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By
S. S.
No. IX.
Prejudice.
Over some fair oasis, more beautiful and blooming
for the surrounding desolation, the deadly simoom
has breathed, and where but now nature revelled in
all her loveliness, nought is to be seen but decay
and death. So wither and perish all those
beautifying and soul-like qualities of the mind,
when Prejudice with its blighting influence usurps
the prerogative of the understanding, and bids
Reason fly from her throne. Cunning in its
approaches, it makes its way by steps slow but sure,
and ere the victim feels a dread of its advances, it
finds itself shrouded in its gloomy pall. Though few
things are impervious to the light of truth, here it
has no power to penetrate the parent of
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bigotry, and the germ from which have sprung those
autos-da-fé which blacken the pages of history, and
at whose recital the blood of the coldest burns with
horror and indignation.
The mind, when it first begins to feel the influence
of this tendency, becomes morbid, and the eye
perceives things under a false and uncertain medium.
And, as when viewed through a telescope, the spots
on the sun’s disc cover the whole field of
vision:—so the beauty and worth of character
disappear, and nothing presents itself but some
trifling defect, not perceivable by the unaided eye.
Beauty becomes deformity, and truth and virtue,
things of expediency. Passive at first, it soon
tires of inaction, and with its venom tooth it
injects the poison where it may spread and fructify,
and from whence its seed may be widely strewn. As
you would, my young friends, attempt to shield
yourselves from he attacks of a dangerous and
venomous reptile, so should you guard yourselves
from the approach of this insidious foe to your
reasoning powers. For, as reason is the grand
distinctive between man and the brute creation, we
should endeavour to keep this faculty in all its
native purity, and shun all that might tarnish its
innate beauty. Principle based upon religion is the
only guide and criterion of thought.
Our minds should at all times, and in every case,
act as a just judge, and without any reference to
individual or personal feeling, decide upon the law
and the testimony. And this must not be a negative
act only. We must cultivate early the habits of
self-examination. If we find our thoughts leading us
astray, we must battle with them manfully until we
subdue them. By close application and severe study
of moral and scientific works, we may, on finding
out how weak we are, and how little we know,
acquire that faith and trust in the Great Creator,
which, when they inspire the mind, free it from all
its little pettinesses and contractions a faith and
trust which we never can acquire unless we can say
with truth when we lie down on our nightly pillow or
to our eternal rest—I thank thee, oh God ! that in
thought or deed, I never have injured my fellow-man. |
