Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1889-07-13
HOW TO Be HAPPY.
SEE THAT YOU ARE HEALTHY,
WEALTHY AND WISE.
A Thoroughgoing American Address De.
ivered by Judge Richard O'Gor-
man in New York.

nNereu Dy fSlchard OGOr-
man in New York.
from the New York Commercial Advertiser |
The following spirited, wholesome and
patriotic address was delivered by Judge
| Richard OGorman to the graduating class
of st. Francis Xavier College, which took
place at the Metropolitan Opera House on
Monday evening last June oath, and
which is here reproduced in full. 1t
should be model in style and sentiment
to orators for occasions of this kind, for
such words can not fail to foster those
principles which others have Joined this
journal in commencing, the principles
which are at the bottom of American
manhood, and which in time will bind all
the varying elements that compose our
national character into an impregnable
unity of purpose and accomplishment:
| Gentlemen of the Graduating Class: 1t
is difficult to imagine a position more en-
vlable than that which you occupy TO-
night. You are young, in the happy and
| hopeful morning of life. You have under
| gone the last and most severe ordeal of
your collegiate career, and you have ac-
quilted yourselves with success and honor.
| The diplomas you have received testify
to your industry and your requirements,
and give you the right to take rank in the
honorable confraternity of scholars. You
ought to bel am sure you are-yery
proud and happy.
All here are your friends Those who
love you and whom you love, with the
fondness and fidelity of home, are here.
The reverend and learned professors of
your college are here, who have watched
over your progress with anxious care and
pride. Here, too, is the eminent and hon
ored prela.e, the Archbishop of this do
cese, whose presence tonight gives addi-
tional dignity and grace to this assem-
blage. All are here to do you honor-to
tender you our hearty congratulations, and
to assure you that we cherish the hope
that your recent successes are but the har-
bingers of future honors, which you will
obtain on the broader field of activity upon
which you are soon to enter.
MEMORABLE NIGHT.
You will not easily forget this night.
This scene will be a pleasant vision, famil-
lar to all your lives. Other triumphs are,
trust, before you-other efforts will
achieve success-you will be prosperous
and honored yet, in the midst of YOUR
fullest pride and exultation, this scene
will steal back to youths triumph of the
old times-and with it, perhaps, may come
also a feeling, akin to regret, such as a
poet thus expresses
Ne'er tell me of glory, serenely adjoining,
life;
Give me back, give me back. the wild freshness
| OF morning,
Its smiles and its tears are worth evening S
best light
But that can never be. Neither poet.
nor magician, nor sage can restore the past.
can keep sweet hours from dying, or charm
them to life again. The past once gone Is
gone forever. The present alone is ours
to use it as best we may, and in it to build
up our fortune for the future.
Gentlemen of the graduating class, your
college life is past. All that skillful and
careful teaching could do for you has been
done, and you have turned it to good
account. You have acquired all the vari-
GUS knowledge that goes to make up a
practical and liberal education. The
weapons by means of which you can best
tight and win the battle Of life are ready
to your hands. 1t is for you now to WELD
them with courage and skill.
Henceforth your fate is in your own
control. The portals of the great world
will soon open to receive you, the great,
busy, bustling, earnest, restless world
where each man is striving to gain for
himself wealth or power or honor. There
lies your future field of battle There YOU
must win victory or suffer defeat.
| For the present you need rest-you are
weary after your long continued efforts
you need the indulgence of idleness for a
time. You have won the right to enioy il
for awhile. But don't let it last too long.
Don't let idleness grow into a habit, for
the habit of idleness is, of all the bad hab-
its that mar the efforts of aspiring youth.
the most subtle and the most dangerous.
Once in its fatal grasp, energy, ambition
and force of will begin to wither and de-
cay, and the wretched victim becomes lost
to life and name and fame for evermore,
| IDLENESs.
| You know with what bitterness of scorn
the proverbs of all people denounce idle
| ness.
| Idleness is the mother of mischief
me Devil tempts other men, but idleness
| tempts the Devil.
The Devil dances in an idle brain.
| These are some of the expressions for
! popular contempt for idleness. Here. in
this energetic republic, in this earnest
rapid, unresting life of ours, there is no
room for an idle man, no respect and but
little liberation. He is like driftwood.
moved to and fro by wind and tide, while
the ships of commerce pass him by with
out notice. His life is unfruitful and sur
perfous. Here, more than any other
place on earth, labor is lord and master
commands armies and sends them over all
the land, to win the battle of civilization.
| think it was the monks of "Subiaco"
who used to say that "to labor was to
| pray" and, indeed, as far as steady occu-
patton tends to keep men out of mischief.
labor may be regarded in the light of a
| religious observance | don't believe that
a wholly idle man ever was happy man.
! If you want to be happy, go to work-and
| the sooner you do so the better. And you
do want to be happy, do you not? You
want to have "a good time" No wish can
be more natural.
Men have been eagerly seeking happi-
ness ever since the occurrence of the un-
toward event in the Garden of Eden, which
We have had such bitter cause to deplore.
On this subject of happiness great deal
may be said, and had thought of saying
something about it tonight, more or less
original, when, luckily, l CHANGED to see
correspondence in one of the daily news
papers which threw an unexpected light
on the question. A person taking the
name of "Juvenus" wrote to the editor
requesting to be informed of the best way
to be happy.
THE MODERN ORACLE SPEAKS.
The daily newspaper, as we all know, is
the only true representative and legiti-
mate successor of the "Delphic Oracle of
old, and inherits all its wisdom and astute-