The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1892-05-04

face, and reptiles crawl among the ooze,
and frogs utter their hideous croak, and by
day and night there rises from the foul
mire and green scum fever and ague and
death. There is an endless activity under
foot and overhead.
Not one four o'clock in the flower bed,
not one fly on the window pane, not one
squirrel gathering food from the cones of
the white pine, not one rabbit feeding on
clover tops, not one drop falling in show
er, not one minnow glancing in the sea,
not one quail whistling from the grass, not
one hawk cawing in the sky but is busy
now and is busy always, fulfilling its mis-
sion as certainly as any monarch on earth
or any angel in heaven You hear the
shout of the plowboys busy in the field
and the rattle of the whiffietrees on the
harrow, but you do not know that there is
more industry in the earth upturned and
in the dumb vegetation underfoot than in
all that YOU see.
NATURES CEAsELEss ACTIVITY.
If you put your ear TO a lump of riven
sod you may hear nothing in the roots and
spicule Of grass, but there are at work
spades and cleavers and piledrivers and
battering rams and internecine wars. do
not wonder that the lively fancy of the an
clients saw in the inanimate creation
around Floras and Pomonas and Graces
and Fauns and Fairies and Satyrs and
Nymphs Everything is busy Nothing
is inanimate, except the man who cannot
see the life and hear the music AC the
creation the morning stars sang together,
but they were only the choir which was 10
lead all the stars, and all the mountains
and all the seas in Gods worship All
natural objects seem ut one and the same
time uniting in work and Joy and worship.
In CODE bur.a - oft Iar
the worship, or the work, or the Joy.
Amid all natural objects at one and the
same time it is Halloween and Whit
sunday and Ash Wednesday and All
Saints Day.
All the healthy beauty of that which we
see and hear in the natural world is de-
pendent upon activity and unrest. Men
will be healthy intellectually, morally
and physically-only upon the condition OF
an active industry. / know men die every
day of overwork. They drop down in coal
pits, and among the spindles of northern
factories, and on the cotton plantations of
the south. In every city and town and vii
lage You find men grooming under burdens
"a, in the east the cameis stagger under
their loads between Aleppo and Damascus.
Life is crushed out every day at counters
and work benches and anvils. But there
are other multitudes who die from mere
inertia. Indulgences every day are con-
tracing diseases beyond the catholicon Of
allopathy and homeopathy and hydropathy
and eclecticism. Rather than work they
rush upon lancets and scalpels.
Nature has provided for those who vio-
late her laws by inactiyity-what rheum
for the eyes aud what govt for the feet,
and what curvature for the spine, and
what structures for the chest, and what tu-
bercles for the lungs and what rheuma-
tisms for the muscles, and what neural
gias for the nerves. Nature in time ar
raigns every such culprit at her bar and
presents against him an indictment of one
hundred counts, and convicts him on each
one of them. The laws of nature will not
stop their action because men may be ig-
noraut of them. Disease, when it comes
To do its work, does not ask whether you
understand hygiene or pathology or ma
If there were not so many lies written on
tombstones and in obituaries you would
see what multitudes of the world inhab-
itants are slain in their attempts TO escape
the necessity OF toll. Men cross oceans
and continents and climb the Alps and sit
under the sky of Italy or the shadow Of
Egyptian Pyramid end 20 down into an
cient ruins. and bat he at Baden Baden. and
breath, and tine same poor digestion, and
the same twitching of the nerves, when at
home with their own spade they might
have dug health out Of the ground, or
with their own AK hewn health out of
log, or with their own scythe garnered
health from the grain field.
There are many who estimate the re-
spectability Of an occupation by the little
exertion it demands, and would not have
their children enter any employment where
their hands many be soiled, forgetting that
laborer's oycralls are just as honorable
as a priests robes and an anvil is just as
respectable a pulpit. Health flies from
the bed OF down and says, Il cannot sleep
here's" and from the table spread with
ptarmigan and epicurean viands, saying,
81 cannot eat here" and from the vehicle
of soft cushions and easy springs, saying,
Il cannos ride here" and from houses
mxuriouSly warmed and upholstered say
ing, Il cannot live here and some day
you meet health, who declined all these
luxuriant places, walking in the plow's
/ furrow, or sweltering beside the kissing
/ forge, or spinning among the looms, or
driving a dray. or timing n roof, or carry
| inc hods Of brick up the ladder Of wall.
| IDLENEss Is sATAN's OPPORTUNITY.
Furthermore, notice that Incidence en-
/ dangers the soul. Satan makes bis chief
/ conquests over men who either have moth
ing to do, or. il they have refuse to do it.
| There is legend that St. Thomas, years
after Christi resurrection. began again to
doubt, and he went to the Apostles and
told them about his doubts. Each Apostle
| looked az him with surprise and then said
! he must be sScuscd. for he had no time TO
listen any longer. Then St Thomas went
ts the devout women of his time and ex-
pressed his doubts. They said they were
sorry, but they had no time to listen.
! Then St. Thomas concluded that it was
because they were so busy that the Apos-
ties and the devout women had no doubts
Idleness not only leads n man into as
sociations which harm his morals, but
often thrusts upon him the worst kind of
, skepticsm. Loafers are almost always in
/ fdels. or fast getting TO be. Consummate
idlers never read the Bible, and if they APP
pear in church can be distinguished in an
audience of thousand - their listless-
ness, for they are too lazy TO hear. 1t is
not so much among occupied merchants,
Industrious mechanics and professional
men always busy that you hear the reli-
gion of Jesus maligned, as in public
lounging places. given up TO profanity and
dissoluteness. They have no sympathy
with the Book that says. let him that
stole steal no more; but rather let him
labor, working with his hands the thing
which is good, that he may have to give