New-York tribune., 1881-09-11

In the year l176 DIR. Samuel johnson, the
principal journalist of his day, wrote to James
Boswell from Brighton, then the rising resort of
England, saying:
al was weeks this autumn at Brighthelm-
stone. The place very dull and was not well !;
my expedition to the Hebrides the most
pleasant journey that ever made. Such an annual
effort would give the world little diversfcation.
"Every year, however, we cannot wander and
must therefore endeavor to spend our time at home
as well as l believe it is best to throw life
into method, that every hour may bring its en-
ployment, and every employment have its hour
81 have not practised all this prudence myself
but | have suffered much for want of it. and
would have you, by timely recollection aud steady
resolution escape from those evils which have laid
heavy on me-"
Such the counsel of the summer-seduced sage
who lived hundred years ago, and only last year
Longfellow, great tourist in his day. broke into
the song:
Stay, stay at home my heart and rest;
housekeeping hearts are happicst,
Are full of trouble and full of care;
Weary and homesick and distressed
They wander East. they wander West,
And are balfed and beaten and blown about
by the winds of the wilderness of doubt;
10 stay at home is best.
NEXT GENERATION
-" Johnny" said an aged politician and editor to
me- yesterday, L" | like to read your of hand social
sermons, because they seem to be confessions Now
leI me MAKE q confession 10 you. / don't belle
although have large summer house at the most
successful resort in the country that the dsspatons
and broken habits of the long season do me anv
good OF give me any rest or that am as we'll in
sured for length of days in the idle summer as in
the winter. And can You tell me- thou
Diogenes of Broadway! why everybody is visiting
the summer resorts and at such increase OF board
bills and family expenses"
1t is the rise of wealth. said l. resulting from
deVeOpment lati in
giving an unrest to young and old, and making the
most forward our leaders, whether in physics or
morals. None dare be Independent whera all can
be rich. When George the Fourth was ruling n sue
cessful empire that had just finished thirty years of
war and was trading with the whole world Beau
Brummel who could starch his collars and neckties
the incest, was the next man to the King though
sharper and parasite, and the King without a
single virtue, called the first gentleman of
Europep"
@Alas~ said the political sage there is too
much wealth, / fear, to make us as happy as we
have been. l am sure people not as happy as in
the day of small incomes and quiet habits. know
most of our rich men, and men they are not the
social equals of the moderately rich men of forty
years iago. Rufus King was then my neighbor at
Albany, considered the richest man north of New
York and the leading banker He told me that il
cost him only three thousand dollars a year for his
whole expenses and family and no other man lived
as well i'll Albany. YET his expenses would not
pay his children's school bills When | was
Collector of the PoIt of Albany, at salary of.four
dollars a day, felt if had got a lift that would
make me independent, and when | saved seven
hundred and fifty dollars year | felt that | was
on the high road to success No man in those DAYS
had million of dollars, or f he did he was consid
cred to have vast responsibilities to his country and
his God. Now million dollars excites no admira-
ton, and do not think it brings much compcnsa-
op1xyn de Tho tn uuh
His relations to his faculties and his health arc
worse. His career is really more contracted because
he is sitting down by the million like pin by load
stone. unable TO get away from its influence upon
his mentality"
ayes" said /. tho son of Agassiz is worth
millions made by himself, but will he ever be an
Agassiz2 He might be without the million but
with it, probably, never.".
The reflective qualities of the mind turn with bit
terness against this accumulative time when every
facility of intercourse seems to increase the prime
cost of life, every comfort to call for larger drains
upon the brain. No has time for affection,
much less for religion in age where his mental
wheels and pinions even in pleasure, at the
highest speed. The country is still wide and full
of land, but nobody dare go apart. He who dares
go aside on any self-respectng mission hears such
exclamations as Millions wife and daughters raised
when he would write the epics of thousand years
What have we to do with thy fame thy writ
ings for freedoms We must have horses to hunt
with the court party, new gowns for Bath this
season, archery dresses, footmen, and new sedan
chairs! Mr.. Wychery is writing matter for the
playhouses which will fetch money. Write profit
able poetry like that right wanton and right fast
and we may taTy with thee. But pooh pooh on
Paradise and Freedom!p !p
. The age around the English Restoration has
passed will. Nothing will survive ours as
that bat the moral monuments of great souls,
with time to think and without wealth to dis
turb them. Pleasure is only an expression of
wealth jim which some spendthrifts of poverty mix.
But wealth unblessed by wisdom or example is no
more now than the former wealth of India. the very
history of which is a jungle. The innumcrable
Rajahs, Mogus, ETC., of India, whose wealth excited
the avarice of Europe and led to their conquest,
have left nation something like our own, already
covered with railroads, productive in staples full
of specialtIes, splendid in rivers and maintaining
every nation well but its India is the nearest
match tor America, only general ADVANTAGE
over her being moral weight; not more wealth but
more light and truth. Yet with nothing but mate
rial monuments VIC can claim nothing above India