 

 Bible. He started up in surprise and said 

 something like this: 



" Why, fathei-, where in the world did 



