The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1889-07-17

|
hever again put my name on the back OF any
mans note 1 gave beggar ten cents, anc
| live minutes after saw him entering liquor
store to spend 1t. I will never again give 6
cent to beggar. helped that young man
start in business, and 10, after a while, he
| came and opened store almost next door to
me, and stole my customers. I will never
again help young man start in business. l
trusted in what my neighbor promised to do,
md he broke his word, and the Psalmist was
right before be corrected himself, for all
lnen are lars" So men become suspicious
and saturnine and selfish. and at every addi-
tional 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 Inisin--
terpreted, or disappointed. or betrayed, and
higher goes the wall, and faster goes another
bolt, not realizing that while they lock others
nut, they lock themselves in; and some day
they wake up to find themselves imprisoned
in a dastardly habit. No friends to Others,
others are no friends to them. There's an
island half way between England, Scotland
hnd Ireland, called the Isle Of Man, and the
Eeas dash against Al sides Of it, and am told
that there IS no more lovely place than that
Ia his disposition, and cuts himself OFF from
the main land of the worlds sympathies, he
Is despicable, and all around him is an Allan
tic Ocean of sel6sh1ess. Behold that Isle of
Man!
Now, supposing that you have, by divine
Regeneration, got right toward God and hu-
manity. and you start cut to practice my
text: "a man that hath friends must show
himself friendly" Fulfill this by all forms of
appropriate salutation. Have you noticed
that the head is so poised that the easiest thing
on earth is tn give nod Of recognition? To
swing the head from side to side, as when it
is wagged in derision, is unnatural and un-
pleasant; to throw it back, invites vertigo;
but to drop the chin in greeting IS ACCOM-
panied with so little exertion that all day
long and every day you might practice it with
out the least Semblance of fatigue. So also
the structure of the hand indicates hand-shak-
ing; the huckles not made so that the fingers
can turn out, but so made that the fingers
can turn in, as in clasping 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
st 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 hand-shaking. /.
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 i'm
proved in health, and it is demonstrated in
girth and color, say: 'How well you lookm'
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,
anything at all about physical condltions.i
In the case Of improved health, you have BY
your words given another impulse toward
the robust and the jocund; while in the
rase Of the failing health you have arrested
the decline by your silence, by which he con-
cludes: "If 1 were really so badly of, he
would have said something about it." We ara
hl, especially those of nervous tempera-
nlent, susceptible to kind words and discour-
and let ten men meet us at certain points on
our way over to business and let each one
say: ''How sick you look" though
Ge should start out well, after meeting
the first and hearing his depressing salute,
we would begin to examine your symptoms.
After meeting the second gloomy accostinC,
I'VE would conclude we did not feel quite as
well as usual. After meeting the third, our
sensations would be dreadful, and after meet
ing the fourth. unless we expected @ conspir-
acy, we would go home and go to bed, and
the other six pessirnists would be a useless sur
plus OF discouraG cement. My dear sir, my dear
madam, what do you mean by going about
this world with disheartenments? Is not the
supply Of gloom and trouble and misfortune
enough to meet the demand without your
running factory Of pins and spikes? Why
should you plant black and blue in the world
when God SO seldom plants them? Plenty
OF scarlet colors, plenty OF yellow, plenty of
green, plenty of pink, but very seldom a
plant black or blue ! never saw a black
flower, and there's only here and there blue
bell or violet: but the blue is for The most
part reserved for the sky, and we have to
look up to sec that, and when we look up no
color can do us harm. Why not plant along
the paths Of others the b,'ightnesses instead of
the glooms? Do not propaesy misfortune. If
you must be prophet at all be an Ezekiel
cts who foretold evil were doing right, for
they were divinely directed; but the proph-
cts of evil in our time are generally
false prophets. Some Of oIT weather wise
people are prophesying we shall have sum-
mer Of unparalleled Scorch. 1t will not be
that at all. think we are going TO have a
summer of great harvest and universal
health; 81 any rate know as much about it
as they do. Last fall all the weather proph-
cts agreed in saying we should have Win
ter of extraordinary severity, blizzard on the
heals of blizzard. It was the mildest winter
I ever remember to have passed. Indeed,
the autumn and the spring almost showed
winter out OF the procession Real troubles
have no heraids running ahead Of their SOM
Der cheriots, and no one has any authority
in our timo to announce their coming. Lead
yourself up with helpful words and deeds.
The hymn once SUNG in our churches is unfit
to be sung, for IL says:
We shoald suspect sorle danger near
Where we possess delight
Tr otba,, r-or1c p,o,oora +o loan r,iSero}IIa
all the time. The old sorg sung at the pianos
quarter Of g century ago was right: Kind
Words Can Never Die" Such kind words
have their nests in kind hearts, and when
they are hatcaod ont and take wing they cir
Gle round III flights that never cease, and
storms cannot lufile their wings. ard when
they cease flight in these lower skies Of earth
they sweep around amid the higher attitudes
Of heaven.
Oh, what glorious state of things to have
the friendship OF God! Why,we could afford
to have all the world against Us and all other
worlds against us if we had God for lis. He
could in u minute blot out this universe, and
in another minute make 4 better universe. /
have 10 idea that God tried hard when he
made all things. The most brilliant thing
known to US is light, and for the creation OF
that He only used a word Of command. AS
out Of flint the fronGiersman strikes spark,
So out OF one word God struck the monday
sun. For the making OF the present universe
do not read that God lifted so much IS a
finger. The Bible frequently spe@ks Of
Gods hand, and Gods arm, and Gods
shoulder, and Gods foot; then sup.