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ftljc Jlrieon JUirrur. Vol. VII.—No. 35. JUST A WORD. In the midst of life’s reverses, When thy pathway all seems dark, Black as midnight, unillumined E’en by pleasure’s faintest spark; When deep gloom and sad foreboding Cradles thee within its arms, And thy soul is filled with broodings Working ill like evil charms; When thy labor all seems useless. And existence one great pain, Joy and hope are fled forever, And to struggle on seems vain; Do some tender deed of mercy To a soul with sorrow racked, Give the balm of loving kindness In some helpful little act. That one deed thy soul will lighten, And its heavy gloom will lift, As a ray of brilliant sunshine Through the blackest clouds may drift. —Mina F. Schmitz, in Good Housekeeping LOVE. If Everyone felt its Power it would make the World a New Eden. Love is the only true motive power in human affairs if they are to be car ried on in harmony. All else is warfare. There is no real justice but love. With out this principle as a propelling power, without kindness as a lubricant, this weary old world of ours will always rumble along like a belated, broken down coach, or like a vehicle without springs; jerky and uneasy. But, what is love ? There is so much that goes by that name! There is a love w'hich’loves money; but that is Avarice. There is a love which loves to add house to house and land to land; but that is Greed. There is a love that is Lust. There is a love which loves rank and position; but that is Pride. There is a love which loves finery, dress and petty distinction and attentions; but that is Vanity. There is a love which loves to be talked about, which loves fame or notoriety; but that is Ambition. There is a love which loves the delicacies of the table, or those of the wine cellar; but that is Gluttony or Drunkenness. There is a love which loves revenge; but that is death. The love I am interested in is none of these. It is LOVE! And what a grand thing is Love! If everyone felt its power— its saving power—it would make the earth a New Eden. In imagination, I see a universe of human beings loving and living for each other and for all; and, by the same imagining, I see a Paradise, inasmuch as world-wide Love is world-wide rest. When every human creature, in purpose and in ef fect, says; “All that I am, and have, and can do or say, is at others' service, at everybody’s command, a common good, as opportunity occurs,” the dark places will be bright with a superabund ance of happiness. No longer will a portion of the human family rise early and go to bed late, and spend their days in grinding toil and anxiety; with never the proper thing to eat, or to wear, or to shelter in, that another portion of God’s family may take its unearned ease, fare sumptuously every day, and luxuriate without stint. No longer will jails, asylums, hospitals, workhouses and gin shops be crowded with the criminal, the mad, the diseased, the poor and the drunken. Even the ani mal kingdom, and the lower forms of life or sentient existence, will benefit by the change, when the wand of Love is waved as a sceptre over a mad world. Under the new regime there is not a beast of the field, or an ox in the stall but will grow more sleek and docile. Not an insect but will be filled with di viner life. Every flower will be more beautiful. Every tree more luxuriant. With humanity, as soon as love con trols it, every living and, indeed, every “IT IS NEVER TOO LATE TO MEND.” STiLL WATER, MINNESOTA, APRIL 5, 1894. inanimate thing will be in harmony. All the shy things of the forest and brake, and the wild things of the fields and woodland, have become compan ionable; the human beings, reclaimed and redeemed by Love, see in them a beauty and utility, a ness, they never saw before.' The beat en dog and the kicked cat, like the half starved child, welcome the reign of Love, for blows and kicks, starvation and neglect are done with; remembered only as an evil nightmare. The tall elm and the sturdy oak indulge in kind ly whisperings; which all interpret as a benison; and the music of the rustling leaves in the woodland sanctuary, the sweet breathings of the gentle zephyr,' and the rippling rhyme of the brooklet touch a responsive chord deep down in human nature when its diapason is Love. Nor is the fury of the tempest, the harsh recoil of the ocean wave on the shingly beach, or the mournful murmuring of the autumnal winds through the quivering leaves unmusi cal to those whose heart strings are set to harmony. Verily, it is a new world that Lo tq has created! Love! The mightiest, gentlest, most magnanimous, the most Godlike power attainable and imagin able! The world is full of poetry un der its spell! The goal is found! Love is the key to every conceivable good!— World’s Advance Thought. Courage. Following is an extract taken from an address delivered by Hon. C. F. Buck, to an audience at the Unitarian church, of Winona: “I admire courage because so far as my knowledge enables me to judge, all advance that has been made during all the ages, and fair play gen erally, can be attributed almost entirely, if not altogether, to courage. I admire it, too, because it is found in the high est degree among honest people, and because, in its highest and fullest de velopment, it is unselfish and always stands by the right and against the wrong. “As a rule, courage does not dom inate in individual character. It is only here and there we find one that posses ses that commanding courage which dominates the whole character, and en ables one to meet the responsibilities of life without question, and to stand by the right though the heavens fall. “Leonidas. Damon and Pythias, John Brown and Lincoln possessed the high est courage, and they died while bat tling in the interest of humanity. Yet, notwithstanding these noble sacrifices in the interest of the right, wrong still exists in the world, injustice is still be ing perpetrated, and pain and sorrow are still being inflicted. The reason is because there is so little courage in the world. We do not possess the courage of our convictions; we do not stand by the right as we see it. It is not ‘con science makes cowards of us all, ’ it is our selfishness dominating our courage which makes cowards of most of us. Conscience quickens courage and our sense of right. “This lack of courage in human char acter, and the consequent wrong and injustice, appears in every phase of hu man life. You will see it in our courts of justice. Some juryman, perhaps not having the courage of his convictions, allows himself to be coerced jnto re turning an unjust verdict. My obser vation and my experience teach me that there are but few men who have the courage to stand up alone in the de fense of the rights of a common citizen against a powerful public opinion, or against the active opposition of some great financial or corporate interest. “ You will see the same want of cour age in the religious world. Men sur render their independence and their right to think and talk, because they are afraid of the ostracism or injury to business which may follow. “It is just the same in the practical world. I knew a man who voted the same party ticket he had been in the habit of voting for years, against his convictions of right, because he was afraid of being called a turncoat. “I have known many young men who have been led into vicious and de structive habits which ultimately led to ruin, because they did not have the courage to say ‘No!’ “ It is courage we need; and although the man who has courage to stand by the right under all circumstances, and to say ‘ no,’ when he should say it, will be voted by the world a disagreeable crank perhaps, yet, it is upon the shoul ders of courage that humanity must be lifted; slowly, almost imperceptibly, yet surely, I think, to a higher and bet ter standard.” An Appeal to Patriotism. Thundering from the distant past, there started, with America, swelling like a mighty tide, a spirit of patriotism seldom equalled in rolling on and on through years of infancy and strife, and struggling toward a point of maturity where love of country might be combined with peace and pros perity. We have attained this peaceful element, but the prosperous one is, as yet, only a dream of the future. The poor man is under the thumb of capital. His bane is hard labor. The farmer’s good is tresspassed by tariff tinkerings. The syndicate intrudes on the merchants business. In our struggle for a peace ful and prosperous day, we have lost sight of the great ennobling principles of our forefathers. When they breath ed forth their sentiments of loyalty, the mighty spirit of patriotism received a new impetus with each such prodigy as Washington, Webster and Lincoln. We need some such awakening now! We need to look through the smoky windows of financial and political affairs and religious wranglings, and see the stars and stripes waving in a vehement call for recognition. Instead of living in a “free and independent” state, there seems to radiate from the wrangling hub of the political wheel, tangent lines of discord, greed and bribery. Were the words of Washington and those ear ly heroes of independence, a mere Vesu vian eruption, and are we now crouch ing under its falling shower of rocks and lava? Why need we cry for our youth again ? Let us stop chasing phan tom windmills and dragons, and show more of our firmer, truer nature. Let us rally once more to the emblem of honor! Let us lay aside these petty prejudices, these religious differences, these greedy scrambles for office and power, and show to the world that we cherish one country and worship one God, and love our honor more than sil ver and gold. We have had experience enough. Let us now put it to practice. Then we will see the dawn of prosper ity. The dismal hootings of the night owl will cease and the song of the lark begin. We will have more honest men and more clean characters. We will have less crankism and fewer Coxeys. And when the time comes for each of us to leave this mortal house, we shall be ready, knowing we have done our best in loving God and home. Vic. An Element of Character. Among men engaged in business af fairs there is wide difference in their ability to arrive at speedy conclusions. While some have will-power and self dependence, and can look at both sides of a subject, weighing and balancing arguments until a satisfactory decision is reached, there are others who halt between two opinions and by their hes itancy and indecision miss golden op portunities. Their judgment wavers and the longer they dwell upon the arguments, pro et con, the more difficult it seems to be for them to reach a de cision. In this, as in all things, extremes are not commendable, yet it is not easy to say which is the more harmful. A hasty decision made without due re gard may prove disastrous, while the one who does not decide, shifts respon sibility, and leaves time to settle that which should have been settled by good sense and wise judgment. There ought to be no difference of opinion on the Tcdmo. i s l<o ° P er year, in advance, i bnMo. -j six Months 50 Cents. value of speedy decision when it is reached by fair consideration and best judgment. A man who can decide quickly and correctly is valuable in the community, and his habit of ready decision is equally beneficial to himself. Speedy conclusion stimulates quick ac tion, and the man’s powers are roused to throw off whatever of indolence or torpidity may lurk in his nature by the determination to settle a question at once. A conscientious desire to do this be comes an educator and its value ought not to be underestimated in the work of training young minds. Whatever can be properly decided by a child should be left to it. Early training in this as in other things will make habit ual that which may not have been nat ural. Use will also add to the efficien cy of this faculty. The boy is trained to think quickly and to act promptly, consequently the decisions reached by him in after years will be more apt to be the result of wise judgment than will be those reached by one who has been allowed to procrastinate until de cision could be deferred no longer. This habit of readiness can be ac quired and like other good habits it cannot be formed too early. Once formed its daily exercise will be an element of strength in the character of any man.—Ft. Worth (Tex.) Gazette. Completely Prostrated. “Some of the medical ‘experts’ who have been cutting a wide swath in criminal trials lately, may be able to give an explanation of a singular phe nomenon that accompanies the detec tion of and the arrest of ‘respectable’ rascals,” says the Chicago Herald. “De faulting bank cashiers, embezzling bookkeepers, defeated Napoleons of finance, unlucky political bosses —all are ‘completely prostrated’ when they are found out. Why don’t their nerves occasionally give way while they are carrying on their rascality undetected ? Why does the Sunday school superin tendent who has been systematically robbing a bank for years go about with his nose in the air and enjoy life to the uttermost, only to be ‘completely pros trated’ and repentant when he is de tected ? Why should Boss McKane’s nerves give way when he is judicially pronounced a scoundrel —a fact that he and everyone else has been aware «f for years ? Why will a sanctimonious knave rob widows and orphans with out any compunction and yet collapse utterly when the law brings him to book? Is hypocrisy always cowardly, or do respectable thieves always delude themselves into the belief that they are doing nothing wrong, and suffer collapse when they find that they are common criminals after all ?” How We are Wrapped Up. We are all wrapped up in something. I do not refer to garments, for I have always considered that a person’s gar ments cut little or no figure in regard to their intellect or disposition. We may be all wrapped up in music, art, science, poetry, agriculture, oratory, charity, history, or in some great man of to-day or the past. These are all beautiful and bright shrouds; but very often we are bored most to death by persons who are all wrapped up in themselves. Have you not often seen persons so thickly wrapped up in their own importance that they could not command freedom enough to see the good qualities of their fel low man ? When you are speaking to them they are not heedful of your speech, but very ungenerously they will give you an idea of far more im portance from their large mind. The shroud of self importance is so great and thick that it entirely smothers meditation, which, if allowed to ex ercise would create reason, considera tion and judgment, hence justice to our fellow-man. Then I say it would be very wise and manly of us, if we should loosen the shroud of self-importance in which, alas, too many of us are en veloped.—Graceville Enterprise.