One day a neighbor was in and my grandfather asked him for a chew. He went to hand it back, and I wanted some. He said I couldn't have it. I said I wanted it anyhow, and he picked me up and turned me across his knee and gave me a crack that made me see stars as big as moons.
If there is a father that hits the booze, he doesn't want his son to. If he is keeping some one on the side, he doesn't want his son to. In other words, you would not want your son to live like you if you are not living right.
An old general was at the bedside of his dying daughter. He didn't believe in the Bible and his daughter said, "What shall I do? You don't believe in the Bible. Mamma does. If I obey one I'm going against the other." The old general put his arms around his daughter and said: "Follow your mother's way; it is the safest." Man wants his children to have that which is sure.
I have sometimes imagined that young fellow in Luke xv. He came to his father and said, "Dig up. I'm tired of this and want to see the world." His father didn't know what he meant. "Come across with the mazuma, come clean, divvy. I want the coin, see?" Finally the father tumbled, and he said, "I got you," and he divided up his share and gave it to the young man. Then he goes down to Babylon and starts out on a sporting life. He meets the young blood and the gay dame. I can imagine that young fellow the first time he swore. If his mother had been near he would have looked at her and blushed rose red. But he thought he had to cuss to be a man.
No man can be a good husband, no man can be a good father, no man can be a respectable citizen, no man can be a gentleman, and swear. You can hang out a sign of gentleman, but when you cuss you might as well take it in.
There are three things which will ruin any town and give it a bad name—open licensed saloons; a dirty, cussing, swearing gang of blacklegs on the street; and vile story tellers. Let a town be known for these three things, and these alone, and you could never start a boom half big enough to get one man there.
Old men, young men, boys, swear. What do you cuss for? It doesn't do you any good, gains you nothing in business or society; it loses you the esteem of men. God said more about cussing than anything. God said, "Thou shalt not kill," "Thou shalt not steal," "Thou shalt not bear false witness," but God said more about cussing than them all; and men are still cussing. "Thou shalt not take the name of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless who taketh his name in vain."
No Excuse for Swearing
I can see how you can get out of anything but cussing. I can see how a man could be placed in such a position that he would kill and be exonerated by the law of God and man, if he killed to protect his life, or the life of another.
I can see how a man could be forced to steal if he stole to keep his wife from starving.