St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1886-03-13


because their doors swung easily open in
the charging, ennobling, irradiating and
divine grace of hospitality.
do not know what your experience has
been, but I have had men and women
visiting at my house who left benedic-
ton on every room-in the blessing they
asked at the table, in the prayer they Of
sered at the family altar, in the good ad-
vice they gave the children, in the gospel
ization that looked out from every Inca
ment of their countenances; and their de-
,parture was the sword of bereavement.
. The Queen of Norway, Sweden and Den
.mark had a royal cup Of ten curves or
clips. each one having on it the name
::of the distinguished person who had
vdrank from it. And that cup which we
offer to others in Christian hospitality,
though it be of the plainest earthenware,
is royal cup, and God can read on all its
sides the names of those who have taken
from it refreshment.
But all this is impossible unless you have
q home of your own.
1t is the deluson as to what is necessary
for home that hinders SO many from es-
tablishing one. Thirty rooms are not nee
essary, nor twenty, nor fifteen, nor ten,
nor FIVE, nor three.
In the right way plant table, and
couch. and knife. and fork, and a cup,
and chair, and you can raise young
paradise. Just start home, on however
small scale, and it will grow.
When King Cyrus was invited to dine
Fri tho 10
the one condition of his coming that the
only dish be one loaf of bread, and the
most imperial satisfactions have some
times banqueted on the plainest fare.
Do not be caught in the delusion of many
thousands in postponiug home until they
can have an expensive one. That idea is
the DEVILS trap that catches men and
women innumerable who will never have
any home at all. Capitalists OF America,
build plain homes for the people. Letthis
tenement house system, in which hum
dreds OF thousands OF the people OF our
cities are wallowing in the mire, be broken
up by small homes. where people can have
their own firesides and their own altar.
In this great continent there is room
enough for every man and woman to have
ligion demand it.
Young married man, as soon as you can,
buy place, even if you have to put on it
a mortgage reaching from base to cap
stone. The much abused mortgage, which
is ruin to a reckless man, to one prudent
and provident is the beginning Of a COM
potency and fortune, for the reason he
will not be satisfied until he has paid it off :,
and all the household are put on stringent
economies until then. Deny your
selves all superAuities and all luxuries
until you can say, "Everything in this
house is mine, thank God! every tim
Der, every brick, every foot of plumbing,
every door SILL" Do not have your chill
dren born in boardinghou and do not
yourself be buried from one. Have a
place where your children can shout and
sing, and romp, without being overhauled
for the racket. Have kitchen where you
can do something toward the reformation
of evil cookery and the lessening OF this
nation of dyspeptic9. As Napoleon lost
one of his great battles by an attack ofin-
digestion, so many men have such a daily
wrestle with the food swallowed that they
and though your wife may know how to
pay on all musical instruments and rival
a prima donna, she is not well educated
unless she can boil an Irish potato and
| broil mutton chop, since the diet some
| times decides the fate of families and ma
| tions.
/ Have sitti ng-room with at least one
! easy chair, even though you have to take
| the turns at sitting in it, and books out
of the public library of your OWL
| purchase for the making Of
| your family intelligent, and checker
boards and guessing matches with an oc.
casional blind mans buff, which is, of al
games, my favorite. Rouse up your home
with all styles of innocent mirth, and gath
er up to your children's nature reservoir
of exuberance that viii pour down re-
freshing streams when life gets parched
| and the dark days come, and the lights gt
| out, and the laughter is smothering into {
! sob.
First, last and all the time, have Chri,
in your home. Julius Caesar Gained thu
fears of an affrighted boatman who was
rowing him in stream, by stating: "St
long as caesar is Win you LII tne saine
boat, no harm can happen" And what
ever storm of adversely or bereavement OF
poverty may strike your home, all is wei
as long as you have Christ the King OF
board. Make your home SO far-reachins
in it's influence that down to the last mo
ment Of your children's life you may hole
them with heavenly charm.
At seventy-six years of age, the Dem os
| themes of the American Senate lay dying
at Washington mean Henry Clay, o
| Kentucky. His pastor sat at his bedside
and "the old man eloquent" after lon'
and exciting public life, translantic an'