The Newberry herald and news. (Newberry, S.C.) 1884-1903, 1893-04-05
ARP'S SYMPATHY.
For Anybody Helpless, and Especially the
Young-Doesn't Understand Why
Children Should Be Afflicted
with WhoopioS Cough.
T Atlanta Constitution.

Win w AOOp1Ots SOUSA.
[Atlanta constitutional
Here she comes running and wants
somebody to hold her while she coughs
and coughs until the blood darkens her
face and the tears run down her cheeks.
The poor little orphan. I wonder what
the whooping cough was made for
and the measles and rnumps and scar
let fever, and the collie and all these
infantile diseases that prey upon and
distress the poor little innocents-what
have they done that they should suffer.
I know what I have done and left un-
done, and it is no wonder that grown
people, except a few, have headache
and toothache and rheumatism and
consumption, and a whole doctors
book full of complaints. feel that I
deserve my share of all these bodily
troubles, and even if I don't I know
that they better prepare me for heaven.
They make me so tired that I am will
ling to 60 when my time cometh. But
I can't understand why these little
children, who are all unconscious Of
original sin or any other sin should
suffer so.
But suppose that we can't under
stand it, what are we going to do about
it t-nothing-nothing of course, and so
the best thing to do is to accept ali the
conditions of life and be thankful.
Though He slay me yet will I trust
in Him" On this beautiful spring
morning, while the sweet south wind
is breathing its balmy odors upon US, I
was Illuminating upon life and its mea-
sure of JOY and sorrow, and I wondered
why both were not more evenly dis
tributed. Why should bad luck and
peril overtake some and leave out
others? Why should the i'll fated Ma
ronic 60 down with all on board and
the Aurania came safe to port? Why
should one man fall in battle and his
colnrade escape unharmed? Is it fate
or providence? Is it chance or destiny
that one should be taken and the other
left? I know not and will not let it
disturb me. I do know thatI am here
and have duty to perform. I know
that
Life is real, life is earnest.
And the grave is motifs goal,
I know that virtue is everywhere
respected and that good people save
the world just as ten good men would
have saved Sodom.
What shock it is to the civilized
world when a ship goes down at sea
and passengers and crew
Sink into the depths with bubbling groan,
Unknelled, unconfned, and unknown.
Why is it, why does it so harrow up
our feelings and provoke our tenderest
sympathies? Here are 5000 people
dying every day in the United States
and they would make a funeral pro-
cession 500 miles long. Not less than
$4,000 kindred are bereaved and mourn
for them, and yet all these cofins and
graves and saddened hearts and homes
do not concern the public like the
sinking of a ship at sea. The manner
of the death is not so horrible. Indeed,
drowning is said to be the least repul-
sive of all deaths for it is painless and
the agony Of mind is soon over, and
yet it is an awful calamity. No help,
no kindred, no last words, no messages
of love, no requiem, no flowers on the
grave! In my early youth the shock
of the loss of the pilot inwhich Theodor-
sea Allston perished had not passed
away. She was the beautiful daughter
of Aaron Burr. That ship went down
with all on board and no one knew
when or where, and the whole south
was grieved. She had married a
distinguished son of South Carolina
and was herself the great granddaugh-
ter of Jonathan Edwards, and her
beauty and her loveliness had saved
her father from being convicted of
treason. 1t was tender story that my
father used to tell me and I loved such
things, and I love them yet. The next
disaster that shocked the country in my
youth was the loss of the, Home that
went down on the Carolina coast when
almost in sight of land. I remem Der
how Georgia mourned for Oliver
Prince, her most distinguished lawyer,
who sank with that vessel. He was
our United States Senator and the
gifted author of many sketches. Had
he sickened and died at home not half
the !grief and sympathy would have
been manifested by the public heart.
We are more reconciled to the newt
able than to the unseen, unexpected
stroke that comes at sea from the
mighty haud Of God. We all desire to
die at home-at home, where loving
hands can smooth the aching head and
loving eyes look down into our own
and weep. I do, and if don't get
better, I am not going far away any
more. There is nothing sadder to me
than to see kindred, who are near and
dear gather at the depot to meet the
corpse of son or a daughter who had
died in strange land and whose last
request was to be taken home.
But do not know why my thoughts