Watertown republican. [volume] (Watertown, Wis.) 1860-1906, 1873-01-22
Turning Over n New Leaf.
From the January Galaxy


There IS a wondrous differerce in
people, as regards tie propensity foi
turning over new leaf. IT. is odd
that, for the most part, they who have
power of will and self-restraint enough
to keep good resolutions, are least in
the habit of making them, and appear
most content to live on lower plane.
without aspiration while, on the other
hand, they who are most sensible OF
personal shortcomings, and most ap-
| preciative of better modes of liyinr.
oftenest break good resolutions. and
seldomestreach the standard thew coyet.
/ thus ll sturdlness or stability of character
| is frequently earthly by instinct, and
incapable of that volatility which, on
its part, can never walk steadily on
ward, but is always on series of
eacursionary skips and hops upward to
/ a higher life, whence it as regularly
| founders and fops down, bruised but
not tanned, to the clay. Goethe saws
| that persons quite unstable and inca
pable of all Improvement fire
qlef1tly accuse themselves in the
bitterest manner, confessing and
deploring their faults with ex
treme righteousness though they
possess not the smallest power within
them to retire from the course along
which the irresistible tendency OF
their nature is dragging them for
ward. Nobody need be down hearted
at this dictum. Some men seem to
be governed by fate, because they have
10 will worth speaking of, or at least
give no proof of any, while others ap-
parently have will free of fate, so
strongly does it act on circumstances
but if it be answered that this strong
and free will is itself form of fate, at
least it is one the possessors can neith-
sr feat nor complain of. ##s lg
Many lads have such practical views
of life, joined with such self-conscious-
hess and sef-esteem, as to mature it at
HnGe. They imagine themselves grown
men before their boards are out in
their elders. they see only their peers,
and hence feel the burdens of life al
ready in youth. These are they who
become famous betimes-great traders,
money-lenders, railroad sbuilders, sol
diets, lawyers, journalists, at the dawn
Of active life. Their opposites waste
6dCn new ledT III WOHueElng WHAT Will
happen when they grow to be men
when the opportunity comes; : when
life really opens wide. Humble and.
timid, they fancy all other men to be
wiser or stronger than they. At thirty
they hear With wonder what yonder
stalwart, thoughtful man, whom, in old
childish habit. they address with de-
fereItial sts1r," is only thirty years old,
too. At forty, they still cling to their
conciliatofy, depfeeatory ways-feel
like boys lodging about bewildered
among. men, though +. manhood has
encompassed them twenty years.
1t comes upon them like a. shock
to find their hair whitening, and people
describing them as "the old gentle
man." while their feet are too palpably
sliding on the doWfhill stretch. Till
then, they had never thought them
sslves mature for career, nor suspect
ed that they ted reached the now-or
never of life till it was years away in. the
past. Such men take an aroma Of the
cradle with them to the grave, only
quitting their first childhood when they
enter the second; ever are they dream
Inc of the possible future, and propos
ifip to turn over the new leaf