The Daily Dispatch: September 18, 1862., [Electronic resource]

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The extortioners.

We have heard that one of our most exemplary divines in this city says he really cannot find it in his heart to pray for the extortioners and speculators who are availing themselves of the calamities and privations of their fellow creatures to swell their ill-gotten gains. For common publicans and sinners he believes there may be some forgiveness, but that people who show no mercy to others need expect none from Heaven. We are afraid, however, that motives of this kind will not reach the extortioners. It's no more use preaching to them than praying for them. They have hardened their hearts like Pharaoh, and will not let the people go. If Moses and the Prophets should rise from the dead, they would not listen; and if they knew the Day of Judgment were coming to-morrow, they would advertise ascension robes in the morning papers. It is but little consolation to know that the Devil will ultimately have them, one and all. People who speculate in articles of prime necessity, so that their poor neighbors must starve or freeze this winter, deserve the attentions of a gentleman whom they fear more than the Devil — the Provost Marshal, who ought to arrest them, as worse enemies to the State than Yankee spies or native traitors, and place them in Castle Thunder or the army.