The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1884-04-26
Cheer.

To move through life with cheerful
bearing docs not present itself to our minds
sufficiently often and clearly in the light of
duty. At times of festiyity, at the incom-
ing of the new year, at wedding, or
birthday feast, it is true we feel it is our
duty to take happy face among our friends,
or else to stay away but when we fall
back on the lower level of the ordinary
week day and work day, we take no shame
to ourselves for carrying about with us
brow of gloom or countenance of dis
content We are too apt to ascribe to our
innate temperaments the praise attaching
to blithe compartment and the blame due
to a sad demeanor. But indeed, save in
the hour of bereavement or of humiliation,
when aught but sad aspect would appear
to bespeak frivolity, We are all capable Of
so schooling ourselves that our presence
shall be gladdening instead of saddening,
and our arrival shall bring with it sense
of comfort, and not of depression and
undoubtedly it is part of our duty to our
neighbor, and one that will react most ia
vorably, on our own happiness, SO to bear
ourselves 1t is recorded of John Keats
that his face was so radiant with brightness
that it bore the expression Of one who had
Just looked on some glorious sight and it
is related of Henry Lord Holland that he
came down to breakfast with the air of a
man who had just met with some signal
good fortune Such men communicate
happiness and rebuke detection as a sunny
spring morning does, and stand to us for an
ensample of how to take life. For those
who have eyes to see, there is always some
glorious sight to look on, and to fill the
gaze with radiance for those who have
the heart to feel it, every morning that
brings with it the power to rise from sleep
and descend to breakfast, brings signal
good fortune. To meet the morning with
a dark face is an affront to the sun and to
nope for ones own sorrow in the presence
of another's mirth is unquestionably as bad
in taste as to give rein to hilarity in the
presence of another's grief; yet the latter
sin against good manners is one we would
not lightly allow ourselves to be charged
with.
Cheer and mirth are by no means syn
onymous They are as different as a smile
and a laugh. The latter may often be i'll
timed, the former can hardly ever be SO.
We may bring a smile of comfort to the
mourner by the bed of death, for smiles
and tears are no enemies and no strangers
And so with cheer. When mirth would
be resented, cheer is welcomed. A man of
an evil habit of life may be loud and
frequent Laughter, but he will rarely bring
with him an atmosphere of cheer. The
stern Christian moralist, who was also the
greatest poet of the middle ages, felt that
to live sunken in gloom Of spirit was not
only to make miserable this life, but to
earn punishment in the next; for, when
picturing the various sufferings imposed
upon the lost souls for the various sins
committed during life, he describes those
''who in the sweet air that is cheered by
the sun had lived sullenly," as condemned
to abide infxeG in pool of slime, accusing
themselves, too late, of having always car
ried within their own hearts the sluggish
smoke that darkened their days.
In homely language "to make the best
of things" or ''to look on the bright side, "
is the habit of life that we approve in 9th
ers; and that approval we give those who
act in that temper implies our belief that
the opposite mood is cul pable. 1t has been
said that the best of life is conversation;
and to conversation, society is requisite.
Certainly, therefore, it is much to our adj
vantage to cultivate that side of our char
acter which will make our company desir-
able; and we may rest assured that no bril-
lance ofspeech, no attractiveness of manner,
no rare attainments or acquisitions that we
may possess will render our society so well
come and so beloved as CHEEKY temper.
Pride itself might well come to our aid,
and bid us keep a countenance of cheer;
for what is detected bearing but a con-
fession that we have not been able to hold
our own in the battle of life-that we have
been worsted, and that no efforts we can
make are sufficient to restore to us that
which we have lost, or can satisfy those
desires which we have nourished? This
is an avowal which we should be ashamed
to rake in words Why, then, should we
publish it in our demeanor? The self
reliant man, the man who is able to help
himself and others, and is conscious of
brave effort and high endeavor, will, despite
reverses, have the spirit and the fortitude to
comfort himself cheerily among his fellow
men, and will find that this very cheer is a
key to open to him mems hearts and homes
at once-is magic POWER that finds him
chair at every table and place by every
hearthside He will find this, and he will
recognize that it is Cheer that he himself
seeks in the intimacy and converse of
friends-Cheer that he seeks in his favorite
pleasures that is offered to him by
the lessons of religion; that it is this that
makes the live and ripping brook the dar-
ling of the glooming woodland-it is this
that makes the glowworm the glory of the
moonless August night-it is this that
makes the robin the darling of the silent
winter morning, when the trees are leafess
and the snow is abroad and no other bird
has heart to sing.