The Harm of Stone Bruises.
The United States has four million automobiles, which means more than sixteen million tires, probably at least twenty million. A very little carelessness in the use of these twenty million tires mounts up very soon to an incredible aggregate.
One of the commonest forms of carelessness results in what are known as stone bruises. These bruises are caused by hitting loose stones or fixed projecting stones while going at a high rate of speed, say from twenty-five miles an hour upward.
No cut or opening is made in the tread of the tire, no harm appears on the surface, but soon the motorist has a blowout while running, perhaps, over a perfectly smooth road. What has happened? The heavy car, moving rapidly, bumped over that stone with an impact equal to a hammer-stroke of about ten tons. The tire was bent inwards with great violence. It rebounded and almost instantly resumed its shape, but the inner fabric was broken. This break weakened the other layers of fabric, and soon the rent spread. Gradually a gap was made clear through to the inner tube, and the tire could do nothing but collapse. That unnoted stone bruise was fatal.
It is like much that happens on the rough roads of life. We get many soul bumps, especially when we go too fast and too carelessly. Before we know it, our spirit is broken. "A broken heart," it used to be called. We have lost our old resiliency. The spiritual rent spreads. The integrity of our mental fabric has been ruptured. Our character is not the firm and gallant whole it once was. Then comes the break-down.
Temptation, un-resisted, makes a stone bruise. Any sin into which we rush gives the soul a stone bruise. Pride, greed, envy, jealousy, hatred, all make stone bruises.
Ah, brother motorists, consider not merely the outer surface but the inner fabric! Go prudently and wisely over the cobblestones of life!