The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1873-05-09
SUNDAY READINGS.

STRIVE to love and seek after that
which can never be sufficiently loved
and sought.
GRATITUDE does not depend on the
amount Of mercies received, but on the
amount of mercies known and priced.
THE very heart and ROOT Of sin is an
| independent spirit. We erect the idol
self; and not only wish others to wOr-
ship, but worship it ourselves.
For we care not to b. safe, but to be
safe, but to be secure; not to escape
hell, but TO live pleasantly. We are
not solicitous Of the event, but of the
way tLither, and it is sufficient if we be
pei shaded all Is well.
Moses rod was a serpent till he took
it by the tail, and then it became what
it was before; and if we lay hold Of
things only by that end, we should find
many things that seem terrible and
xious TO be benign and salutiferous.
WE should always record our
thoughts in affiicticn; set up way
marks; set up our Bethels; erect our
Ebenezers; that We may recur to them
in health: for then we are IN other cir
cumstances, and can never recover our
sick-bed views.
THE lower your senses are kept, the
better you may govern them. Appetites
are commonly like two buckets, when
one is at the top, the other is at the
bottom. Now, OF the two, L had rather
the reason buckets should be upper
most. The senses are some Of them so
mean, they relish scarcely anything but
what they beg for.
CHEERFULNEss and a festival spirit
fills the soul full of harmony. 1t com
poses music for hearts, it publishes
Qualifications of God, it produces thank
fuIness, aud serves the end of charity,
and when the oil Of gIadness runs over
it makes bright and tall emissions Of
light and holy fires, reaching up to a
cloud and making JOY round about.
THoUGHrsl Whence do they arise?
what stuff arc they made of? and what
yigor is it that gives them such an in
stantaneos production? They are con-
ceived in full maturity, and step into
perfection at first. They scorn the gra-
dation OF bodies and the heavy. Success
sions of motion. They gain the race at
a start, outstretch the speed of guupOw-
der, and distance light and lightning.
Thoughts take up no room. When they
are right they afford a portable pleas
ure, which one may travel with, with
out any trouble or incumbrance.
OUR conversation is commanded to be
such that it may minister grace-that
is, favor complacence, cheerfuness-
and be accept able and pleasant to the
hearer. And so must be cur CONVERSE
ton 1t must be as far from Sullennes5
as it ought to be from Iightness, and a
cheerful spirit Is the best convoy for re-
Iigion. And though sadness does, in
some cases, become a Christian, as be
ing an index of pious mind, of com
passion, and wise, proper resentment !
of things, yet it serves but one end, be |
ing useful in the only instance Of re-
pentance, and hath done its greatest
works not when it weeps and sighs, but
when it hates and grows careful against /
sin.
In order to achieve some good work |
which you have much at heart, You may
not be able to secure an entire week, or [.
even an uninterrupted day. But try
what You can make of the broken frag-
ments of time. Clean up its golden
dust-those reapings and parinGs Of
precious Duration those leavings OF
DAYS, and remnants Of hours which soon
may sweep out into the waste Of cxls-
tence. And thus, II you be mIscr OF
momeuts-if you be frugal, and hoard
mn odd minutes Of half hours, and an
expected holidays glcauings may
exc out a long and useful Life, and you
NAV die at last richer iu existence than
muItitudes whose time IS all their own.
That which some men waste in super
fuous slumber, and idle visits, and de-
guItory application, were Il all redeem
ed. would give them " alth of leisure.
and enable them to execute undertak-
ings for which they deem q less worried
life than theirs essential. When a per
son says, ''I have no time to pray, no
time TO read the Bible, no time 10 i'm
prove my mind, or to do a kind turn to
a neighbor," he may be saying what he
thinks, but no should not think what he
says; for # he has not got time already,
he may get It by redeeming it.
CoMrARE what thou hast not with
what thou hast, and see which Is better. /
This viii keep thee from trouble for !
what thou wantest, and thy desire shall /
not disquiet thee. Thou art poor, but /
thou art well, and hast many good /
friends; or, perhaps, thou hast none
but thou hast all the host Of heaven /
the sun, ruoon and stars, and all the ele- /
ments, and the providence of God, and
the charity of All wcli-disVosed people, /
as much as another man thou mayest +
walk in thy neiShbor's fields, yea, even