The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1883-09-23
AIMS AND OBJECTS.
BY GASKELL.
Will.

VIII.
Leaves have their time to fall,
And flowers to Wither at the north
winds breath,
And stars to eet-but all,
Thou hast all seasons for thine own, o
death! Mrs. RenlGHS.
Cruelty of all kinds should be dis
countenanced as much as possible.
No generous-minded person can
calmly look upon suffering, even of
a dumb brute unless his feelings
are hardened aud debased. The boy
or the girl who wilfully causes suf-
fering does not often grow 10 to be
kind and obliging in after life. To
stick pins through flies, to kill birds
and pigeons with fiippers, causing
needless suffering of any kind
to any created thing, is foolish and
may be done thoughtlessly and may
be source Of after regret. / believe
in play as much as any one, for play
and recreation are necessary at
times, as a continuous strain may
weaken the strongest substance. But
play should be in season and of an
innocent kind. 1t should be of a
nature to improve as well as amuse.
[ like to hear the joyous laugh of
children, so full of innocence and
free from care. Troubles come soon
enough at best, without our spend
ing valuable time in anticipation or
seeking for them. But there is q
proper means to be observed in
all things of every kind and nature.
All play and no study, will not store
the mind with knowledge, nor will
cruelty fill the mind with visions of
peace and virtue and happiness and
all work and no play, we are told,
will make Jack a dull boy" In
enjoyment as we'll a labor
there is ample room for improve
ment, for display Of prudence,
wisdom and forbearance, and unim-
FASHIONED reason would tell us the
benefits derived from one source are
as important to us as from the
other.
What is good for the young is
good for older ones, too. 1t counsels
of mercy and kindness will do them
good, it will be good for all, ire
spectiYe of age. When we are too
old to learn our usefulness is over,
and we merely exist, and it would
be mercy for the Lord to take us
away lest folly overtske US, and the
good we may have done becomes
Obscured. Age should always be
venerated, but age itself is no excuse
for folly and sin. Yet there is pre-.
sented in the whole range of human
life no more interesting sight than
virtuous age, the silvery hue of
whose locks adorns far more
nobly the brow of manly
integrity. than does the glitterine
gold and gems of princely coronet
the brow Of vice. We love our ia.
theirs and our mothers, and we well
remember how the blanching hand
of time, one by one, mixed white
hairs with their darker locks, until
at last the whole head was crowned
with the symbol of approaching
winter. How graceful even Wrink-
les appear on the countenance of
virtue, furroWed by thought, or
care, or suffering, as though time
were loath to destroy our beauty,
without compromising the loss by
the bestoWal of another. To see
however, gray hairs Joined to worse
than imbecility-to crime and guilt
and sin-to see the last Pickering
light, the last feeting hours of this
present life, employed in selfish and
sinful strife, in mercenary greed and
lavaricious injustice, or in wicked
| pleasures and senile longings, instead
of composing the mind to think of 6
future life, or wisely gathering in
| the separated and diverging threads
of interest, uniting them in one
lstrOng desire to meet humbly and
becomingly the inevitable change,
thus leading the young, by precept
and example, to the practice OF
lChristian charity and mercy and
usefulness, is pitiful and weak
more forcibly than anything else
can dc illustrating the weak and
Icarnal nature of human beings
Nature, in her workings, has hel
laws of compensation and equilib-
rum, and as age creeps on, love OF
life generally becomes less strong.
AS the sensations and faculties are
ldulIed, the desire of continual
existence on earth becomes less and
LESS powerful, until, as with q
piece of mechanism, the frame is
IWorn out and movement ceases,
but with this indiffel ence to nun,
ldane life should come an increased
ldesire to prepare for future one.
for that future life is to be eternal
| One little scene, and I conclude
] this series of articles. 1t is death.