Delaware gazette. [volume] (Delaware, Ohio) 1855-1886, 1858-02-05
coon NATURE.

To be good-natured is both the duty and
the privilege of human beings. Immature is
a sin, sheme, and misfortune. A peev-
ish, fretful disposition may be regarded as a
very small vice; but i, is one of the greatest
generators of evil in society. And it is the
great curse of domestic life.
From the disposition which some persons
manifest to fret and scoid, on all occasions
aad without any occasion at all, it may be
reasonably inferred that they look upon
fretfing and scolding as the natural cure for
all the ills that flesh is heir to. But it is not
very difficult TO show that the practice ex-
aggerafes and mIltiplies :hem all.
To be good-natured is to be good per ses ;
il is to cultivate good feelings and good ac-
tons, and thus to become still better. To
be ill-natured is TO be bad per Sc; it is to
nurture an evil spirit and thus become worse
and worse. And between good and bad,
between better and worse, there is certainly
. distinction U;th difereace.
Some persous seem to have been born to
good-naiure, or with good nature. They
sre always good-natured. They are the salt
of the earth. IL there were none such, So
ciety would soon become entangled in a
general wrangle, and q universal war oil
determination would speedily reduce human
iify to the last of his race--an '' individual
sovereign"
With temper calm and unruffied by the
storms Of life. with passions equipoised and
always in subsection to the intellect, good
natured people coolly survey and easily
overcome the obstacles and difficulties in
their life's pathway.
Others there are who seem to have come
into the world in fretful humor. Does an
accident happen does evil betide ! does
anything go wrong. instead of applying the
remedy within reach, instead of acting ra
tionally in view of all the circumstances
they .break OUT in a passion, Ego off, in /
fit Of fury, rave rage. storm, muiter, sputter
All the energy of mind and of body whicl
should have been employed in the correc
ton of the evil, is wasted, and worse thar
wasted, in scolding and fretting about it
Lamentation, elimination, iteration, reitera
ton, babbling and gabbling, bawling ane
pickering, take the place of useful thinking
5 and rational action. In this way NOR,
strength is expended foolishiy than woult
have sufficed to have rectiied the wrong
ard, perchance, to have turned the evil init
good. o, the disadvantages of peevishness
Its possessors are the most commiserable o
all miserable wretches.
Freifulness invariably aggravates ever,
existing evil. AS inevitably as the needle
s points to the pole, and as surely as the poi
soned fountain gives forth bitter waters
fretting can not possibly produce anythin!
but evil. Frequently it converts one trivia
difficulty into two serious ones and some
times into ten incurable ones. The spiri
Of fretfnlness in this way becomes the pes
tilent seed whose growth and nurture uproo
and destroy the fairest flowers that bloom il
the garden Of Eden.
Persons say they are peeyish becaus
they are sick; they are frettul because the.
are bothered; they are ill-natured becaus
the weather is ungenial; they scold, an
glbber, and rant because they are troubled
or because somebody has abused them
they are angry because some one else is Sc
Fatal mistakel
Shall we iniure ourselves because other
try to injure us! This is too silly notio
for intelligent beings to entertain moment
Shall we act madlv because some one els
has acted foelishly! This is the very eS
preston ef the spirit of beastEness--ev
for evil. 1t is good alone that can overcom
evil.
Alas. those who live life of peeVishnes
who fret and scold on all the trivial occ;
sions of losses and crosses, little know VIII,
bodily injury and mental degradation al
among the fearful penalties which they il
cur and suffer. They scarcely dream
the depth of that unfathomable pit, adow
which the whole moral nature sinks amor
the hells of dsordered and perverted min
Little do they understand of the immens
difference, in the final result of a lies e,
perience, between applying all of the
mental powers on all occasions to the be
of purposes, or misapplying. wasting, al
debasing them.-Life Illustrated.