Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1891-08-28

New j Ofh anu DtoohiyA SAo"~ ~
wear about 10000 young women, and
would like to grind up about as many
this year. Out of all that long process
sion of women who march on WIN no
hone for this world or the next, battered
and bruised and scoffed at, and flung on
the prccipice, not one but might nave
been saved for home and God and
Heaven. But good men and good women
are not in that kind OF business. Alas
for that poor thing! Nothing but the
thread of that sewing girls needle held
her, and the thread broke.
l have heard men tell in public dis
course what man is; but what is
woman? Until some one shall give
better definition l will tell you what
woman is. Direct from God. sacred
and delicate gift, with affections so
great that no measuring line short OF
that of the infinite God can tell their
bound. Fashioned to refine and soothe,
and lift and irradiate home and society
and the world. OF such value that no
one can appreciate it, unless his mother
lived long enough to let him understand
it, or who in some great crisis OF life,
re-cnforce him with faith in God that
nothing could disturb.
Now l should not wonder if you
trembled a little with a sense Of re-
sponsibility when l say that there is
hardly person in this house but NAV
have an opportunity to save woman.
advice, or by financial help, or by trying
Christian influences. If, for instance,
i,, al n icfr
and breaking down in health and spirits
trying to support her children, now that
her husband is dead or an invalid, doing
but which is little appreciated-keep-
guests, according as they pay small
board, or propose, without paying any
board at all, to decamp, are critical Of
yourselves in trying to get her more
pathy.
Yea, if you see woman favored of
fortune and with all kindly surround
ings, finding in the hollow batteries of
the world her chief regalement, living
for herself and for time as if there
were no eternity, strive to bring her
into the kingdom of God, as did the
other day a Sabbath school teacher,
who was the means of the conversion
of the daughter of man of immense
wealth, and the daughter resolved to
join the church, and she went home
and said, Father, l am going to join
the church and l want you to come"
'tOh, no,' he said 81 never 20 to
church." "Well," said the daughter,
''if I were going to be married, would
you not go to see me married." And
he said, ''Oh, yes.' "Well," she said,
''this is of more Importance than that.''
So he went and has gone ever since,
and loves to go. do not know but that
faithful Sabbath school teacher not only
saved a woman, but saved man. There
may be in this audience-gathered from
all parts of the word-there may be
man whose behavior toward womanhood
is perfidious. Repent! Stand up, thou
masterpiece of sin and death, that may
charge you! AS far as possible make
reparation. Do not boast that you have
her in your power. and that she cannot
help herself. When that fine collar and
cravat and that elegant suit of clothes
comes off and your uncovered soul stands
before God, you will be better off if YOU
save that woman.
There is another exploit you can do.
and that is to save child. A child does
not seem to amount to much. 1t is
nearly a year old before it can walk at
all. For the first year and half il can
not speak word. For the first ten
years it would starve if it had to earn
its own food. For the first fifteen years
its opinion on any subject is absolutely
valuless. And then there are so many
of them. My! What lots OF children1
And some people have contempt for
children. They are good for nothing
but to wear out the carpets and break
things and keep you awake nights crying
Well, your estimate of child is quite
different from that mothers estimate
who lost her child this summer. They
took it to the salt air of the seashore
and to the tonic air of the mountains,
but no help came, and the brief para
graph of its life is ended. Suppose that
life could be restored by purchase, how
much would that bereaved mother give?
She would take all the jewels from
her fingers and neck and bureau and
put them down.
And if told that that was not enough,
she would take her house and make over
the deed for it, and if that were not
enough she would call in all her in
vestments and put down all her mort
cages and bonds, and if told that were
not enough she would say: II have
made over all my property, and if 1 can
have that child back will now pledge
that will toll with my own hands and
carry with my own shoulders in any
kind of hard work, and live in a cellar
and die in garnet. Only give me back
that lost darling!"
But what are you going to do with
those children who are worse off than il
their father and mother had died the day
they were born? There are tens of
thousands such. Their parentage was
against them. Their name is against
them. The Structure of their skulls is
against them. The nerves and muscles
contaminated by the inebriety or dsso-
luteness of their parents, they are prac-
tlcally at their birth laid out on plank
IN the middle of the Atlantic ocean in an
equlnoctial gale and told to make for
shore. What to do with them is the
question often asked.
There is another question quite as
pertinent, and that is, what are they
going to do with us? They will, ten or
eleven years from now, have as many
vntnS a hn