duty and avoiding impulsive actions. Pause before you say a hasty or a
cruel thing. Human life is so uncertain, are you sure that you will have
a chance to make it right before death will have claimed the object of
your momentary anger? Tears and expressions of regret are of no avail
when addressed to cold clay. Pause before doing a hasty or inconsiderate
action. It may be of such a nature that you can not undo its effects. It
may embitter your whole after life. Reflection is your good angel; give
heed to her warning voice. How are you spending your life? Are you
living as becomes a man and immortal being? Are you striving to make the
most of life and its possibilities? If not, be warned in time, and turn
from your ways. When life is nearly ended you will think of the
past,—wonder at your actions, and sigh for the days of youth. They will
not come to you again; therefore, make the most of them _now_. Thus will
you spare yourself many vain regrets, and your closing days will be days
of peace.
[Illustration: MEMORY.]
"Lull'd in the countless chambers of the brain,
Our thoughts are linked by many a hidden chain.
Awake but one, and lo, what myriads rise!
Each stamps its image as the other flies."
—POPE.
[Illustration]
Some one has said that of all the gifts with which a beneficent
Providence has endowed man the gift of memory is the noblest. Without it
life would be a blank, a dreary void, an inextricable chaos, an
unlettered page cast upon the vast ocean of uncertainty. Memory is the
cabinet of the imagination, the treasury of reason, the registry of
conscience, and the council chamber of thought. It is the only paradise
we are sure of always possessing. Even our first parents could not be
driven out of it. The memory of good actions is the starlight of the
soul. Memory tempers prosperity by recalling past distresses, mitigates
adversity by bringing up the thoughts of past joys, it controls youth
and delights old age.
Memory is the golden cord binding all the natural gifts and excellences
together, and though it is not wisdom in itself, still it is the primary
and fundamental power without which there could be no other intellectual
operations. Memory is often accused of treachery and inconstancy, when,
if inquired into, the fault will be found to rest with ourselves.
Although nature has wisely proportioned the strength and liberality of
this gift to various intellects, yet all have it in their power to
improve it by classing, by analyzing and arranging the different
subjects which successively occupy their minds. By these means habits of
thought and reflection are required, which will materially conduce to
the invigorating of the understanding, the improvement of the mind, and
the strengthening and correction of the mental powers.
A quick and retentive memory both of words and things is an invaluable
treasure, and may be had by any one who will take the necessary pains.
Educators sometimes in their anxiety to secure a wide range of studies
fail to sufficiently impress on their scholars' minds the value of
memory. This memory is one of the most valuable gifts God has bestowed
upon us, and one of the most mysterious. The more it is called upon to
exercise its proper function the more it is able to do, and there seems
to be no limit to its power. It is not what one has learned, but what he
remembers and applies that makes him wise. Still memory should be used
as the storehouse, not as a lumber-room. The mind must be trained to
think as well as remember, and to remember principles and outlines
rather than words and sentences.
It is an old saying that we forget nothing, as people in fever begin
suddenly to talk the language of their infancy. We are stricken by
memory sometimes, and old reflections rush back to us as vivid as in the
time when they were our daily talk. We think of faces, and they return
to us as plainly as when their presence gladdened our eyes and their
accents thrilled in our ears. Many an affection that apparently came to
an end, and dropped out of life one way or another, was only lying
dormant. A scent, a note of music, a voice long unheard, the stirring of
the Summer breeze may startle us with the sudden revival of long
forgotten feelings and thoughts.
Memory can glean, but can never renew. It brings us joys faint as the
perfume of the flowers, faded and dried of the Summer that is gone. Who
is there whose heart is dead to the memories of his childhood days? Old
times steal upon us, quietly making us young again, even amid the din of
business and the whirl of household cares! The care-worn face relaxes
its tension and the saddened brow clears for a time as some
well-remembered scene rushes through the mind, bringing back the
childhood home and the loved faces which met around the daily board.
We love to think of days that are past if they were days of happiness,
and even experience a sad pleasure in recalling days of sadness. The man
or woman who loves to look back upon the direction and counsel of a wise
father and faithful mother will seldom do an unworthy or unjust act. And
we find the most degraded at times marveling as to what led them into
sin, because the remembrance of a happy home is theirs—a home of
purity, of a father's and mother's loving counsel and upright example.
When sorrow and trial, care and temptation, surround us how often do we
gain courage and renewed strength by thinking of the past. The bankrupt
loves to think that he started on a fair basis from the cradle. And the
worldly woman, who seems plunged in the vortex of fashionable pleasure,
stops to think that it was not always thus, that a devoted mother taught
her nobler things, and an earnest father bade her live for some real
object in life. Just that moment's reflection may sow the seed which
will develop into a life of charity and good works among her
fellow-mortals. And that condemned criminal—who knows what memory
recalls to his view? Perhaps it was a home from whence the incense of
daily prayer ascended to God—where kind words enforced a cheerful
obedience to wise counsels. Disturb him not; the influence is holy—'tis
memory's voice urging him to final repentance.
We love to think of the unbroken circle; the curly heads of the
children, and the various dispositions that marked them; the childish
employments and aspirations; the mischievous pranks and merited
punishment; and the quiet hour when the mother, gathering the little
ones about her, told them of the better life to come, and sought
earnestly to teach them that here below we live as school children,
gaining an education that shall fit us for the brighter home hereafter.
But these thoughts are not altogether of joyous scenes. Change and death
appeared on the scene, and strangers came to dwell in the home of our
childhood.
It is strange what slight things suffice to recall the scenes of
childhood. A fallen tree, a house in ruins, a pebbly bank, or the
flowers by the wayside, arrest our steps, and carry the thoughts back to
other days. In fancy we again visit the mossy bank by the wayside, where
we so often sat for hours drinking in the beauty of the primrose with
our eyes; the sheltered glen, darkly green, filled with the perfume of
violets that shone in their intense blue like another sky spread upon
the earth; the laughter of merry voices, are all brought back to memory
by the simplest causes.
The reminiscences of youth are a trite theme, but it possesses an
interest which the world can not dislodge from our breasts. If all then
was not uninterrupted sunshine, yet the clouds flew rapidly by, and left
no permanent shade behind them, as do those of mature years. From the
covenants of friendship then we thought in after days to enjoy the
benefits and treasures of love. But the forces of life have driven us
asunder, and swept away all but the memory of the past. How different
the contrast in thoughts and feelings then and now! Then it was the
trusting confidence of childhood; now it is the doubting mind that hath
tasted of the world's insincerity. We had _faith_ then, but we have
_doubts_ now.
The heart must, nay, it has, grown old, and is full of cares. It will
relate at length the history of its sorrows, but it has few joys to
communicate. Memory seldom fails When its office is to show us the tomb
of our buried hopes. Joy's recollection is no longer joy, but sorrow's
memory is a sorrow still. The memory of past favors is like a
rainbow—bright, beautiful, and vivid—but it soon fades away; the
memory of injuries is engraved on the heart, and remains forever. The
course of none has been along so beaten a road that they remember not
fondly some resting-places in their journey, some turns in their path in
which lovely prospects broke in upon them, some plats of green
refreshing to their weary feet.
Some one has said: "Memory is ever active, ever true; alas, if it were
only as easy to forget!" Memory is a faithful steward, and holds to view
many scenes over which we would fain drop the curtain of oblivion and
let the dust of forgetfulness cover them from view. What a relief could
we but forget that angry word! The uncalled-for harshness and the
passionate outbreak that went unrecalled so long that death
intervened—O could we but erase their remembrance! But no, with a
retaliative justice memory summons us to review them! Words which can
never be recalled, deeds whose effect on others can never be effaced,
how they come, one by one, showing us how useless our lives have
been—how vain! Still, these memories are friends in disguise, for they
are faithful monitors, and are experience's ready prompters. How much is
spoken which deserves no remembrance, and which does not serve as a
single link in one's existence, not calling forth one result for others'
weal, or thrilling one chord with nobler impulses!
How beautiful to distinguish the pearls in the rush of events—this
torrent of scenes both sad and pleasing! The gift of memory is
diversified to different people, some having a taste for history, some
for literature; others delight in politics, and so on through all the
different phases of existence, with its diversity of thought and
feeling. Memory has been compared to a vast storehouse. How important,
then, that we inure the mind to healthful actions instead of feeding it
on poisons until it will produce naught but poisonous thoughts! Look at
the world of literature and science. Why not delve in its mines of
glittering, genuine treasures? Inasmuch as the mind derives much of its
pleasures from thoughts of the past it becomes all to provide, as far as
possible, for happy reminiscences. This is the reward of right living.
An aged person whose thoughts revert to a life of self-denial and
exertion in virtue's ways has a source of happiness, pure and unalloyed,
which is denied to him whose guiding rule of life has been selfishness.
Memory has a strange power of crowding years into moments. This is
observed ofttimes when death is about to close the scene. As the
sunlight breaks from the clouds and across the hills at the close of a
stormy day, lighting up the distant horizon, even so does memory, when
the light of life is fast disappearing in the darkness of death, break
forth and illume the most distant scenes and incidents of past years.
And the very clouds of sorrow which have drifted between are lighted up
with a glorious light. As the soft, clear chimes of the silvery bells at
the vesper hour float down on the shadowy wings of evening, even so are
the thoughts of old age. They recall scenes past, their memory being all
that is left now. It may be the face of a mother, the smile of a sister,
a father's kind voice, all stilled by death. Many of these thoughts are
too sacred to expose to the gaze of the curious; they are their only
treasures; beware of drawing back the curtain which conceals them from
your view.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: HOPE.]
"Auspicious hope! in thy sweet gardens grow
Wreaths for each toil, a charm for every woe."
[Illustration]
All that happens in the world is directly or indirectly brought about by
hope. Not a stroke of work would be done were it not in hopes of some
glorious reward. It matters not that it generally paves the way to
disappointment. Phœnix-like it rises from its ashes and bids us
forget the disappointment of the present in the contemplation of future
delights. Hope, then, is the principal antidote which keeps our hearts
from bursting under the pressure of evils.
Some call hope the manna from heaven that comforts us in all
extremities; others the pleasant flatterer that caresses the unhappy
with expectations of happiness in the bosom of futurity. But if hope be
a flatterer she is the most upright of all the flattering parasites,
since she frequents the poor man's hut as well as the palace of his
superiors. It is common to all men; those who possess nothing more are
still cheered by hope. When all else fails us hope still abides with us.
Used with a due prudence hope acts as a healthful tonic; intemperately
indulged, as an enervating opiate. The vision of future triumph, which
at first animates exertion, if dwelt upon too strongly, will usurp the
place of the reality, and noble objects will be contemplated, not for
their own inherent worth, or with a design of compassing their
execution, but for the day-dreams they engender. Hope sheds a sweet
radiance on the stream of life, and never exerts her magic except to our
advantage. We seldom attain what she beckons us to pursue, but her
deceptions resemble those which the dying husbandman in the fable
practiced upon his sons, who, by telling them of a hidden mass of wealth
which he had buried in his vineyard, led them so carefully to delve the
ground that they found, indeed, a treasure, though not in gold, in wine.
Reasonable hope is endowed with a vigorous principle; it sets the head
and heart to work, and animates one to do his utmost, and thus, by
perpetually pushing and assuring, it puts a difficulty out of
countenance, and makes a seeming impossibility give way. Human life hath
not a surer friend nor, many times, a greater enemy than hope. It is the
miserable man's god, which, in the hardest grip of calamity, never fails
to yield him beams of comfort. It is the presumptuous man's devil, which
leads him awhile in a smooth way, and then lets him break his neck on
the sudden.
How many would die did not hope sustain them! How many have died by
hoping too much! This wonder may we find in hope—that she is both a
flatterer and a true friend. True hope is based on energy of character.
A strong mind always hopes, and has always cause to hope, because it
knows the mutability of human affairs, and how slight a circumstance may
change the whole course of events. Such a spirit, too, rests upon
itself; it is not confined to partial views, or to one particular
object, and if at last all should be lost it has saved itself its own
integrity and worth.
It is best to hope only for things possible and probable; he that hopes
too much shall deceive himself at last, especially if his industry does
not go along with his hopes, for hope without action is a barren undoer.
Hope awakens courage, but despondency is the last of all evils; it is
the abandonment of good—the giving up of the battle of life with dead
nothingness. When the other emotions are controlled by events hope
remains buoyant and undismayed,—unchanged, amidst the most adverse
circumstances. Causes that effect, with depression, every other emotion
appear to give fresh elasticity to hope. No oppression can crush its
buoyancy; from under every weight it rebounds; amid the most depressing
circumstances it preserves its cheering influence; no disappointment can
annihilate its power; no experience can deter us from listening to its
sweet illusions; it seems a counterpoise for misfortune, an equivalent
for every disappointment.
It springs early into existence; it abides through all the changes of
life, and reaches into the futurity of time. In the midst of
disappointments it whispers consolation, and in all the arduous trials
of life it is a strong staff and support. If, in the warmth of
anticipation, it prepares the way for the very disappointments to which
it afterwards administers relief it must be confessed that, in the
severer inflictions of adversity, which come upon us unlooked for, and
where previously the voice of sorrow was never heard, it then appears
like an angel of mercy, and frequently assuages the anguish of
suffering, and wipes the dropping tears from the eyes.
Hope lives in the future, but dies in the present. Its estate is one of
expectancy. It draws large drafts on a small credit, which are seldom
honored when presented at the bank of experience, but have the rare
faculty of passing readily elsewhere. Hope calculates its schemes for a
long and durable life, presses forward to imaginary points of bliss, and
grasps at impossibilities, and, consequently, very often ensnares men
into beggary, ruin, and dishonor. Hope is a great calculator, but a poor
mathematician. Its problems are seldom based on true data, and their
demonstration is more often fictitious than otherwise.
There is a morality in every true hope which is a source of consolation
to all who rightly seek it. It is a good angel within that whispers of
triumph over evil, of the success of good, of the victory of truth, of
the achievement of right. "It hopeth all things." It is a strong
ingredient of courage. Under its guiding light what great events have
been wrought to a successful completion! It is a friend of virtue. Its
religion is full of glorious anticipations. It encourages all things
good, great, and noble.
It is not surprising when we reflect on the nature of hope that we find
it to be such a mainspring to human action. It is the parent of all
effort and endeavor, and "every gift of noble origin is breathed upon by
hope's perpetual breath." It may be said to be the moral engine that
moves the world and keeps it in action. Every true hope which has for
its object some great and noble design is an unexpressed prayer, which
flies on angel's wings to the throne of God, and returns to the
struggling one a precious benison of inspiration to go forth on his
errand of good.
A true hope we can touch somehow through all the lights and shadows of
life. It is a prophecy fulfilled in part—God's earnest money paid into
our hands, that he will be ready with the whole when we are ready for
it. It is the sunlight on the hill-top when the valley is dark as death;
the spirit touching us, all through our pilgrimage, and then soaring
away with us into the blessed life where we may expect either that the
fruition will be entirely equal to the hope, or that the old glamour
will come over us again, and beckon us on forever as the choicest gift
heaven has to give.
"Hope deferred," saith the proverb, "maketh the heart sick." But we are
prone to be too dictatorial as to how we enjoy life; too positive. We
must not determine that their fulfillment must come in just the way we
wish, or else we will be miserable in the grief of disappointment. It is
not for man wholly to determine his steps. Sometimes what he thinks for
his good turns out ill; and what he thinks a great evil develops a great
blessing in disguise. It is folly, almost madness, to be miserable
because things are not as we would have them, or because we are
disappointed in our plans. Many of our plans must be defeated for our
own good. A multitude of little hopes must every day be crushed, and now
and then a great one.
But while we may be all wrong in our thoughts of the special form in
which our blessing will come, we need not fail of the blessing. It may
be like the mirage, shifting from horizon to horizon as we plod wearily
along; but in the fullness of God's own time we shall reap if we faint
not. There is always a sadness in the dying of a great hope. It is like
the setting of the sun. The brightness of our life is gone, shadows of
the evening fall behind us, and the world seems but a dim reflection of
itself—a broader shadow. We look forward into the lonely night. The
soul withdraws itself. Then stars arise, and the night is holy.
Hopes and fears checker human life. The one serves to keep us from
presumption, the other from despair. Hope is the last thing that dieth
in man. Though it may be deceptive, yet it is of this good use to us,
that while we are traveling through this life it conducts us in an
easier and more pleasant way to our journey's end. There is no one so
fallen but that he may have hopes; nor is any so exalted as to be beyond
the reach of fears. "When faith, temperance, and other celestial powers
left the earth," says one of the ancient writers, "Hope was the only
goddess that stayed behind."
The man who carries a lantern in a dark night can have friends walking
safely by the light of its rays, and not be defrauded himself. So he who
is of cheerful disposition, and has the light of hope in his breast, can
help on many others in this world's darkness, not to his own loss, but
to their gain. Hope is an anchor to the soul, both sure and steadfast,
that will restrain our frail bark and enable us to outride the storms of
time.
There are so many humiliations in this world! The secret is to rise
above them, to throw off dissatisfaction, and to grasp some pleasing
hope, grateful and beneficial to the mind. We are encompassed by
illusions and delusions. We need the comforting promises of the heart—a
steadfast faith in the good and true, and hopefulness in all things,
especially of futurity. Hope is rich and glorious, and faithfully should
it be cultivated. Let its inspiring influence grow in the heart; it will
give strength and courage.
Let the cheerful word fall from the lips, and the smile play upon the
countenance. The way of the world is dark enough even to the most
favored ones among us. Why not, then, gather all the happiness out of
life that you can? Why not strive to cultivate the cheerful, hopeful
disposition that will enable you to see the silver lining to every
cloud? By such a course you will do much to assuage the sorrows and to
increase the joys and pleasures of life.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: PROSPERITY.]
[Illustration]
Prosperity is the great test of human character. Many are not able to
endure prosperity. It is like the light of the sun to a weak
eye—glorious, indeed, in itself, but not proportioned to such an
instrument. Greatness stands upon a precipice, and if prosperity carries
a man ever so little beyond his poise, it overbears and dashes him to
pieces.
Moderate prosperity is not only to be hopefully expected as the proper
reward of a life's exertion, but to bring the best human qualities to
any thing like perfection, to fill them with the sweet juices of
courtesy and charity, prosperity, or a moderate amount of it, is
required, just as sunshine is needed for the ripening of peaches and
apricots. But prosperity, if it be good for the encouragement of
humanity, is full of danger as well. There is ever a certain languor
attending the fullness. When the heart has no more to wish, it yawns
over its possession, and the energy of the soul goes out like a flame
that has no more to devour. A smooth sea never made skillful mariners,
neither do uninterrupted prosperity and success qualify men for
usefulness and happiness. The storms of adversity, like those of the
ocean, rouse the faculties and excite the invention, prudence, and skill
of the voyager. The martyrs of ancient times, in bracing their minds to
outward calamities, acquired a loftiness of purpose and a moral heroism
worth a life-time of softness and security.
It seems as if man were like the earth. It can not bask forever in the
sunshine. The snows of Winter and its frosts must come and work in the
ground, and mellow it to make it fruitful. A man upon whom continuous
sunshine falls is like the earth in August—he becomes parched, hard,
and close-grained. To some men the Winter and Spring come when they are
young. Others are born in Summer, and made fit to live only by a Winter
of sorrow coming to them when they are middle-aged or old. But come it
must, and under its softening influence the mind is fitted for the
routine of life, and then the warm, shining sun of prosperity spreads
abroad in the heart its vivifying influence, and the best powers of man
are developed.
The way to prosperity is as plain as the way to market. It depends
chiefly on two words—industry and frugality; that is, waste neither
time nor money, but make the best use of both. Without industry and
frugality nothing will do, and with them every thing. There is no other
way to arrive at a true prosperity. It is gained only by diligent
application to the business of life. The men who may be said to be
prosperous are seldom men who have been rocked in the cradle of
indulgence or caressed in the lap of luxury, but they are men whom
necessity has called from the shade of retirement to contend under the
scorching rays of the sun with the stern realities of life, with all of
its vicissitudes.