Acres of Diamonds | Page 8

did,
and while we sit here and laugh at him he has a better right to sit out
there and laugh at us. I know I have made the same mistakes, but, of
course, that does not make any difference, because we don't expect the
same man to preach and practise, too.
As I come here to-night and look around this audience I am seeing
again what through these fifty years I have continually seen-men that
are making precisely that same mistake. I often wish I could see the

younger people, and would that the Academy had been filled to-night
with our high- school scholars and our grammar-school scholars, that I
could have them to talk to. While I would have preferred such an
audience as that, because they are most susceptible, as they have not
grown up into their prejudices as we have, they have not gotten into
any custom that they cannot break, they have not met with any failures
as we have; and while I could perhaps do such an audience as that more
good than I can do grown- up people, yet I will do the best I can with
the material I have. I say to you that you have ``acres of diamonds'' in
Philadelphia right where you now live. ``Oh,'' but you will say, ``you
cannot know much about your city if you think there are any `acres of
diamonds' here.''
I was greatly interested in that account in the newspaper of the young
man who found that diamond in North Carolina. It was one of the
purest diamonds that has ever been discovered, and it has several
predecessors near the same locality. I went to a distinguished professor
in mineralogy and asked him where he thought those diamonds came
from. The professor secured the map of the geologic formations of our
continent, and traced it. He said it went either through the underlying
carboniferous strata adapted for such production, westward through
Ohio and the Mississippi, or in more probability came eastward
through Virginia and up the shore of the Atlantic Ocean. It is a fact that
the diamonds were there, for they have been discovered and sold; and
that they were carried down there during the drift period, from some
northern locality. Now who can say but some person going down with
his drill in Philadelphia will find some trace of a diamond-mine yet
down here? Oh, friends! you cannot say that you are not over one of the
greatest diamond-mines in the world, for such a diamond as that only
comes from the most profitable mines that are found on earth.
But it serves simply to illustrate my thought, which I emphasize by
saying if you do not have the actual diamond-mines literally you have
all that they would be good for to you. Because now that the Queen of
England has given the greatest compliment ever conferred upon
American woman for her attire because she did not appear with any
jewels at all at the late reception in England, it has almost done away

with the use of diamonds anyhow. All you would care for would be the
few you would wear if you wish to be modest, and the rest you would
sell for money.
Now then, I say again that the opportunity to get rich, to attain unto
great wealth, is here in Philadelphia now, within the reach of almost
every man and woman who hears me speak to- night, and I mean just
what I say. I have not come to this platform even under these
circumstances to recite something to you. I have come to tell you what
in God's sight I believe to be the truth, and if the years of life have been
of any value to me in the attainment of common sense, I know I am
right; that the men and women sitting here, who found it difficult
perhaps to buy a ticket to this lecture or gathering to-night, have within
their reach ``acres of diamonds,'' opportunities to get largely wealthy.
There never was a place on earth more adapted than the city of
Philadelphia to-day, and never in the history of the world did a poor
man without capital have such an opportunity to get rich quickly and
honestly as he has now in our city. I say it is the truth, and I want you
to accept it as such; for if you think I have come to simply recite
something, then I would better not be here. I have no time to waste in
any such talk, but to say the things I believe, and unless some of you
get richer for what I am saying to-night my time is wasted.
I say that you ought to get rich, and it is