December 16, 1871
[Page 14]
WOMAN ITEMS.
Seven thousand women belong to the Belgian International.
A bill in the Illinois Legislature proposes that women shall not be debarred from any occupation except the military….
The world is a looking-glass, [it] gives back to every man the reflection of his own face. Frown at it, and it will in turn look sourly upon you; laugh at it and with it, and it is a jolly, kind companion….
Did you ever think how much in the aggregate one single New York party costs? Original cost of the entertainment—cards, supper, flowers and music—$1,000. Say there are 200 people present, their expenses will easily average for carriages, gloves and the like, twenty dollars—$4,000 more; amounting altogether to the neat little sum of $5,000, a fortune for a good many people….
[Page 7]
COST OF THE CREDIT SYSTEM.
That the credit system is getting to be a costly one to honest and solvent buyers of merchandise is every day becoming more apparent. To say that an individual’s, or a nation’s credit, stands high in the market, is considered a great compliment, as betokening an unusual degree both of thrift and integrity in the party so complimented…. But the commercial value of such a reputation is not always as great as generally supposed, and depends very much upon the uses to which it is put.
Good credit, and too much of it, have often in the end, proved the ruin of some of our smartest business men…. When the credit system generally is in bad odor, as at the present time, and business failures are heavy and numerous, it is no great boon for a man to be able to get trusted, since it is just then that he is obliged to pay the dearest for this privilege. He not only has to pay the highest market prices for whatever he buys, but in addition he has to help to pay for what other people buy and fail to pay for themselves….
Perhaps it may be said, that those who uphold this costly system need not care, so long as the actual consumer foots the bill. But they ought to care, since on the ground of self-interest alone there is abundant reason why the dealer in merchandise should not wish to increase its cost to the consumer than is necessary to yield the former a fair profit..
The sufferers by the credit system are generally those who leas suspect themselves to be victims of the robbery. They know that many people fail in business, and that their creditors are supposed to lose large sums of money; but, as long as none of these debts are due to them, they do not feel concerned. They know, also, that they are obliged to pay unreasonably high prices for many things; but they do not dream that there is any connection between these prices and the bad debts and bankruptcy resulting from this abuse of credits. But there is such connection, and the mass of consumers have to pay roundly for the folly and fraud of men who undertake to do an immense business with little or no capital, and who for a while pride themselves on the excellence of their credit….
THE SIGNS OF “THEIR” COMING.
Some time since we said there was an organized movement prepared in the spirit world to move upon and convince this mundane sphere that life and immortality are not away in the distant future, as old theology teaches, subject to a resurrection upon a given judgment day; but that they are in our very midst…. Some incredulous people ask: Why do not spirits do something worthy of heaven, if they do in reality communicate?… But they forget that nothing is perfected at once. Children begin with their A, B, C’s. We used to ride in the slow stage-coach, where we now fly in the railroad-car; and mail-coaches and ships once carried our messages to distant friends, requiring even months to make the passage, where now telegraph accomplishes the same thing in time calculated by seconds. So with spirit communication, the methods of which are still very meager and oftentimes even unsatisfactory; but we are rapidly approaching much more perfect and satisfactory things, when the whole spirit-world will be opened to our astonished vision….
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