The Lancaster gazette. (Lancaster, Ohio) 1846-1852, 1847-07-30
miscellaneous.
From he New York Mercury.
A Short Patent Sermon.

from Ne NeW 1OTh MeTcufy.
A Short Patent Sermon.
My text is as follows:-
There is a voice which haunts me still,
wherefore on earth be-
In lonely vale, on lofty hill,
And on the distant sec
hear it in the silent night,
And at the break of morn;
And aye 1t crleth-dark or light
Man was not made to mourn!
My hearers-what do you suppose this
still small voice is, that haunts me wher-
ever l go-except it be through some
mud-holes Of misery of Gotham? Why,
it's nature whispering with a calm smile
upon her phiz, that man was not made to
mourn, Notwithstanding the Bard of
Ploughshare's sentiments on the subject.
No, brethren, man was made to laugh,
love, enjoy himself, and dig potatoes, to
the glory of his Creator. Yet how many
lazy, widowed mortals there are, who sit
down in the shade of melancholy to
mourn owe misfortunes of their own
breeding! There they sit, and sit, and
sit, looking at all that is bright and lovely
with a yellow and jaundiced VISION
nursing despair and determined on be-
ing forever miserable and as for enticing
them into habits of industry, with the
promise of a happy compensation, you
might as soon think of getting a barrel of
old cider To work by placing a dollar at
the bung hole. Mourn they must
mourn they will; and this too in a country
like ours?--where there is so much ell
bow room for ambition-where all a man
has to do is take courage and a shovel and
dig his way to wealth and honor-and
where, by the aid offaith and a few Irish
men, such almighty big mountains can
be moved! Oh! it is a sin and a shame
that man should mourn, where there is
nothing under the curtain of heaven to
prevent his laughing, singing, dancing,
and being as merry as a cricket in the
chimney corner.
My friends-all nature has proclaimed
that nothing was made to mourn. The
bright-faced sun-the calm silvery moon,
and the glittering stars-all sing togeth-
er of this grand truth in one ~unceasing
song, and echoing earth to their
sweet strains. If the world were inten-
ded for a house of mourning every flow
err would be painted b~lack-every bird
would be born a crow Or a black bird
every body would be born a negro-the
ocean would be a vast inkpot-a black
veil would be drawn over the face of
heaven-and an everlasting string of
Grape hung around the borders of crea-
ton. When | look abroad and see how
bright and cheerfulisthe general aspectof
things-how Earth exults in her joyous
springtime-how glorious in the pride of
her summerhood--and how camly, smil.
ingly beautiful in her autumnal decay-I
am bound to the conclusion, that nothing
upon Gods green-cushioned footstool
was ever intended to mourn. 1t is natur-
al for US sometimes to indulge in dull,
mush-and-milky meditation, and to en-
courage cold and blood-curdling fancies
or listen f~earfully to the tread of some
harbinger of evil, whose footsteps fall
with a rustling sound among our scared
flowers of hope, like those of the angel of
Death among the frost-faded leaves of
November; but | do assert, from the
neither extremity of my heart, that man
was no more.made to 60 prowling through
the world, than a canary bird was Gre
ated to sing at a Methodist meeting.
My dear friends-iti is mans inhuman-
ity to man. and mans inhumanity to him
self, that causes so much mourning. The
dreadful carnage Of war causes thousands
to mourn the loss of sires, sons, relatives
and friends, who immediate themselves
upon their country's altar, but whose val
lent lives are worth more than all the
mines of Mexico. Millions groan under
the iron hands of oppression; and as
many more under the incubus of laziness,
who moan and sigh to think that dollars
don't roll at their feet and that the sun of
prosperity won't shine in their den of
sluggishness. Let war be avoided as
far as possible-palsied be the Cypress
or's ARMAND flea besieged be he, say,
who is too lazy to move when he finds a
nest of young mice in his hair, and spiders
weaving their webs over his shirt bosom.
| tell you again, my brethren. you were
never made to stand still and moan, like
a mountain pine in the hollow midnight
wind. You were intended to go ahead
and keep stirring, like a busy barkeeper;
to be jolly, gay and lively-always in as
good spirits as a fly in a bottle of old ia
maica: to laugh at care, snap your fingers
at sorrow; and to whistle when beset by
the myarids of petty ills that so constant
ly are seeking'to annoy mankind. So
mote it be! Dow, JR.