Quasqueton guardian. (Quasqueton, Buchanan County, Iowa) 1856-1858, 1858-01-28
For the Qaasqueton Guardian
The Experience of ,57.

sun welcomed in the new born year of
Grace-One thousand eight hundred and
ffty-eight. 1t was the custom of the
ancients TO represent the year with two
faces, one glancing back upon the past
and the other gazing steadily forward up
on the future. So should it be with us
now, sending our thoughts back through
the months and days that have passed be-
fore US, learn wisdom by experience, and
look hopefully forward to the future.
There is no man whom the lessons Of
the past year should not beneft-not one
to whom the teachings of experience
will bring no real lasting profit. 1t is a
stern teacher, this same experience, but
its truths sink deep, and are not easily
eradicated. And although the last few
months have been productive of ruin,
disaster and suffering to many-althougb
but very few of us stand wholly un-
scathed by the financial storm that RACES
around us-although the patient toll of
years may have been scattered in breath
now is not the time to sit respondent,
idly weeping over our losses. We should
be up and doing, working out, solving
and regulating these great problems of
life, and let our experience, which has
been so bitter, deduce for us the moral
truths that shall guide and direct US to
increased prosperity in the future
We are now in the midst of serious
and alarming crisis. 1t came like the
whirlwind, and the strongest men bowed
and were broken before it. 1t found us
"eating and drinking and making mer-
ry," marrying and giving in mar
riage," buying and selling and getting
gain" We had no time or thoughts to
waste on commercial disaster or ruin-we
were SO prosperous, SO industrious-had
such vast and varied resources that we
could never experience a revulsion. To
be sure, such a thing did once happen,
perhaps, but then twenty years is such
an age in this fast generation, that we
had almost come to regard it as a myth,
a fable, that loomed up largely through
the misty past, but then not near as bad
as represented.
So we lived high and fast, built pala-
tial residences, drank costly wines, i'm
ported cargo after cargo of useless yet
high-priccd merchandise, paid picture
promises to pay in lieu of the real money
that was being sent out to pay for our
inery and furbelows. added acre after
acre to our farms, which were alread Y
too large to be titled with profit, specu
lated in corner lots and wild lands, dab
bled in stocks, went crazy after railroads,
and ran in debt to each other and to Eu-
rope more than we can honestly cancel.
All this while, everything was going
up, up. up. Labor, provisions and pro-
perty of all kinds rose in value so rapid
ly, that one might fall asleep in moder-
ate circumstances and wake up the next
morning millionaire. So We all fell
asleep one night counting our gains and
adding few thousands or millions or SO
as the morrow's profits, when behold,
upon arising, there had been great crash
in the night and our whole commercial
fabric was in ruins.
Well, the thing has been done-no
power can call back the past--no regula-
tions, retrenchments or reforms can roll
back the wave of disaster that has already
broken upon and overwhelmed us. And
although much private suffering and
many disappointments have ensued, we
shall find in the end that it has been the
best thing that could have happened to
US.
Ii is not good for nations or individu-
ais to be always prosperous, to sail for
ever down the sunny stream of life
Clouds and tempests must o'ershadow
them-they must be involved amidst
whirlpools and quicksapds to feel their
dependence upon Him "who guides the
whirlwind and directs the storm" With
no adversely they grow proud and AFRO
giant, then luxurious and effeminale, and
finally sink and die through the gross
ness Of their own fullness. So sank Rome
in debauchery and corruption. and the
once mistress of the world is now among
the things that were. So faded Babylon
and Thebes and Palmyra, and the wild
beasts howl amid their crumbling pal
aces, and the wandering Arab pitches
his tent beside the mound that covers all
that remains Of the proudest city that
ever existed.
We have, as nation and AS individu-
ais, been too prosperous. Having gone
on steadily from year to year, increasing