19U1 



GLKANINGS IN BEE CULTURE 



483 



not know there was any such thing as swear 

 words. I have been here only four days, and 

 yet I have heard some terrible swearing. A 

 young man was drawing off stones on a stone- 

 boat. He was on a side hill, away up in plain 

 sight, and where everybody could hear him. 

 He drove his team over where the bank was 

 so steep the stoneboat tipped over, and the 

 stones all went rolling to the bottom of the 

 hill. At this he swore just awfully. He seem- 

 ed to want to let everybody knoiv what a bad 

 and wicked heart he had. Now, pretty nearly 

 at the same time, and not far away, another 

 boy (or young man) was also drawing stones 

 and logs and stumps. When he was going 

 after a log, the log-chain caught in a stick, 

 and he called to his horse to stop, and then 

 stooped down to get the end of the stick out 

 of the chain. But the horse started suddenly, 

 without orders. The stick flew up and struck 

 him under his chin, and knocked him down 

 flat in the dirt. I think it must have hurt 

 him considerably. Now, it would have been 

 quite natural for this boy, anger, d by the 

 pain, to scold at the horse — may be to swear 

 — that is, if he was in the habit of swearing, 

 because the horse started without orders. But 

 this last boy is not a swearing boy. He just 

 looked pleasant and good-natured, and laugh- 

 ed abopt it. I saw him sprawling in the dirt, 

 and asked him what the matter was, and he 

 told me how it happened. He did not " yell " 

 at his horse, and he did not even talk loud. 

 He took it all as an accident. " Now, chil- 

 dren, let us consider a little about that other 

 boy. Whose fault was it that his stoneboat 

 tipped over? Was it the fault of the horse? " 



" No, sir." 



" Was the stoneboat to blame ? " 



Some of the children smiled at the idea of 

 a stoneboat being to blame for an accident. 



"Well, children, a good many peopleswear 

 at stoneboats and other inanimate objects 

 They seem to think it is sensible, and may be 

 smart, to curse things that have no sense or 

 responsibility. You have told me the horses 

 were not to blame for this accident, and the 

 stoneboat was not to blame. Then who was 

 to blame? " 



"The boy himself." 



Another answer came from another part of 

 the house : 



" Mr. Root, the accident was the result of 

 his own carelessness or stupidity." 



Then I added : 



" Children, people sometimes say swearing 

 does not hurt anybody. It does hurt people. 

 It pains everybody who loves righteousness 

 and hates iniquity. It sets a bad example for 

 the younger ones. It is catching, like small- 

 pox and cholera ; and I am inclined to believe 

 it is worse than either. It worries the horses. 

 "Vou watch the horses, and see how they look 

 Avhen somebody swears at them. They know 

 "what swear words mean. More than all, it 

 harms the man who allows himself to yield to 

 the temptation to use such words. First he 

 swears at his team, then he whips and pounds 

 Ihem. Then they get contrary and stubborn, 

 and work is interrupted and hindered. I have 

 sometimes thought that the man who swears 



at his team was worth only about half as uiuch 

 as the man who does not swear ; and there 

 are some owners of horses who will not have 

 a man on the premises who swears and gets 

 mad at his team, at his stoneboat, or at his 

 work." * 



You may urge it is not so bad to swear at a 

 stoneboat, for that has no feelings ; but there 

 is less sense and reason in it than swearing at 

 horses. It is a very bad plan to swear at 

 horses, but not nearly as bad as to swear at 

 your neighbors. The last of our texis says, 

 " Let none of you imagine evil in his heart 

 against his neighbor ; " and then it adds, 

 " Love no false oath, for all these are things 

 that I hale, saith the Lord." The man who 

 swears at a stoneboat and at horses will soon 

 swear at his neighbors, especially if he has 

 difficulty with them. Then come blows, law- 

 suits, penitentiary, and sometimes death. A 

 man not far from where I live quarreled with 

 his neighbor about a division fence. One of 

 them was killed, and the other is now in the 

 penitentiary. Very likely it commenced by 

 the foolish habit of swearing ; but before 

 swearing comes, there must be " evil imagina- 

 tions " in the heart. The swearing only tells 

 to the world, and publishes abroad, the bad- 

 ness of the man's heart. Where the spirit of 

 Christ Jesus rules, there can never be any 

 thing of this kind. 



Poor Peter ! It may be that he would have 

 never used those very bad and awful words 

 had he not been around where he heard some- 

 body else use them. May God help you, dear 

 children, to keep from this terrible habit. 

 Keep away from it ; let it alone just as you 

 would smallpox, cholera, or that terrible mal- 

 ady known as the " black death." 



NOTES or TRAVLL 



< BY A. I. BOOT- 





FLORIDA TRAVELS, CONTINUED. 



My trip down the coast was in the night, so 

 I could not get a glimpse of the towns in the 

 vicinity of Miami. Going back, however, I 

 had a better opportunity for doing so. All 

 along the railway from Miami to Palm Beach 

 there are acres and acres of pineapples 

 These require no sheds — that is, so far as frost 

 is concerned ; but they did not show the lux- 

 uriance and thrift that we find in smaller 

 plantations, especially those under sheds. 



* It so happened, strangely enough, that, during the 

 week following my Sunday talk, the young man who 

 swore at the stoneboat came to help me. I did not 

 send for him, but a neighbor for whom he was work- 

 ing sent him. He began to swear before my four 

 boys. 1 remonstrated; but a little later I saw him 

 offering one of the boys some tobacco, telling him he 

 would " never be a man " until he could use tobacco. 

 Do you see, boys, how these things go together? It 

 seems as if each one of you must sooner or later make 

 a choice — a choice either for righteousness or iniquity. 

 Which shall it be? Almost everything depends on 

 the way you start out. May God help you to choose 

 rightly. 



