OBJECT-TEACHING
Many men could be brought to abandon their evil habits if they could have them as plainly pictured as the man did in the following incident:
A rich profligate kept two monkeys for his amusement. Once he peeped into his dining hall where he and his friends had been enjoying themselves in wine, and found his pets mimicking the recent party. They mounted the table, helped themselves to the wine, and gestured and jabbered as they had seen their master and his guests doing. Soon they got merry and jumped all about the room. Then they got to fighting on the floor and tearing each other’s hair. The master stood in amazement. “What,” he said, “is this a picture of me? Do even the brutes rebuke me?” Ever afterward he was a sober man.
(2219)
Object-teaching, Successful—See [Warmth, Lost].
Objection Overcome—See [Tact].
OBLIGATION
George William Curtis exhibited an unusual honesty. Not only had he a fine sense of obligation where there was no legal or moral responsibility, but he considered himself bound by obligations made by others, in which he had no part. Upon his father’s death, Curtis assumed his liabilities, amounting to $20,000, which took many years of personal deprivation for him to pay; and later, upon the failure of a firm in which he was merely a special partner for only a small amount, and having no part in the management, he refused the immunity allowed under the law, and gave up almost his entire fortune to pay the firm’s indebtedness.—James T. White, “Character Lessons.”
(2220)
OBLIGATION TO THE CHURCH