Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1895-08-12
would not live in world that bore

L would not i've IL q WoI4u Indt bore
no witness that material things are trans.
itory. Tragedy? Is death tragedy or
wholesale death more tragic than indi-
vidual deaths? A single blossom falls
from the leaf Then puff of wind
comes out of the north and shakes the
tree. and q hundred blossoms follow.
The one is not more tragic than the 9TH
er. You and [ know we all have to die,
one by one. Why more tragic to die
hundred by hundred than one by one?
No, it is net death that is Tragic. It is
life. And we need the lesson which ma
ture is ever teaching US, for, though
the blossoms falls, and the bud decays,
and the grass withers, and the noun
tains are rent and broken, and the great
EARTHQUAKES shake the solid earth. and
cyclones come out of the heavens and
sweep the solid structures from us, still
we do not believe the world is transi-
tory-at least we live as though it were
eternal. Death? What is it? We are in
the theater, and one character comes
upon the stage and speaks his part and
goes off, and then another, and then an
other, and by and by the curtain falls
and the play stops-and then true life
begins, for death is life, eeme when and
how and as it will. And we need to be
reminded that all things earthly are
transitory. and yet, despite distinctions,
do not learn the lesson.
Tragedy of Nature.
Nor is that ALL Nature is full of awe
inspiring events If it were not, you
and I would be bereft of the highest,
noblest, divinest Of all experiences
Would you have your world all carpeted
and cushioned and tapestried? Would
you have life one long caress? Would
you have no burdens to make your shout
ders broad, 40 dangers to make your
hearts brave, no sorrows to make yOu1
souls tender? said the poets interpret
nature. Listen
Ye winds of night, your force combine.
Without his high behest
Ye shall not in the mountain pine
Disturb the sparrows nest.
His voice sublime is heard afar.
In distant peals it dies.
He yolzes the whirlwind to his car
And sweeps thehowling skies.
That is the moderfs poet. Now listen
to an ancient one: "Come, behold the
works Of the Lord, what desolation he
hath made in the earth. He maketh
wars to cease unto the end of the earth
He breaketh the bow and cutteth the
spear in sunder. He burneth the chariot
in the fire. Be still and know that am
God" thank God for the awe inspir.
ing aspects of nature. [ do not care sc
much for nature curried and groomed,
where mans hand has shaped her to his
own placid and shallow nature. I like
to stand on the bow of the ocean steam
er and hear the wind howl around my
ears and see the great waves curl over
and sweep the deck. I like to sit on my
piazza and see the clouds gathering il
the west and the lightning flashing from
them and feel grander JOY in the very
sense that perhaps death is near. I like
to look upon the cyclone and hear its
roar among the trees and be still and
know that God is. / would not hav,
life one long caress, robbed of it's powe
to make me kneel in trembling JOY be
fore the Almighty.
When this summer you turn aside
sometimes to look at the burning busf
and wonder what it means, take off the
shoes from your feet, for the place
whereon you stand is holy ground.