The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1870-03-26
OUR RnGroxoUs COLUMN.
RORRLRpY.


Every mau should be sober sometimes. ] once
knew one so unfortunate MS to be sober all the
time, and yet an honest man We have known
men thet never smiled, or seldom, whose face
was rigid as an iron mask, aid yet they were
kind, simple. and really reliable. But such are
exceptional cases. Uniform sobriety is pre-
sumptively very much against n man. He who
gives no play to the gentler feelings has some
thing the matter with him that should be looked
into before one trusts him far.
Mirth itself is not always honest. But il tends
TO openness, to sincerity, to sweetness. Mirth
has better stuff in IL to make man of than
sobriety has. 1t, too, is used sometimes as a
mask for hypocrisy. But not half SO often as
sobriety is.
Only consider how many men quite empty and
worthless, inwardly neither rich nor forcetul,
are kept agoing by the mere trick of gravity.
When some men come to you 1t is like sunrise.
Everything seems to take new life, and shines.
Other men bring night with them. The chill
shadow of their sobrety falls upon every inno-
cent gaiety, and your feelings, like birds at even
ing, stop singing. and go to their roost Away
with these fellows who go owling through life,
all the while passing for birds of paradise! He
that cannot laugh and be gay should look well
to himself. He should fast and pray until his
face breaks forth into light!
Here, too, are the immortal billiards who, IL
Is to be feared, will never forsake the earth.
Dull good men They live with the uniform
consistency of stagnation. They are said to be
reliable. You always know where to find them.
Safe men they are. They are none Of your
highflyers, never extravagant, always where
you found them last! Over their blessed faces
hangs the twilight of sobriety. They are im-
mense negatives. Nothing saves them from
pity but their sobriety. Men worship that, and
so duness passes for consistent piety
Behind the mask of sobrety how many pre-
tenders pass themselves off! Every one knows
how wretchedly inconsistent with honor their
outdoor life is, but they have such power of
gloom in meetings that meu respect their reli-
gious experience! And SO the young are taught
that one can be eminently religious without
being strictly honest or reliable.
Public sentiment is purifying itself. Men are
beginning at last to understand that nothing is
so cheerful, so full of liberty, so genial, and
joyous, as true religion. Christ called this sort
of men children of light He ridiculed and de-
nounced the long-faced hypocrites who ostenta-
tously prayed and prayed, and got further from
grace and humanity the longer they prayed.
After Him came the apostles, who cry out to all
good and true men, "Rejoice in the Lord alway,
and again say, Rejoice"
With all this, sobriety ought not to be de-
nounced. Men have right to be solemn, in
spots, and on just occasion If men of inelastic
natures and of rigid face live truly kind and
uprightlives their sobriety should be considered
misfortune, and not a fault. But such men are
not the types of Christianity. The typical
Christian hangs full of the fruit of every faculty
which God planted in the soul. A man of reason
he is; man of instinct and intuition too; q
man capable of suffering, full of
light and shadows; stern, if need
be, but relenting, placable and mild capable
of hating, choosing rather to love; strict
with himself, lenent with all others; loving this
world dearly but loving the other even BETTER
abhorring wickedness, and yet the best friend
of wicked men; gay and guileless as a child,
sensitive as woman; loving joy in himself, in
spring it in others; lover of activity, and
lover of rest; full of thunder and full of peace
after it-this is the man which the true Gospel
breeds. Ascetics, cynics, eremites, mere so5riety
moDgers, are all bastards.
Whatsoever things are kind, whatsoever
things are honest, whatsoever things are just,
whatsoever things are pure, whatsoever things
are lOUety, whatsoever things are of good report
think on (pOnder) these things."-
Henry Ward BeeCher in the Christian Union.