Ashtabula weekly telegraph. [volume] (Ashtabula, Ohio) 1853-1873, 1861-09-07
ASHTABULA 0. SATURDAY MORNING. SEPTEMBER 4 1861.

pose is the cradle of power. The man who
cannot hold his passions in repose-in per
feet repose-can never employ the measure
OF his power. These "cold men," as the
world calls them, are the men who move
aud control their race. But it is not ne.
ccesSary TO cling to great men for the illus
tration OF my subject. 10 say that Chris,
lian phianthrophist should not be sym
pathetic man would be to say that he should
not be man at all bnt nothing is more
certain than that ifa man should surrender
himself to his sympathies it would kill him.
In world where sin and its bitter fruits
abound as they do in this, where little chill.
dren cry for bread, and whole races arc
sunk IN barbariSm, and villainy prcys upon
virtue, and the innocent suffer in the
place oil tho guilty, and sickness lays
US manu- upon muItitudeS, and pain holds its
HctlnS TO life long bondage, and death
oa1s tlrongS daily to the grave, and leaves
other throngs wild with grief, a sensitively
! sympathetic man surrendcring himselfto to all
the influences that address him. would lose
all power to help the distressed. or even to
speak word of comfort. We are to nm.
prehend the woes of Others through our
sympathles in such reposc that all the DOW
er OF our natures will be held ready for
and subject to- intelligent ministry. The
woman who faints at the sight of blood i,
not fit for hospital. The man who erowls
at hearing groan will not do for a surgeon
1t we mean to do anything in this world for
the good of men, we must first compel
our sympathie: and our passions into re.
pose.
That which is true of power in this mat.
ter Is true of jndg mcnt. 1t is widely
bruited aphorism that call history is a lie, ,
and this aphoriSm had its birth in the fact
that historians become as it were, magnet
lied by the character with which they deal.
A man who writes the life Of ofNapoleon finds
himself either sympathzing with him, or
reused into antipathy by him. In short,
he becomes the subject of a passion,
wrought upon him by the character which
he coniemplates and undertakes to paint
and from the moment this passion takes DO.
session of him, he becomes unified to write
an impartial and reliable word about him.
All positive historical characters have all
posSIoIe historical portraits, simply because
the "rllerS are subjects of passion. 1t il
because no man can write of positive char
acterS without being the subjects Of an in
lluence from them that no man can be an
impartial historian, and that all history
must necessarily be lie. If ever perfect
| history shall be written, it will be written
by one whose passions are under entire con-
troll, and kept in condition of profound
rcpose--who will look at a historical char
acler as he would upon an impaled beetle in
an chronological collection. A man is no
competent judge of characters either in
history or in life, with which he strongly
Sympathizes. | have known many man
utterly unified to read the proofs of the
vilainy of one to whom he has surrendered
his Sympathies. A woman in love is Il very
poor judge Of character. She can see moth.
! ing but eXcelencies were others see nothing
but shalIOwneSs and rottenness.
Once more, there is no dignity without
repoSe. a restless, uneasy man can never
be a dignitied man. There can be no dig
pity about a man or a woman who fumes
and frcts and fuses, and is full of freaks and
caprccs. Dignity of manners is always as
sociated with repoSe. Mrs Fluttcr Budget
always enters drawingroom as if she were
loaded doll, tossed in by the usher, and
goes dodging aud tipping about to get her
center of gravity, without getting it. Her
queenly neighbor comes in as the sun rises
calmly, swcetly, steadily, and all hearts
bow to her dgnifed coming What would
an Archbishop be worth for dignity. who
should be continually scratching his cars,
and brushing his nose, and crossing and re-
crossing his legs, and drumming with his
fingers Who would not deem the ermne
degraded by chief justice who should be
constantly twiching about upon his bench
1t is fact that has come under the obscr-
vation of the least observant that the mo-
mcnt a man surrenders himself to his pas
sions, he loses his dignity. A fit of anger
is as fatal to dignity as dose of arsenic to
life A fit Of mirthfulness is hardly less
fetal So it is in repose, aud particularly
in repose of passions, that we find the hap,
piness, the influence, the power and tic dig
nifty of our life. Let us cultivate repOse.