I heard of a boy who stole a cannon-ball from a navy-yard. He watched
his opportunity, sneaked into the yard, and secured it. But when he
had it, he hardly knew what to do with it. It was heavy, and too large
to conceal in his pocket, so he had to put it under his hat. When he
got home with it, he dared not show it to his parents, because it
would have led at once to his detection. He said in after years it was
the last thing he ever stole. The story is told that one of Queen
Victoria's diamonds valued at $600,000 was stolen from a jeweler's
window, to whom it had been given to set. A few months afterward a
miserable man died a miserable death in a poor lodging-house. In his
pocket was found the diamond and a letter telling how he had not dared
to sell it lest it should lead to his discovery and imprisonment. It
never brought him anything but anxiety and pain.
Everything you steal is a curse to you in that way. The sin
overreaches itself. A man who takes money that does not belong to him
never gets any lasting comfort. He has no real pleasure, for he has a
guilty conscience. He cannot look an honest man in the face. He loses
peace of mind here, and all hope of heaven hereafter. "As the
partridge sitteth on eggs, and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth
riches, and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days,
and at his end shall be a fool. . . . Let no man go beyond and defraud
his brother in any matter; because that the Lord is the avenger of all
such."
I may be speaking to some clerk who perhaps took five cents to-day out
of his employer's drawer to buy a cigar; perhaps he took ten cents to
get a shave, and thinks he will put it back to-morrow--no one will
ever know it. If you have taken a cent, you are a thief. Do you ever
think how those little stealings may bring you to ruin? Let your
employer find it out. If he doesn't take you into court, he will
discharge you. Your hopes will be blasted, and it will be hard work to
get up again. Whatever condition you are in, do not take a cent that
does not belong to you. Rather than steal, go up to heaven in
poverty--go up to heaven from the poor-house. Be honest rather than go
through the world in a gilded chariot of stolen riches.