The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1890-07-17

North Bennington.
----a-------------
ON municated.
'uF DOSE Yc This Day Whom We win
'nly eight simple monosyllables,
I'd yet they hold our destiny in a
8sp as inhexible as fate. They
. us perfect freedom of choice.
y compel us to choose. They fix
ay in which we must choose.
thought is revived and intensi-
ia by the recent tragedy at Man
jter Centre in which four human
gs were bruised, cut and mangled
-a left upon the very threshold of
III. 1t is sadly true that this is
one case of thousands. In fact
one of daily occurrence in this
d and prosperous land of sixty
ons of people and dotted from
er to circumference with church.
nd institutions of learning, all of
n claim to be aiming at the safe
prosperity, and happiness of the
e people. And this sickening
tragedy is the subject of passing re-
mark for a few days and then it fades
from interest and even from memory
and no danger signal is left to warn
the comming traveller. Is this well !?
Is it creditable for land of colleges? !?
A half century ago Charles Harding
was in the bosom of a respectable,
wealthy, family in England surround
ed with friends and every comfort of
life. He became master of a good
trade and was a skillful workman a
liie of ease, Of plenty, and Of hap
piness lay before him. The day
came and he made his final choice !;
he chose to serve his appetite for
strong drink, and soon friends and
relatives became nucongenial and he
left his home and country and came
among strangers, and to-day he lies
on what came near being his death
bed from the hand of violence in a
home of squalor and frenzy at the
age of sixty-five years. Is the pic
ture fascinating for young men !?
About thirty years ago two stu
dents attended one of our institutions
of learning, they were nearly of equal
age and equal attainments and grad
uated with honor about the same
time. (For briefness we will call
them A and b. They drifted apart
after leaving school, but after many
years they met at Manchester Centre.
They had both passed the day of
choosing whom to serve and were re-
ceiving their wages. A had chosen
to serve his own appetite and pas
sions and now walked the streets in
shabby clothing, trembling wreck
and an out spoken infdel. B had
chosen to serve his creator and was
appointed as pastor over the M. f.
Church at Manchester Centre (then
Factory Point) where he preached
with honor to himself and profit to
his congregation three years. Dur
ing the term, his fellow student, A,
was found dead one morning after a
severe cold plight in pile of straw
in an old abandoned house, where it
appeared he had lodged for many
nights. And his fellow student, b,
preached his funeral sermon the town
paying expense of burial. This was
less than half dozen years ago and
the circumstance has nearly faded
out. 1t is not mentioned now.
1t is easy for us to dismiss such a
disagreeable subject as the recent
tragedy with the simple remark: SIT
was the freak of lunatic." 1t was
not the freak of lunatic that took
Charles Harding from a happy home
and placed him under the deadly iron !;
but it was the result of a choice made
by him wears before. The eight mon
osyllables:at the head of this article
came to us through the lips of one
of the greatest leaders of men the
world ever saw, and their certainty
of verification, in every instance, for
four thousand years, proves their or
igen To have been witt, him whose
ssvorl novnr rpturuS void And