Page:Dr Stiggins, His Views and Principles.pdf/157

 to the soil. Who, without minute and delicate observation, could identify the splendid butterfly, clad in all the colours of the rainbow, with a loathsome caterpillar crawling on the ground? So, it must not surprise us if we find in the Inspired Volume that deliberately to hurt another man's feelings is denounced to be a most capital and deadly sin, that poverty is held up to our admiration as a highly-privileged state, that the possession of a flourishing business and an immense fortune is considered as occupying much the same position as that of a man on the brink of a frightful precipice, that the saving of money and a careful consideration of future contingencies are regarded as both imbecile and wicked. We must not be surprised again when we find the Master studiously shunning the company of what we should call the respectable classes, and associating with persons, male and female, whom we should describe as drunkards, tavern-haunters, wastrels, and "Bohemians." At the same time, I need not point out to you that