Capital journal. (Salem, Or.) 1893-1895, 1893-09-04

| you get L1 bOStOu III sdTely. linen yOC
return home. Not an accident, not al
alarm. No thanks.
In other words, you seem to be NOR,
grateful when 80 people lose their live.
and you get of than you are grateful t.
God when you all get off and you hav,
no alarm at all. Now, you ought to b,
thankful when You escape from accident
but more thankful when they all escape
In the one case your gratitude is some
what selfish; in the other it is more like
what it ought to be.
Oh, these common mercies, thes,
common blessings, how little we appre
ciate them and how soon we forget
them! Like the OK grazing, with The
clover up to its eyes, like the bird pick
ing the worm out of the furrow-nevel
thinking to thank God, who makes the
grass grow and who gives life to every
living thing from the animalculn in the
sod to the seraph on the throne. Thanks
giving on the eth of November, in the
autumn of the year, but blessings hour
by hour and day by day and no thanks
at all.
l compared our indifference to the
brute, but perhaps wronged the brute.
| do not know but that among its other
instinctsitmay have an instinct by which
it recognizes the divine hand that feeds
1t. l do not know but that God is
through it holding communication with
what we call ''irrational creation" The
COW that stands under the willow by the
water course chewing its cud looks very
thankful, and who can tell how much q
bird means by its song2 The aroma of
the flowers smells like incense, and the
mist arising from the river looks like the
smoke of morning sacrifice. Oh, that
we were as responsive!
If you were thirsty and asked me for
drink and gave you this glass of water,
your common instinct would reply,
"Thank you" And yet, how many
chalices of mercy we get hour by hour
from the hand of the Lord, our Father
and our King, and we do not even think
to say, "Thank You" More just to men
than we are just to God.
INGRATTTUDE.
Who thinks of thanking God for the
water gushing up in the well, foaming
in the cascade, laughing over the rocks,
pattering in the shower, clapping its
hands IN the seap Who thinks to thank
God for thaS Who thinks to thank
God for the air, the fountain of life, the
bridge of sunbeams, the path of sound,
the great fan on a hot summer day?
Who thinks to thank God for this won
derful physical organism, this sweep of
vision, this chime of harmony struck
into the ear, this crimson tide rolling
through arteries and veins, this drum
ming of the heart on the march of i'm
mortality?
l convict myself, and convict every
one of you while say these things, that
we are unappreciative Of the common
mercies of life. And yet if they were
withdrawn, the heavens would withhold
their rain, and the earth would crack
open under our feet, and famine and
desolation and sickness and woe would
stalk across the earth, and the whole
earth would become place of skulls.
Oh, my friends, let us wake up to an
appreciation OF the common mercies of
life. Let every day be Sabbath, every
meal sacrament, every room holy of
holies. We all have burdens TO bear; let
us cheerfully bear them. We all have
battles to fight; let us courageously fight
them.
If we want to die right, we must live
right You go home and attend to your
little sphere of duties. will go home
and attend to my little sphere of duties.
You cannot do my work; cannot do
your work. Negligence and Incidence
will win the hiss Of everlasting scorn,
while faithfulness will gather its gar
lands and wave its scepter and sit upon
its throne long after the world has put
on ashes and eternal ages have begun
their march.