"Health and good humor," said Massillon, "are to the human body like
sunshine to vegetation."
The late Charles A. Dana fairly bubbled over with the enjoyment of his
work, and was, up to his last illness, at his office every day. A
Cabinet officer once said to him: "Well, Mr. Dana, I don't see how you
stand this infernal grind."
"Grind?" said Mr. Dana. "You never were more mistaken. I have nothing
but fun."
"Bully" was a favorite word with him; a slang word used to express
uncommon pleasure, such as had been afforded by a trip abroad, or by a
run to Cuba or Mexico, or by the perusal of something especially
pleasing in the "Sun's" columns.
"One of my neighbors is a very ill-tempered man," said Nathan
Rothschild. "He tries to vex me, and has built a great place for swine
close to my walk. So, when I go out, I hear first, 'Grunt, grunt,' then
'Squeak, squeak.' But this does me no harm. I am always in good humor."
Offended by a pungent article, a gentleman called at the "Tribune"
office and inquired for the editor. He was shown into a little
seven-by-nine sanctum, where Greeley sat, with his head close down to
his paper, scribbling away at a two-forty rate. The angry man began by
asking if this was Mr. Greeley. "Yes, sir; what do you want?" said the
editor quickly, without once looking up from his paper. The irate
visitor then began using his tongue, with no reference to the rules of
propriety, good breeding, or reason. Meantime Mr. Greeley continued to
write. Page after page was dashed off in the most impetuous style, with
no change of features, and without paying the slightest attention to the
visitor. Finally, after about twenty minutes of the most impassioned
scolding ever poured out in an editor's office, the angry man became
disgusted, and abruptly turned to walk out of the room. Then, for the
first time, Mr. Greeley quickly looked up, rose from his chair, and,
slapping the gentleman familiarly on his shoulder, in a pleasant tone of
voice said: "Don't go, friend; sit down, sit down, and free your mind;
it will do you good,--you will feel better for it. Besides, it helps me
to think what I am to write about. Don't go."
"One good hearty laugh," says Talmage, "is like a bomb-shell exploding
in the right place, and spleen and discontent like a gun that kicks over
the man shooting it off."
"Every one," says Lubbock, "likes a man who can enjoy a laugh at his own
expense,--and justly so, for it shows good humor and good sense. If you
laugh at yourself, other people will not laugh at you."
People differ very much in their sense of humor. As some are deaf to
certain sounds and blind to certain colors, so there are those who seem
deaf and blind to certain pleasures. What makes me laugh until I almost
go into convulsions moves them not at all.
Is it not worth while to make an effort to see the funny side of our
petty annoyances? How could the two boys but laugh, after they had
contended long over the possession of a box found by the wayside, when
they agreed to divide its contents, and found nothing in it?
The ability to get on with scolding, irritating people is a great art in
doing business. To preserve serenity amid petty trials is a happy gift.
A sunny temper is also conducive to health. A medical authority of
highest repute affirms that "excessive labor, exposure to wet and cold,
deprivation of sufficient quantities of necessary and wholesome food,
habitual bad lodging, sloth, and intemperance are all deadly enemies to
human life, but they are none of them so bad as violent and ungoverned
passions;" that men and women have frequently lived to an advanced age
in spite of these; but that instances are very rare in which people of
irascible tempers live to extreme old age.
Poultney Bigelow, in "Harper's Magazine," in relating the story of
Jameson's raid upon the Boers of South Africa, says that the triumphant
Boers fell on their knees, thanking God for their victory; and that they
prayed for their enemies, and treated their prisoners with the utmost
kindness. Our foreign missionary books relate similar anecdotes, it
being a characteristic feature of their childlike piety for new converts
to take literally the words of our Lord,--"Love your enemies."
It is not true that the devil has his tail in everything. A stalwart
confidence in God, and faith in the happy outcome of life, will do more
to lubricate the creaking machinery of our daily affairs than anything
else.
"LE DIABLE EST MORT."
"_Courage, ami, le diable est mort!_" "Courage, friend, the devil is
dead!" was Denys's constant countersign, which he would give to
everybody. "They don't understand it," he would say, "but it wakes them
up. I carry the good news from city to city, to uplift men's hearts."
Once he came across a child who had broken a pitcher. "_Courage, amie,
le diable est mort!_" said he, which was such cheering news that she
ceased crying, and ran home to tell it to her grandma.
Give me the man who, like Emerson, sees longevity in his cause, and who
believes there is a remedy for every wrong, a satisfaction for every
longing soul; the man who believes the best of everybody, and who sees
beauty and grace where others see ugliness and deformity. Give me the
man who believes in the ultimate triumph of truth over error, of harmony
over discord, of love over hate, of purity over vice, of light over
darkness, of life over death. Such men are the true nation-builders.
Jay Cooke, many times a millionaire at the age of fifty-one, at
fifty-two practically penniless, went to work again and built another
fortune. The last of his three thousand creditors was paid, and the
promise of the great financier was fulfilled. To a visitor who once
asked him how he regained his fortune, Mr. Cooke replied, "That is
simple enough: by never changing the temperament I derived from my
father and mother. From my earliest experience in life I have always
been of a hopeful temperament, never living in a cloud; I have always
had a reasonable philosophy to think that men and times are better than
harsh criticism would suppose. I believed that this American world of
ours is full of wealth, and that it was only necessary to go to work and
find it. That is the secret of my success in life. Always look on the
sunny side."
"Everything has gone," said a New York business man in despair, when he
reached home. But when he came to himself he found that his wife and his
children and the promises of God were left to him. Suffering, it was
said by Aristotle, becomes beautiful when any one bears great calamities
with cheerfulness, not through insensibility, but through greatness of
mind.
When Garrison was locked up in the Boston city jail he said he had two
delightful companions,--a good conscience and a cheerful mind.
"To live as always seeing
The invisible Source of things,
Is the blessedest state of being,
For the quietude it brings."
"Away with those fellows who go howling through life," wrote Beccher,
"and all the while passing for birds of paradise! He that cannot laugh
and be gay should look to himself. He should fast and pray until his
face breaks forth into light."
Martin Luther has told us that he was once sorely discouraged and vexed
at himself, the world, and the church, and at the small success he then
seemed to be having; and he fell into a despondency which affected all
his household. His good wife could not charm it away by cheerful speech
or acts. At length she hit upon this happy device, which proved
effectual. She appeared before him in deep mourning.
"Who is dead?" asked Luther.
"Oh, do you not know, Martin? God in heaven is dead."
"How can you talk such nonsense, Kaethe? How can God die? Why, He is
immortal, and will live through all eternity."
"Is that really true?" persisted she, as if she could hardly credit his
assertion that God still lived.
"How can you doubt it? So surely as there is a God in heaven," asserted
the aroused theologian, "so sure is it that He can never die."
"And yet," said she demurely, in a tone which made him look up at her,
"though you do not doubt there is a God, you become hopeless and
discouraged as if there were none. It seemed to me you acted as if God
were dead."
The spell was broken; Luther heartily laughed at his wife's lesson, and
her ingenious way of presenting it. "I observed," he remarked, "what a
wise woman my wife was, who mastered my sadness."
Jean Paul Richter's dream of "No God" is one of the most somber things
in all literature,--"tempestuous chaos, no healing hand, no Infinite
Father. I awoke. My soul wept for joy that it could again worship the
Infinite Father.... And when I arose, from all nature I heard flowing
sweet, peaceful tones, as from evening bells."