Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1883-01-31
A KINDLY PHILOSOPHER.
Peter Cooper on this Life and
That TO Come.

At a meeting to forward a humani.
tartan undertaking held in one of the
lecture rooms of the Cooper Institute
last week. the venerable Peter Cooper,
who had lately passed his ninety
second birthday, occupied seat on the
platform When the business of the
meeting was finished he made few
remarks in which he gave the audi
eDce a glimpse of very genial and
charitable philosophy of this life and
the life to come. He said he was sat-
isfed that the circumstances and sur
roundings amid which child grew
up usually determined his career as u
man. This belief led him to make
great allowances for the sins and fail
ures of human beings, and to think
that he, too, might have been one of
the many wrecks he encountered in the
pathway of life if he had not enjoyed
the advantages of a good home and
good parental training. Remember
ing how powerfully we are controlled
by circumstances beyond our control, !"
continued Mr.. Cooper, "when | see a
poor, besotted, depraved wretch lying
in the gutter, | am disposed to ask our
Heavenly Father whether he or | is
the better entitled to happiness in the
next world he whose life in this
world has been so miserable, or | who
have enjoyed here so many blessings
and comforts" In the goodness of his
heart the kindly old philanthropist
thinks that the poor creatures who
are born and reared in the midst of
dirt, drunkenness and crime, and whose
moral natures are saturated with i'm
purities, have not had a fair chance in
this world, and believes that they will
find compensation for their sufferings
in the futare life
He has found this good world to
live in. Speaking from the experience
of life prolonged twenty years be-
yond the Psalmist's allotted span, he
says existence is comfortable and en-
joyable. Others do not find it So To
many it is dreary round of work,
want and pain, darkened by sense of
degradation and hopelessness. To
some it is a hideous carnival of
drunkenness and depravity, ending in
disease and early death Now much
the sinners and sufferers are them
selves to blame our good nonogenarian
does not stop to ask. The problem is
difficult one, and he feels that its
safest solution is charitable one
which lifts as much of the load of re-
sponslity from their shoulders as pos
sible. These poor creatures, he says,
did not have an even start in the race,
aud they have fallen into the mire
DO doubt their Heavenly Father will
give them better opportunity in the
next world.
Truly sunny and generous philos-
ophy If it were the philosophy of
some young dreamer to whom life is
all poetry and roses. it would not be
worth moments thought; but it is
the ripe fruit of the thought and ex-
perenca of man whose actual and |
useful life has almost filled the meas
ure OF century. 1t may not agree
with the sour theolo5ies which rile
humanity, but we question whether
any glowing themes concerning the
future were ever seriously believed by |
old men whose lives have been busy |
and successful, and whose age is serene
and healthlul. Are not such themes |
the conceptions of men in the midst of
the STORM and strife of middle age,
men old enough to have experienced |
the deceptions, disappointments and
bitterness of life, but not old enough /
to realize its meaning or to gain a
point of view where the lights and I
shadows OF the picture harmonize and
reveal the DeviDe purpose. and where
they can look forward with vision not 7
wholly obscured to the life of the
soul beyond the grave -Ne,e York |
Tribune.