Mineral Point tribune. (Mineral Point, Wis.) 1869-1938, 1876-09-06

man. This is Just the radical fault
with most of our endeavor. the secret
of most of our discomfort and failure.
We all want to keep warm. To keep
warm Is such very good thing,
II Is not a violent stretching
OF the truth to say that all
that man needs and most that
he wants may he said to come under
the head of warmth. Shelter is
warmth; clothes are warmth: food is
fuel And when one comes to the
luXurles of life, is there luxury
which cannot be placed under one or
other of these heads? Art? 1t is the
/ adornment of shelter, the ornamental
ton of clothes, the perfection of food.
The difference between the savage
man and the civilized is only dill
| ference of methods, and not of aims:
a difference in success. and not in inn
pulse. Art is relative term, and for
ever needs an interpreter from one age
To another. No man for any age, no
man for any spot, can define an arbi-
trary standard, which shall not after
all be reweighed and readjusted, and
at last swing back to the gauge of
shelter, clothes. food" that is.
warmth And if we say "rhis is all
material, let us not forget the
spiritual. Man liveth not by bread
! alone;' when we seek for the right
words TO convey our sense of the des-
( tituton of a man who is without love
and without religion, we are likely to
say that his heart is cold that no fires
| OF affection or OF devotion glow in his
soul. This is only a figure of speech,
to be sure; but no other figure will
answer our purpose, and that fact
alone almost lifts it out of the realm
of metaphor and sets it in the list of
exact statements.
The worst of this "freezing to keep
warm" is that we rarely know that we
are making blunder; rarely suspect
that we have gone the wrong way to
work; and often do not even know
that we are freezing, instead of keep
ing warm.
If 1t Is money we seek, it seems to
" the right way to work early and
late; to deny ourselves at every point
of expenditure which we can possibly
avoid. This dollar that we save to-
day, does it not represent possible,
perhaps certain hundred dollars Il
short time ahead If "A man would
have a comfortable fortune to settle
down on in a leisurely old age, must
he not strain every nerve and save
every penny in his youth? Can he
have too many irons in the fire, or heat
them too hot? Can he search widely
enough in the distance or look closely
enough near at hand for ways and
means to make money. He thinks not
He is going to keep warm ut all haz-
ards and all costs. And what a big
fire he makes. When he finds out that
he has been heap fool it is usually
too late. He has been freezing 50 long
that there is not enough left of his life
time nor enough of blood left in his
veins for him to get thoroughly warm.
If he has acquired his big fortune, he
| is only one degree less wretched than
if he has not. Old and tired, and
worn out and i'll, he cannot find pleas
ure even in riches. There will be
many ragged, healthy, jolly. poor
man whom ne will see and envy be-
fore he dies. And when he dies, !" it
is certain he can carry nothing out.
1t is the same thing with the lover
and seeker of learning. of fame. of
art. To come down to the minor
wants and ambitions of life, it is the
same thing with the lover and seeker
of social success, of comfort, of ease.
The minute we surround ourselves
with machinery, cumbrous and OPP
preSslVe: give up our personal free
dom to one fixed idea of a result to be
attained; make means IN end and any
end necessity of our content-in
short, make hard work Of living
are making too big fire. Whether
we ever find it out or not, we are
cheap fool" Whether we know it
or not, we freeze keeping warm,
and the Indian is better off than We.
". y. Ipdepe1ident.