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Worth Woman 9 s While
“Ye Who Serve.”
oye who serve! And spend life’s days
In homeliest round of little things,
Whose - sun refuses oft to shine,
And vesper’s calm faint gladness brings—
Thon who hast passed within the gate
That shut thee from thyself, and bound
Upon thy willing- feet the chains
That Duty’s love for thee had found—
And left behind thee every wish,
And told thyself ’twas thine no more—
Then stood aghast that buried Hope
Did rise to hunt with dreams of yore—
And fought the battle o’er again,
And prayed for patience when was none,
And wisdom sought when blind, dumb sense
Had left thee spent and prone—undone!
And ye who know the bitter pang
Os careless mien in those for whom
Was bartered much that heart holds dear,
Even day mourned not in night of gloom!
Poor, weary ones! Yet know ye not
There stand bereft without the gate
Sad souls with none whom love may serve?
Than you, oh, far more desolate!
—F. L. T.
The Trick of Being Happy.
Why not be happy? There are very many more
things to make us happy than to,grieve us. The
trouble is we lose the sense of proportion—a little
cloud in our sky obscure not only the sun, but
the very light, so that we are surrounded with a
gloom not even hope can penetrate. With all the
glory of the heavens shining’ over us, and nature
blooming, and birds singing, and the great heart
of the world pulsing warm and true, we can yet so
yield ourselves to a disordered imagination that for
us no sun shines, no flowers bloom, the birds are
tuneless, and no heart is faithful but our own. We
look in, not out. and our crooked vision dwindles
every other object until we are ourselves uncon
sciously the very biggest thing in the universe.
It isn’t a thought we like to face, that thinking so
much of ourselves is what makes our troubles so
large, but—if we are fortunate—there comes a
time when we can look back and see that it was so.
self-centredness is so easy, it creeps on us so
almost like a thief in the night; we are unaware
of its presence until it has stolen our treasure, our
peace of mind, and the something which makes us
pleasant to ourselves and to others.
Nothing can be realer than the troubles and sor
rows which come to all alike, but with them are still
so many good things—the things we have in com
mon with all the world, “the rain that falls on the
just and the unjust,” the sunshine that is as much
for the humblest insect that crawls as for the high
est of earth’s great ones, and the universal love
which takes in the whole system of worlds nor
leaves out one tiniest creature. And there is the
Kingdom of Heaven within us if we so will—the
peace that comes with resignation under whatever
lot is ours, the joy in all the beauty spread around
us, the hope that, born of simple faith and trust,
leaves naught to fear.
“All earth-born cares,” says the poet, “are
wrong,” and when we come to analyze, they are
most of them, earth-born; little worries so sordid
that with a wider vision we would marvel they
could so have thrown us. It is not so much the
great things that prevent happiness as the little
ones that are permitted to rankle, and to grow
until out of all proportion to the seed that gave
them birth. So much grows out of jealousy, and
fancied effront. In a house where, in company with
others, we were a guest, was one whose sense of
The Golden Age for September 20, 1906.
By FLORENCE TUCKER
her own importance was such that when the maid
passed the dessert to others before herself she was
mortally offended, and showed it in such unmistaka
ble manner that not only the hostess, but all at
table were made uncomfortable. This woman’s
presence is a bane wherever she goes,, simply be
cause she has no thought but of herself. She has
cultivated being unhappy until she has succeeded
thoroughly, and for her there is nothing but herself
and the attention she exacts and the slights she fan
cies she gets. In contrast to her is a younger wo
man who practices the habit of being happy. “It
is a trick,” she says—she just makes up her mind
to be happy, whether or no, for only so can she
be so lovable to other people, and add to their
happiness. Not always did she do so, but coming
to see the philosophy of it she goes about it as
something to be done, and having acquired it she
calls it a trick—and a very good trick it is for any
one to play. One, too, that all may learn, fortu
nately.
And why don’t we? Why, when the world is
made so beautiful for us and life intended to be
so pleasant, do we choose to look in instead
of out, to look down instead of up? It is more
largely a matter of choice than we even realize; or
perhaps we were better to say habit. Most children
left to themselves are happy enough; it is only
as people grow older that they take on the ways
of melancholy and gloom, that they fall into the
habit of looking on the world as a dreary place
and life a disappointing experience.
Let us just be happy anyway—like our young
friend, let us learn the trick.
Philosophy of the Simple Mind.
The simple mind is often more philosophical than
one trained to do too much thinking on its own
account. As said of Paul, much learning makes us
mad, but for some of us a very little suffices; where
as, the simple minded person, taking little thought
at all, arrives, perhaps, as often and as correctly
at the solution of things as those who Would go
deep and ever deeper into questions obscure and
hidden.
A lady living in Mississippi had a little waif of a
negro she had gotten from the “po’-’ouse” (poor
house) as the child called it, whose duty it was
every evening to carry water to the different cham
bers.
One evening her mistress said to her, “Eliza Ann,
if you knew that the world would come to an end
to-night, what would you do?-”
“Jes’ gerlong, ” said Eliza Ann, “totin’ up my
night waters!”
Could there be more philosophy than that?
Things small nor great disturbed the tenor of her
way; the very world might come to an end, but
Eliza Ann would not be thrown from her place,
destined for her from the beginning; faithful to
the little groove in which she fitted, nothing could
dislodge her; even though she should know all
things were about to topple about her foolish head
in chaos ami ruin, she would just “gerlong, totin’
up her night waters.”
How ridiculous it sounds! But was not all wisdom
in it? If we would all go quietly on about our du
ties, not bothering about what may be going to
happen, would it not be the better thing to do—
when you come to think of it, the only thing to
do? Then let come what would, let the worlds and
systems go, if we be found at our post we need
be no more concerned than was Eliza Ann.
The Two Roots of 11l Health.
All ill-health, says a writer, has its origin in
two roots: anger and worry. If we accept this as
true, how unnecessary it appears that we should
ever experience anything but physical harmony and
soundness of body. Anger is so foolish a thing, so
unreasonable, so like to insanity; it is intemper
ance of its sort, the wildest intoxication. And how
unbecoming! Self-respect alone, the unwillingness
to appear a spectacle, prevents most of us from
indulging in this, so that the other root, worry,
may be considered the .cause almost entirely of our
undoing.
The other day, in reading, we came on the ex
pression “grandly trusting,” and it left us think
ing. “Simply trusting’’ is the way it is generally
put, but how much more this other means! To
trust simply were to be as a little child without
thought or responsibility and without comprehen
sion of what lies ahead or even around us.
But to trust in full realization of the obstacles
that beset life’s pathway, to look up with confi
dence and with perfect repose of faith under or
deals and deprivations and sufferings that would
lead to questioning; to suffer and yet be true, to
be resigned under whatever affliction and yet with
out ever a doubt of divine love and care—this were
to trust grandly.
To trust so were never to worry. Accepting’ all
things as in the plan for us there were no need to
worry. We would not change what is for our good,
for the working out of what is best for us; then,
if we are satisfied that we are in divine love and
care, we go resignedly, cheerfully, even happily, on,
contented in mind and healthy in body, for it is
mental harassment that undoubtedly is responsible
for fully nine-tenths of the physical unhealth that
afflicts the world. We do not realize it. From
the way that most of us apply ourselves to folly,
to the cultivation and indulgence of the most hurt
ful habits, it would appear we are totally uncon
scious of the inevitable result, that we have never
thought it out. And that is just about it. if we
had once thought properly about the matter we
would never fall into a thing so difficult to over
come and so fatal in effect. Indigestion, the bane
of the American people, the undoing of us as a na
tion, may be traced, perhaps, in ninety-nine cases
out of a hundred, to worry.
Anger is a mighty consumer—like a fearful
whirlwind or a raging tire. We knew a woman who,
in a blind passion, thrust one of her maids so vio
lently against the mantel that the girl’s eye, strik
ing against the sharp corner, was put out. And
strange to say, the daughter of this passionate mis
tress afterward lost the sight of one of her eyes,
which went out, and shrivelled just as had the
poor servant ’s—a cruel judgment, some were ready
to think, on the mother. However that may have
been, it was anger on the part of the mistress,
certainly, that deprived the unfortunate maid of
her eye, and left her for the rest of her life half
blind and disfigured. And the tempests many allow
themselves would result just as seriously if only
accident turned out that way. Anger is responsi
ble lor most of the murders committed, and no man
can compute how many of the lesser deeds of wick
edness.
But for all that, it is only second in its effects
to worry, tor it comes but now and then, and is
soon over; while anxiety and perturbation may,
from constant indulgence, become settled habit ami
an incurable, ever-destroying malady. If only we
could “grandly trust”!
I here are no times in life when opportunity,
the chance to be and to do, gathers more richly
about the soul than when it has to suffer,” says
Phillips Brooks, let, is it not by triumphing over
small things, the petty anxieties, “the cares that
intest the day,” that one becomes poised, acquires
strength, and increases his capacity for enduring
with fortitude the greater trials and sorrows which
enter into all lives?—Ex.