Chapter XX

She thought still less of it that night when awakened from sleep by a gang of boisterous picnickers who, full of liquor, were returning home from a day of revelry. Women's and men's voices mingled together in singing vile songs.

How wholly depraved are some natures, and how necessary that these lewd minds should be purified by a closer communion with more spiritual intellects!

When there are seven days in a week and our King only exacts from us the Sabbath it does seem as if He is entitled to that, but where people are confined to employment every day in the week but one, it is hardly probable that the kind Father would object to their having an outing on their one day of liberty out of a week of unremitting toil, if they would conduct themselves properly.

Not in rioting and drunkenness; not in chambering and wantonness.
But put ye on the Lord Jesus Christ, and make not provision for the
flesh to fulfill the lusts thereof. Romans xiii, 13, 14.

My Sabbaths they greatly polluted.

I am the Lord your God; walk in my statutes, and hallow my
Sabbaths. Ezekiel xx, 13.

Thus saith the Lord, keep ye judgment, and do justice.

Blessed is the man that doeth this, and the son of man that layeth
hold on it; that keepeth the Sabbath from polluting it, and keepeth
his hand from doing any evil. Isaiah lvi, 1, 2.

If thou turn away thy foot from the Sabbath, from doing thy
pleasure on my holy day; and call the Sabbath a delight, the holy
of the Lord, honorable; and shalt honour him, not doing thine own
ways, nor finding thine own pleasure, nor speaking thine own words:

Then shalt thou delight thyself in the Lord; and I will cause thee
to ride upon the high places of the earth, and feed thee with the
heritage of Jacob thy father; for the mouth of the Lord hath spoken
it. Isaiah lviii, 13, 14.

But ere long a few cannot monopolize all the comforts, nor the masses be obliged to struggle hard every hour for the bare necessities of life, for who can defraud his neighbor when all minds will be a unit? and if honesty was practiced to the letter, the good things of life would not be so unequally divided.

The profit of the earth is for all. Ecclesiastes v, 9.

Yet ye say, the way of the Lord is not equal. Is not my way equal?
Are not your ways unequal? Ezekiel xviii, 25.

For every one from the least even unto the greatest is given to
covetousness, from the prophet even unto the priest, every one
dealeth falsely. Jeremiah viii, 10.

Their tongue is an arrow shot out; it speaketh deceit; one speaketh
peaceably to his neighbor with his mouth, but in heart he layeth
wait. Jeremiah ix, 8.

As a cage is full of birds, so are their houses full of deceit;
therefore they are become great, and waxen rich. Jeremiah v, 27.

Behold these are the ungodly who prosper in the world; they
increase in riches. Psalms lxxiii, 12.

Thus saith the Lord, execute ye judgment and righteousness, and
deliver the spoiled out of the hand of the oppressor; and do no
wrong, do no violence to the stranger, the fatherless, nor the
widow. Jeremiah xxii, 3.

Be renewed in the spirit of your mind; putting away lying, speak
every man truth with his neighbor; for we are members one of
another. Ephesians iv, 23, 25.

That they all may be one; as thou, Father, art in me, and I in
thee, that they also may be one in us. John xvii, 21.

Behold, how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell
together in unity! Psalms cxxxiii, 1.