The Middleburgh post. [volume] (Middleburgh, Snyder Co., Pa.) 1883-1916, 1884-05-08
THE HOT AXLE.

like sixty-that is, about sixty m lies
an hour. No sight Of Irish village
to arrest our speed, no sign of break
down and yet the train halted. We
looked out OF the window saw the
brakeman aud crowd OF passengers
gathering around tie locomotive,
and dense smoke arising. What
MAS the matter 4 hot orlc !
/ thought then, rs 1 think now,
that is what is the matter with peo-
pie everywhere. In this swift. "ex q.
press" American life, wa go too fast
for our endurance. We think our.
selves getting on splcndidly, when,
in the midst of our successes. we
come to q dead hall. What is tho
matter? The nerves or muscles or
brains give ont We have made too
many revolutions in an hour. 4
| hOt drle ,
Men make the mistake of working
according to their opportunitics,and
not according to their capacity Of
endurance "Can Irun this train
fromSpringfeld to Boston at the rate
Of fifty milos an houry' says an Gu
gineer. Yes. Then will run it, re-
gardless Of consequences !" Can |
be a merchant, and a president of u
bank, and n director 10 life-insur-
ance company, and a school commits
sioner, and help edit paper, and
supervise the politics Of our ward,
aud run for Congress 81 can T.
the man says to himself. The store
drives him tho bank drives him ;
the school drives him politics drive
him. lie takes all the seedlings
aud frets and exasperatiOns Of each
position. Some day, ut the height
Of tho business season, he does not
come to tho store. From the most
important meeting OF tho bank di
rectors be is absent. In the excite,
ment OF the most important political
canvass he fails to be Mt the place
appointed. What I, the matter /?
His health has broken down The
train halts lcng before it gets to the
station. 4 hot arle !
Literary men bovs greet opportu-
mites opouiuS in thus day. II thuy
take all that open, they are dead men,
or worso-Hci"y men who ought to be
dead. The pen runs SO easy when
You have good ink AMI smooth pa
per, and an easy desk to write on,
and the consciousness of an audi
ence of one, two, or three hundred
thousand readers There are the
religions newspapers through whic b
you may preach, aud the musical
journals through which you may
sing, and the agricultural period di-
calls through which you can plough,
and family newspapers in which you
may romp with the whole house,
hold around tho evening stand.
There are critiquos to bo written,
and reviews to be indulged in, aud
poems to be chimed, and novels to
be constructed. When out OF n
mans pen he can shake recreation
aud friendship and usefulness and
bread, he is apt to keep it shaking.
So great are the invitations to liter
ary work, that the professional III on
OF the day are overdone. They sit,
faint and tagged ont, on the verge
of newspapers aud books; each Que
does the work Of three. And these
men sit up late nights, and choke
down chunks Of meet without masti-
cation. and scold their wives through
irritability, and maui innocent au-
thors, and run the physical machin-
cry with liver miserably given out.
The driving-shaft has gone fifty
times second, They stop at no
station. The steam-chest is hot and
swollen. The brain aud the diges-
ton begin to smoke. Stop, ye fly
ing quills! "Down brake!' A hot
arle !
Some Of our young people have
read--till they are crazed-of learn
cd blacksmiths,w who at the forge con-
quered thirty languages aud of
shoemokers, who, pounded sole
leather, got to be philosophers ;
and of milliners, who, while their
customers were at the glass trying
on their spring hats, wrote q volume
OF hrst~rate poems. Tho fact is, no
blacksmith ought to be troubled
with more than five languages and
instead OF shoemakers becoming
philosophers, we would like to turn
our aurnlna of nhilosonbers into