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Show A SERMON ON EXTRAVAGANCE. Rev. Zimmerman of the Baptist church, in his sermon Sunday night, took as his text, "He that earneth wages, earneth wages to put into a bag with holes." From his subject, Mr, Zimmerman reached the conclusion that the holes in the bag are made by the moths of extravagance. He illustrated il-lustrated his point by quoting from statistics on luxuries. Americans annually expend in drink $1,745,300,000; they consume con-sume in candy $178,000,000; they spend for gum $20,000,000; they give for fancy gloves $25,000,000; they waste on ostrich feathers $15,000,000; they spend for tobacco $515,000,000; they pay for jewelry and plate $700,000,000. The "extravagances" total $3,198,300,000, according to Rev. Zimmerman, and this is deplored as the consuming sin of the American Ameri-can people. The wage earners and others undoubtedly are open to censure for their lack of frugality, but all money spent for luxuries is not money wasted or wealth lost. Those who drink in moderation may receive some physical benefits; those who drink to excess do not cause a nation-wide impoverishment, except as they lessen their own usefulness, because even extravagance, under the competitive system sys-tem of business, demands waste in a country so rich in natural resources re-sources and so efficient in mechanical appliances and workmanship as are the American people. That seems at first thought a misstatement, misstate-ment, but on closer analysis will be found to be. Were we not a nation of spendthrifts, there would come periods of extreme dullness owing to what is termed over-production, but which is really under-consumption. Either that, or a very much larger per cent of the people must become drones in the hive of industry, in-dustry, which is only another term for wastefulness waste of talent and energy. The period in our history when there was the smallest degree of extravagance was that of the panic years from 1893 to 1897. From a moral standpoint though the waste in drink and tobacco, which comes from excesses, is reprehensible. There is a moral and physical breakdown which deserves the attention of not only Rev-Zimmerman Rev-Zimmerman but all ministers of the gospel and all men. He that earneth wages, puts his wages into a bag of holes, may i have another application. The man who is always a wage earner i can settle down to the dreary lot of one who will never gain great riches. The wage earner who receives $100 a month is far above the I average, and yet it is a poor business that will not bring it3 propri etor that net revenue. The ancient sage might have been advising his ' hearers to struggle to get out of the class of wage earners, if they hoped to have more of the money of the world than could be held in a bag of holes. That is good advice today, although every j one is not qualified by training or temperament to be a merchant, and many who are adapted to the calling are without the capital to make ; a beginning. ' |