The Canton times. (Canton, Miss.) 1893-1906, 1895-12-06


how ,.,ucn it means to you. Fres
co on palace wall does not neaI
50 much to you as those rough
hcwn rafters Parks and bowers
and trees on fashionable watering
place or country seat do not mean SC
much to you as that brook that ran IL
front of the plain farm house, and
singing under the weeping willows.
The barred gateway swung open by
the porter in full dress does not mean
as much to you as that swing-gate,
your sister ON one side of 1T, and you
on the other; she gone fifteen years
into glory. That scene coming back
you to-day, as you swept backward
and forward on the gate, singing the
songs of year childhood.
But there are those here who have
their second dwelling place. 1t is your
adopted home. That also is sacred for
ever. There you established the first
family altar. There your children
were born In that room tapped the
wing of the death angel. Under that
roof when your work is done, you ex-
pect to lie down and die. There is
only one word in all the language
that can convey your idea of that
place, and that word is "home"
Now, let me say / never knew a
man who was faithful to his early and
adopted home who was given over at
the same time to any gross form OF
wickedness. If You find more enjoy
ment in the club room, in the literary
society, in the art salon, than you do
in these unpretending home pleasures,
you are on the road to ruin. Though
you may be cut off from your early
associates, and though you may
be separated from all your kim
dred, young man, is there not
room somewhere that you can
call your own? Though it be the
fourth story of third-class boarding
house, into that room gather books,
pictures and a harp. Hang your
mothers picture over the mantle. Bid
unholy mirth stand back from that
threshold. Concentrate some spot in |
that room with the knee of prayer. |
BY the memory of other days, a |
fathers counsel, mothers love, and |
a sisters confidence. call it home.
Another safeguard for these young
men is industrious habit. There are
great many people trying to make
their way through the world with
their wits instead of by honest toll.
There is young man who comes from
the country to the city. He fails twice
before he is as old as his father was
when he first saw the spires of the
great town. He is seated in his room
1T rent of two thousand dollars a
year, waiting for the banks to declare
their dividends and the stocks to run
lp. After awhile he gets impatient.
He tries to improve his penmanship by
making copy-plates of other merchants
signatures! Never mind-all is right
n business. After awhile he has his
state. Now is the time for him to re-
ire to the country, amid the focks
ind the herds, to culture the domestic
'irtues.
Another safeguard that I want to
PRESENT to young men is high ideal
# life. Sometimes soldiers going into
'attlc shoot into the ground instead of
nto the hearts of their enemies. They
re apt to take aim too low, and it is
ften that the captain, going into con-
ict with his men, will cry out: Now,
nen, aim highv The fact is that in
ife great many men take no aim
t all. The artist plans out his
ntire thought before he puts it
pom canvas, before he TAX es up
h. al, |
ect thinks out the entire building
efore the workmen begin. Although
may seem to be morgan
zed, that architect has in his mind
very Corinthian column. every Gothic J
rich, every Byzantine capital. A poet {
kinks out the entire plot of his poem
efore he begins to chime the cantos
+ tinkling rhythms. And yet there |.
re great many men who start the
Important structure of life without
moving whether it is going to be
rude Tartars hut, or a st. Marks
athedral, and begin to write out
he intricate poem of their life
'ithout knowing whether it is to be }
lomer's odyssey" or rhymester's
otch Out of one thousand, nine I
undred and ninety-nine have no life '
lot. Booted and spurred and ca
arisoned, they hasten along, and run }
ut and say: Halo, man! Whittier
way?" ''Nowhere!" they say. Oh!
Dung man, make every days
uty filling up of the great life
oat. Alas! that there should be on c
his sea of life so many ships that seem a
ound for no port They are swept I
very whittier by wind and wave, up I
Y the mountains and down by the q
alleys. They sail with no chart
hey gaze on no star. They long for
o harbor. Oh! young man. have
irh idaaI and ,.~as. g. | 4