The Eaton Democrat. (Eaton, Ohio) 1875-1903, 1884-02-07
Cheer.

To move through life with a cheerful
bearing does not present itself to our
minds sufficiently often and clearly in
the light of a duty. At times of fes-
tivity, at the incoming of the New
Year, at wedding, at a birthday feast,
it is true we feel it our duty to take a
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
a brow of gloom or a countenance of
discomfort. We are too apt to ascribe
attaching to blithe compartment, and
blame due to a sad demeanor. But, in
deed, save in the hour of bereavement
or humiliation, when aught but a sad
aspect would appear to bespeak frivol-
ity, we are all capable of so schooling
ourselves that Il presence shall be
gladdening instead of saddening, and
our arrival shall bring with it a sense
of comfort, and not of depression; and
undoubtedly it is a part of our duty to
our neighbor, and n that will react
most ~favorably 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
has 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 de-
lection as a sunny spring morning does,
and stand to us for al 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 a signal good fortune. To meet
the morning with a dark face is an af-
front to the sun; and to NOPE for ones
own sorrows in the presence of an
others mirth is un~questionably as bad
in taste as to give the 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
synonymous. They are as different as
a smile and a laugh. The latter may
often be ill-timed; the former can
hardly ever be so. We may bring a
smile of comfort to the by the
bed of death, where a laugh would be
sacrilege and Dissertation; for smiles
and tears are no enemies, and no stran-
gers. And so with cheer. Where
mirth would be resented, cheer is well
coined. A man of an evil habit of life
may be a loud and frequent Laughter,
but he will rarely bring with him an
atmosphere of cheer. The stern Chris
tian 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
those 'who in the sweet air that is
,cheered by the sun had lived sullenly,'
as condemned to abide infixed in a pool
of slime, accusing themselves, too late,
of having always carried within their
own hearts the sluggish smoke that
darkened their days.
In homely language, ''to make the
best of things or s'to look on the
bright side" is the habit of life that
we approve in others; and the approval
we give those who act in that temper
implies our belief that the opposite
mood is culpable. 1t has been said that
the best of life is. conversation; and to
conversation society is requisite. Ger
tainly, therefore, it is much to our adj
vantage to cultivate that side of our
character which will make our COM
pany desirable; and we may rest as
sured that no brilliance of speech, no
attractiveness of manner, no rare at
tainments or acquisitions that we may
possess will render our society so well
| come and so beloved as a CHEEKY tenn
per. Pride itself might well come to our
aid, and bid us keep a countenance of
cheer; for what is a detected bearing
but a confession 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 al make are suffi-
| cient to restore US that which we have
lost, or a satisfy those desires which
we have nourishedp This is an avowal
which we should be ashamed to make
in words. Why, then sboyld we cub.
lish it in our demeanv1! The self-re-
liant 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 comport himself cheerily
among his fellow-men; and will find
this very cheer is a key to open to him
mems hearts and homes at once-is 8
magic power that finds him a chair Al
every table and a place at every hearth
side. He will find this, and he viii
recognize that it is Cheer that he him
self seeks in the intimacy and converse
of friends-Cheer that he seeks in his
favorite pleasures-Cheer that's Offered
to him by the lessons of religion; thai
it is this hat make the live and ripping
brook the darling of the gloomine
woodland-it is this that makes the
glowworm the darling of the moonless
August night-it is this that makes the
robin the darling of the silent winter
morning, when the trees are leaies.
and the show is abroad, and no othel
bird has heart to sing Chambers
| journal.