bargain has generally set a trap for the unwary. One class of goods in
the window marked a certain price, an inferior class on the bargain
counter at the same figure. You bargain for a piece of furniture at a
surprisingly low figure; when it is delivered you have every reason to
suppose that it is like what you bought in appearance alone. A roll of
cloth marked "all wool," it is half cotton, and the rest shoddy. The
business lie, though found so often, is never the friend of merchant or
purchaser. It is the foe of all honest transactions. Office,
salesroom and storehouse would be better without it; proprietor, clerk
and purchaser would thrive better if rid of it.

The lie of gossip. If by some power, human or divine, the gossiping
tongue could be silenced and the tattling mouth effectually closed,
half of the evil of this world would already be stopped, and the other
would commence to languish for want of patronage. The lie of gossip is
the blackest of them all. The blackest of all the black horde, the
very worst of the whole evil troop; insinuating, sly and crafty, it
creeps around with a serpent's stealth, and carries beneath its tongue
the deadly poison of ten thousand adders. The venom can be extracted
from the cobra's fangs, but no power on earth can tame the tongue of an
unprincipled gossip. Some lies you can kill, but the lie of gossip is
imperishable. You may clip its wings, but its flight is unhindered;
you may cut off its head, but two will grow out in its place; you may
crush it to earth beneath the heel of denial. Let it alone and
possibly the dirty, contemptible, infamous thing will die; touch it not
and it may droop and languish; do not chase it and it may grow weak for
want of exercise.

Oh, my dear reader, above all things, don't have your life a lie, your
career a falsehood. Be no hypocrite, live no lie, and the God of all
truth will see something in you to admire if you live truthfully and
honestly before all men. Truth is a sure pledge not impaired, a shield
never pierced, a flower that never dieth, a state that feareth no
fortune, and a port that yields no danger. We can not build a manly
character unless we are in possession of the imperial virtue, truth.
Ah! truth is the diamond for which the candid mind ever seeks. It is
the sanction of every appeal that is made for the good and the right.
It may be crushed to earth, it may be long in achieving victory, but it
is omnipotent and