"'Pears like" the affairs of life on this planet are dreadfully
"higgledy-piggledy"; but in reality, there is a divine purpose, a use
in it all. It is the soul's kindergarten. It is interesting to
observe the curious and round-about ways Nature takes to insure the
greatest good to the greatest number of her needy children. Long
before the first nitro-glycerine "go-devil" was sent down, down, to the
uttermost depths, to shatter the oil-bearing rock, and set free the
wonderful deposit that was destined to mark a new era in the affairs of
men, rang out the Biblical mandate: "Let there be light," and in due
time the whole world was illuminated.
The sorcerers, who have abstracted vast wealth from this earth product
have fancied it was for their special benefit and use, that nature had
garnered up her stores to be thus liberated, and chemicalized into a
thousand forms, by their sagacious work. Not so! Quite indeed, not so!
Came--at last--the kerosene lamp. How marvelous the light of its clear
flame, after "tallow dips" and "pine knots"! How the little lamp of
the first experiment grew, and grew into gorgeous centers of sun-like
radiance, shining everywhere, illuminating hitherto darkened,
impenetrable places, carrying the torch of civilization round the
entire world. Alike in slum and palace, in homes of poverty, and set
to shine in the gilded resorts of the noble and wealthy; blessing the
student, and the vast army of enforced workers; lighting the paths of
men, and the ways of the multitude; making vice and crime more
difficult, by dispersing the darkness from hidden purlieus. Through
primeval depths and mountain fastnesses, wherever the footsteps of men
have wandered, the magic lamp has pioneered the way.
All war is horrible. Through what agonies of loss, and orgies of
death, and tortures of the weak driven to the wall by unscrupulous men
the war against material darkness on this planet has been carried on is
utterly unimaginable and impossible ever to be known. The end has been
reached, the great needs of humanity at large have been and are being
served, and while superior sources of light have largely taken the
place of the oil lamp, it still shines calmly on in the homes of the
poor, and will, for ages yet to come.
* * * * * *
"As a man thinketh, so is he." This may be only measurably true, in
consequence of the stress of circumstances; but sooner or later, the
thought moulds the individual beyond the power of disguising the real
character.