p. 127 | Swearing

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Oct 21, 1875

Swearing.

Of all bad habits, it would be difficult to name one that has less reason or provocation in it than that of using profane and vulgar language. When coolly viewed, the act of one human being calling violently on his Maker to deliver over his fellow-man to condemnation is wicked in the extreme; it is a vain and irreverent use of his Maker’s name; and it is the expression of a hateful and infernal wish. But leaving the wickedness of the habit out of account, it is useless and irrational. It brings no pleasure, nor comfort, nor relief. No swearer is ever the wiser, richer, or happier for his curses. He cannot inflict the evil he invokes. He may curse his enemy for a lifetime, without turning one hair of his enemy’s head white or black by the process. The language furnishes all the words and terms needed to give strength and vigor to expression, without resorting to oaths and curses. All the words needed to express indignation and wrath even are to be found in it. An oath does not give strength or emphasis to the truthful man’s yea; and all the oaths and maledictions that can be imagined cannot give an atom of strength to the liar’s nay.

Swearing is chiefly a habit. For the foul volleys of oaths and curses that the habitual swearer pours out in ordinary conversation, or on slight provocations, there is no shadow of excuse. They are a shame to himself, and a disgust to his acquaintances. Some men are such slaves to the vicious habit that they swear without knowing it; they converse in a dialect of oaths. They would be disgusted themselves if they could see one of their simple conversations taken down in short-hand and put in print, with coarse oaths bristling all along the line of their remarks. Profanity and vulgarity do not always go together, but they are apt to. The swearer is in danger of becoming vulgar, and the vulgar man is almost invariably a swearer. When both habits meet in the same individual, they make him intensely offensive to all pure-minded people. It is imagined by some that an occasional oath or a little vulgarity gives spice and flavor to conversation; but if it does, it is a very offensive flavor. There is nothing more charming than chaste and simple language, and it is worth any young man’s while to cultivate the habit of using it. An oath would not be considered a flavor to the conversation of a modest and beautiful maiden; neither can it be justly held to add to the spirit or piquancy of the conversation of a man.—Sel.