The record-union., 1891-03-01
HOME INFLUENCE.
The MoIding and Shaping Power Of
Early Teaching and Example,.
The Influence of a Mother, and the
Dependence of Destiny Upon
Her Faithfulness.
Behold thy mother John xix, 81.

All thinkers must join in the confession
that the surroundings of a human soul
have much to do with the shaping of its
character and destiny.
So said Rev. John F. Won Herrlich in
a sermon recently delivered by him in
this city.
1t was admitted, he said, that great
powers are natural and Unborn and can
not generally be acquired, hut it is also
conceded that unless the surroundings
come to the help of this genius it viii
never expand into practice and develop
ment. In Gray's .'Elegy in Country
Church-yard" we hear of those who rest
in obscure graves who might have
swayed thousands with their eloquent
genius or held the scepter of empire
These all came to the earth lowered with
the power and possibilities of greatness,
but they lay hidden and undeveloped
and were never heard from.
| A few perhaps have dashed outward
from huts and cabins into earthly promi-
nence, but the larger number of earth's
| gifted children are at the mercy of condi-
| tons and environment, and rise or sink
at the bidding of a force not entirely
| within their own controlling.
Times may have much to do with max
| ing man or woman, but the condi-
tions must have the material to work
upon. The age of Columbus made him a
sailor, but he outran his surroundings
and crossed the great waste of waters.
Shakespeare was
IMPELLED TO WRITE PLAYS,
But he wrote away beyond anything
that could have been expected. Thus,
while surroundings awaken mind
bringing before one the opportunity-yet
they do not make or limit genius. In
the brief text Just read we suddenly come
upon one of those wonderful cases of sur
roundings and conditions. The Divine
! Christ, at the age of 33, near his dying
moment, commends his mother to the
care of his loving and devoted disciple.
TO his already great love for Mary st.
John must now add the care and solicit
tude of the dying Jesus. Since these two
persons are morally the two most grand
and eminent types of life in all history,
it is not unreasonable to suppose that
their childhood owed much to the mater
nal love which could hold such empire
and shape such character!
1t may not be absolutely essential to
moral and intellectual eminence that such
conditions shall exist. 1t may be that
some who Were orphaned and friendless
have risen to moral and intellectual great
ness, but if you look deep enough you
viii find in most of these cases a conf
pensating substitute.
But the fact stands undisputed, that a
good home, where the maternal angel is
! the daily minister, is a tropical cline for
the production of luxuriant moral beauty
and goodness. 1t is a pity we cannot look
into the homes and lives of many of our
great and eminent characters to see the
process and result Of home influence!
Statistics can collect all the facts about
gold and silver, grain and produce,
| schools and religion, and draw from them
their great conclusions, but it cannot open
to view the great past and tell us whether
the ancient mother stood as near and close
| to her children as does the mother OF our
day.
FORMER CONDITIONS.
| We know that the old laws show us
that the mother was least and the father
everything-that the mother legally was
an underling, and was not, therefore, the
moral leader of the household.
But this could not haYe been q univer-
sal condition, for the Cornelia of Gracchi
fame, living two hundred years before
the Christian era, devoted her whole life
to the education of her children, all OF
whom achieved national greatness, and,
as Plutarch tells US, made the advantage
of their birth of far less value than the
education and training of their great and
devoted mother! Nirgil'S mother was OF
higher rank and mind than his tather-a
mother who saw her sons future in hen
dreams and aspirations for him. Thus
ancient history gives us the two sides
| woman the underiing, in law next tc
nothing, and woman the queen of the
home, ruling and swaying by her atfec-
ton and example.
Not long ago, in his annual address, a
college President quotes and indorses the
remark of noted public man that he
was educated by his nlother-that schools
| on6 Tp1inuaS did lint he bod
right mother! This was the alpha and
omega in his life-he had the right
mother!-and so we ask, can the schools
and colleges do the molding and shaping
of home teaching and influence?
Womanhood-moth is not all
of life, but it is most of it-her school and
empire may not seem to be large, but il
is as visible as the hills and mountains.
Woman has become what philosophers
call an encompassment, or what the
painters call an atmosphere. Not many
of them sufficiently recognize it, but the
great men have for centuries con-
fessed the power and influence this
earlier training had upon then-for the
mother precedeS the teacher and school
master and outranks them all, for she
lays the very foundation of the structure,
and the earliest days are
FULLEST OF HEART
And destiny! Yes, and in most cases it
| - ttil pOWeI tIldt DeBillS Ill
the cradle and is in full sway till il closes
in the graveyard. Although history is
too imperfect to warrant any positive
generalization as to the dependence OF
destiny upon the mothers fiithfulness
yet il aDoundS in instances which tell us
OF the great part she may play in life's
mighty drama.
st. Augustine. who once ruled the re-
ligious world, is inseparable from his
mother. Monica. They read, walked
talked and journeyed together-nothing
but death could separate them. Sir Isaac
Newton's distinction has direct con-
nection with the power and teaching of a
godly mother. And when we see Frank
lin entering a large city, with his few
provisions under his arm and a scanty
bundle on his shoulder, we must not for
get in our eager wonder at his arrival in
Philadelphia the little home he had left
behind and the weeping mother who
had kissed him good-by, and whose ten
der heart ached over the son who had
/ gone forth to make name and to fight
life's hard and wearisome battles.
In our everyday thoughts about Henry
Clay we see him struggling with poverty
and attempting, while in the corn-field,
to practice the art ofpublic speaking; we
see HIM III his home-Spun pants and
jackets trudging his way to little log
school-house in Virginia, but if we GO
back to those scenes-back TO the fountain
of ambition and inspiration in the child
Henry-we viii find a mother, q widow
and the sole guardian of her gifted son.
Henry Clay left that mother when he
was is years of age to go to Kentucky,
where he carried forward the high
PLANS OF HIS NATURE,
But he took 3 mothers teaching and a
mothers blessing and influence with
him. Not many minds have surpassed
in power and beauty that OF Mime. De Stael
her observation, her logic, her breadth
of thought and cultured judgment made
it necessary for Napoleon to have her