Iron County register. [volume] (Ironton, Iron County, Mo.) 1867-1965, 1891-05-07
STANDARD OF THE HOME.
Material Requirement. Not the Highest

Material Requirement. Not the Highes
Attainment.
The tone of a home that is set to the
key of higher values than those repre-
sented by wealth and material things is
the tone that cultivates the best life
Money, used solely as means to ar
end, is of good service; but discussed
and held in sight as an end, as the ideal
of attainment, is more utterly democrat
izing to character than the direst pow
erty. The undue emphasis on wealth
and luxury is by no means most seen in
luxurious homes. 1t is often present as
an irritating and corrosive atmosphere
in the homes of the struggling, middle
class people. an atmosphere that stiles
spiritual life, that dwarfs noble
and lofty purposes, that degrades life
to mere hand-to-hand struggle
with material things. 1t is out of no
such homes as these that the best and
most useful men and women come to
the world. 1t is out of no such atmos-
phere that the best endeavors come for
general life and progress.
For children, nothing is so valuable
as the home where high ideas are kept
in sight as the standard to which life is
amenable. And, in the way of in
diligence and luxury, there is often op-
portunity for choice between one or
two things, particularly in or near a
large city. For instance, there nav be
choice between the expenditure for
expensive and tasteful clothing for a
child, or between using the same
money this would cost for the
mental stimulus of occasional matt
nees at a good play or opera, trip to
New York, Or the purchase of books.
Obviously, both can not be afforded, but
it is a matter of serious loss when the
dry goods attraction gains the ascend
ency over the intellectual or artistic
pleasure that would be stimulus and
joy for later life, and special aid in
development and culture.
Life may be so rich. even without
much money, for children in or near the
city. The art galleries, where so much
of the best education is offered, are
free; the museum of fine arts opens its
hospitable doors free to all, on certain
days of the week; walks, where the
beauty and dignity of architecture
can be pointed out and impressed on the
child, or strolls where an enchant-
ing sunset view can be seen, are all to
be had for the asking. Public libraries
and free schools offer their invaluable
aid, and there is no possible reasons
why the children of the poor should not
grow into intelligent and cultivated
men and women, if only the home sets
its standard high instead of low, and
holds to its ideals of intellectual and
artistic and spiritual life, rather than to
those of mere material requirement.
1t is an unfailing law of life that we
have that which we demand. Holding
in view the higher standards and press
ing forward to these, we are enabled to
approach and realize them. Unseen
forces bear us along, till we can say,
with the poet:
My bark is waited to the strand
By breath divine;
But on the PROV there rests hand,
Other than mine.
The best use of life is not in a mere
accumulation of material things, how
ever luxurious or beautiful A man
may be worth millions, and vet, in
every essential sense of the term, he
may die poor, or he may die, leaving
nothing of material possessions, but
leaving to the world a heritage of char
acter, of high standards, of dreams
made good" that shall make it forever
richer and more abundant.-Boston
R116uet