The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1889-09-05


a short turn down the road. Then we
go back to the house, and you get me in
the right light and show me the Kensetts
and the Overstadts on the wall, and take
me into the music room and show me the
bird cages, the canaries in the bay VIM
dow answering the robin in the tree tops.
Thank you? I never enjoyed myself more
in the same length of time. Now, why
do MOTIVE do that way in regard to the
character of others, and show the bloom
and the music and the bright fountainsf
No. We say come along and let me
show you that mans character. Here is
a green scummed frog pond, and there's
filthy cellar, and l guess under that
hedge there must be a black snake. Come
and let US for an hour or two regale our
selves with the nuisances.
Oh, my friends, better cover up the
faults and extoI the virtues, and this
habit once established of universal
friendliness will become as easy as it is
this morning for syringa to food the
air with sweetness, as easy as it will be
further on in the season for quail to
whistle up from the grass. When we
hear something bad about somebody
whom we always supposed to be good,
take out your lead pencil and say: ''Let
me seel Before l accept that baleful
story against that mans character, will
take off from it twenty five per cent. for
the habit of exaggeration which belongs
to the man who first told the story; then
will take off twenty-five per cent for
the additions which the spirit of gossip
in every community has put upon the
original story; then l will take off twenty
five per cent. from the fact that the man
may have been put into circumstances of
overpowering temptation. So I have
taken off seventy five per cent But 1
have not heard his side of the story at
all, and for that reason take off the re-
naming twenty-five per cent" Excuse
me, sir, don't believe a word Of it.
But here comes in a defective maxim,
so often quoted: "Where there is so
much smoke there must be some fire. /"
Look at all the smoke for years around
Jenner, the introducer of vaccination;
and the smoke around Columbus, the
discoverer; and the smoke around Martin
Luther, and Savonarola, and Calico, and
Paul, and John, and Christ, and tell me
where was the fire? SANDER, like the
world, may be made out of nothing. If
the Christian, fair minded, common
sensical spirit in regard to others pre-
dominated in the world we should have
the millennium in about six weeks, for
would not that be la NIB and lion, COW
and leopard lying down together? Moth
ing but the grace of God can ever put us
into such habit of mind and heart as
that. The whole tendency is in the oppo-
site direction. This is the way the
world talks: I put my name on the back
of mans note and had to pay it, and l
will never again put my name on the
back of any mans note. gave a beggar
ten cents, and five minutes after I saw
him entering liquor store to spend it.
will never again give a cent to beggar.
helped that young man start in bust
ness, and 10, after awhile, he came and
opened store almost next to me, and
stole my customers. I will never again
help young man start in business.
trusted in what my neighbor promised to
do, and he broke his word, and the Psalm
istwas right before he corrected himself
for ''aIl men are liars. F."
So men become suspicious and saturn
inc and selfish, and at every additional
wrong done them they put another layer
on the wall of their exclusiveness, and
another bolt to the door that shuts them
out from sympathy with the world. They
get cheated out of thousand dollars, or
misinterpreted, or disappointed, or be-
trayed, and higher goes the wall, and
faster goes another bolt, not realizing
that while they lock others out they lock
themselves in, and some day they wake
up to find themselves imprisoned in
a cfardlu hah NJ E,.so A.
others are no friends to them. There is
an island half way between England,
Scotland and Ireland called the Isle of
Man, and the seas dash against all sides
of it, and l am told that there is no more
lovely place than that Isle of Man; but
when man becomes insular in his dis
position, and cuts himself off from the
main land of the worlds sympathies, he
is despicable, and all around him is an
Atlantic ocean of selfishness. B ehoId
that Isle of Man!
Now, supposing that you have, by a
divine regeneration, got right toward
God and humanity, and you start out to
practice my text: "a man that hath
friends must show himself friendly"
Fulfill this by all forms of appropriate
salutations. Have you noticed that the
head is so poised that the easiest thing
on earth is to give nod Of recognition?
TO swing the head from side to side, as
when it is wagged in derision, is I'M
natural and unpleasant; to throw it back
invites vertigo; but to drop the chin in
greeting is accompanied with so little
exertion that all day long and every day
you might practice it without the least
of fatigue. So, also, the
structure of the hand indicates hand
shaking; the knuckles not made so that
the fingers can turn out, but so made
that the fingers can turn in as in elasping
hands; and the thumb divided from and
set aloof from the fingers, so that while
the fingers take your neighbours hand on
one side, the thumb takes it on the other,
and, pressed together, all the faculties of
the hand give emphasis to the salutation.
Five sermons in every healthy hand urge
us to handshaking.
Besides this, every day when you start
out load yourself up with kind thoughts,
kind words, kind expressions and kind
greetings. When man or woman does
well, tell him so, tell her so. IF you meet
some one who is improved in health, and
1t is demonstrated in mirth and color,
say: show we'll you lookup But if on the
other hand, under the wear and tear of
life. he appears pale and exhausted, do
not introduce sanitary subjects, or say
any thing at all about physical condi-
tons. In the case of improved health.