The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1882-07-27
TAKE A VACATION.

Rest Is as sacred duty as work. The
! best reSteTS are the best workers To be
wisely idle requires as true a wisdom as
to be wisely busy. The old Puritan no
tlOn that every moment must be profit
ably employed was all wrong; rather,
let us say, doing nothing is sometimes
the most profitable employment.
God has appointed vacations. He has
written His law in nature The summer
fallOw repeats every season the text,
Come ye yourselves apart and rest
awhile" The sleeping trees repeat
every winter the same eXhUrtatiOn. Ma
ture is 50 joyOusly active in spring be-
cause she has had q long vacation. The
Old fairy story of the DOTnrOschen, the
Sleeping Beauty, is repeated every year
i'll pantOmime. The maiden falls asleep
when winter WeaYeS the spell about her;
she aWakenS when the spring sun dis
covers her and kisses her into Wakeful-
ness and life again. You cannot have
your spring without your winter; your
morning without your night; your joy
GUS abOunding activity without your
quiet peaceful rest hours.
God has repeated His law in ReYela-
liOn. lie has made the law, "ThOu shall
do no work." as imperative as the law,
six days shalt thou labor" Every
seventh day he cries to the army, Halt!
and to halt and lay aside the knapsack
is as much the duty Of loyalty as, when
the halt is over, to rise and buckle it on
again. No man has a right to work
without vacations; still less to lay the
intOlerable burden of ceaseless work up
| on his neighbOr.
God has emphasized His command by
His own example. God rested on the
seventh day from all His work which He
had made. IntidelS make merry over
this declaration; as though God were
tired, fOrsOOthl Tired? Oh, fools and
| blind; as though one must earn his rest
by his weariness, and pay in advance!
God takes a vacation; God knows the
blessedness of rest; God sets His chill
dTen an example for them to follow. To
| rest is as divine as to work; that is the
grand fact which Nature teaches and
Revelation emphasizes.
And Christ adds His testimony. Never
| lived buster man than Jesus of NaZaT-
eth; never was so much and so marvel
! Gus and so exhaustive work crowded into
| three short years. But Jesus took time
| to rest. He took little boat and fled
| from the madding crowd to the middle
of the lake, where they could not follow
| Him. He called His twelve apart into a
desert place to rest awhile. When the
thrOng followed Him, He fled into the
coasts of Phoenicia; when even there He
| could not be hid, He sought and found
| Philippi. From the excitment of His
later life in Jerusalem He found refuge
and rest in the quiet home at Bethany.
To work without vacation is not Chris
tian.
Your rest should be Tecuperative; it
should be recreatiVe. Every muscular
eXeTtiOn uses up muscular tissue; every
thought and feeling destroys a nerve
tissue. Rest repairs what work destroys.
RaCt Iovc n tho funI. work hnTnQ if nm
If your rest leaves you weary, it is not
rest. Whoever wakes up Monday morn
ing, less fresh and vigorous for Monday
mornings work, has broken Gods holy
day. Whoever comes back from his va
cation tagged out has had no vacation.
Some men consume more fuel in blow
ing off steam than in working the en-
gine. Generally vacation is change of
employment; generally a change from
the lower to the higher is the most rest
full. 1t is always dangerous to go down
for YOUR rest; always safe to go up. That
is the reason why a Sabbath well spent
is the perfection of rest; it is rest of the
lower nature by the activity of the
higher. That is the reason why Sabbath
picnicking and junketing is a desecra-
tiOn; it deSpOilS the day both of its sacred
ness and of it's rest. DR.. Lyman Beecher
took to his fiddle Sunday evenings; he
was wiser than the preacher who takes
to a book of deyOtiOns or of theology.
Apply this principle in your vacations
If ,yOu live in the country, go to town;
if in town, go to the country; if you live
by the sea, seek the mount .inS; il among
the mountains, seek the sea; if nature is
your constant companion, commune
with books; if you live among books,
commune with nature; if your life is
among men, seek solitude; if it is soli-
tary, seek society; if you are constant
traveller, stay at home; ikyOu are stay
at-hOme, go on an excursion. Even a
Sunday school picnic, we are credibly
informed, rests some people.
Danish the pagan thought that rest is
a concession to. human weakness, or that
one must be weary before he has right
to rest. Resting is divine. 1t is a con-
ditiOn of growth, of well being, of fruit
full work. The mindl does its best work
when it seems to be doing nothing.
American thinkers have yet to learn the
Oriental art of meditation. We force all
our flowers and fruits; those are most
fragrant and sweetest which grow ma
turally and spontaneously. 1t was not
in his library, pouring over his books, |
but lying under the apple tree, looking
up into its branches, that Newton dis
covered the law of attraction of grayita-
tiOn. 1t was not in the machine shop,
but sitting by the GTeside, looking at
the kettle on the hob, that Watts dis
covered the secret Of steam power. 1t
was not in laboratory, but on shipbOaTd,
where men have to rest whether they
will or no, that Morse dreamed the tele-
graph. The best thoughts come out of
rest hours. The mind is not horse, to
do its best in harness; it is a bird, and
does its best in freedom.
As to editOrs-they never Test.-Chris- |
tian Union.