Arizona weekly journal-miner., 1895-12-04
rHGNKs0IvISG THOUGHTS.
Excerpts and Observations on the sub
 Jeet.-some Sensible suEgesuons.

Excerpts and Observations on the sub
 Jeet-some Sensible suEgesuons.
 UPPER VERDE, Nov. 30.-t Regular
 corresp0noence It is now the
 season for the yearly crop of thanks
 to be gathered in, and perhaps a few remarks ou the subject may not
 be out of place. It is my custom to
 return thanks ,095 times in the year;
 but some folks are not 90 given to that kind of thing. They save up
 their thanks until the end of the
 year, and finally conclude ,that they
 have nothing to be thankful for, and
 get mad because they have gone to
 so much trouble.
 have a theory in regard to thanks; (oTiginal perhaps, but modestly of fered here,) it IS that thanks should
 be promply returned when due. If
 the Lord don't charge you anything but thanks, you ought to pay the debt and not have it run along at
 interest all the year, and then slip
 out of it altogether. But I'm after
 the man who hasn't anything to be
 thankful for, and l mustn't get of
 his track.
 Let us take an inventory of some
 of the thsnk-worthy things which
 you have. Let us begin with your
 country, your great big country, and
 your numerous and diversified coun-
 trymen. Here is a country reaching
 from ocean to ocean, with a past his
 tory that any man ought to be
 proud of; and with future history
 that some of us are afraid to face.
 This country is at peace isn't itl
 (with the exception of few little
 domestic disagreements) You don't
 have to go to war, and camp out,
 and catch cold, and develop a repu-
 tation for cowardIce. Isn't that
 something to be thankful fori And your countrymen; behold all the
 nations of the earth have con tributed largely in order that you
 might have a variety in the way of countrymen. Consider that, will youi think also that you ought to be thankful that you live now. right now; instead of having lived in the time of the fall of Jericho, or the fall of Jerusalem. Be thankful that you wern't in it at the battle of Waterloo. You might have been tempted to signalize yourself at either of these places; and some his torian would have felt it duty to hand you down to posterity on the point of pen; and posterity would not have cared fig whether you were handed down or not. There are other things to consider also. The next time you take a spell of not having anything to be thankful for, go up to a full length mirror and take 8 good look at yourself. You will see at a glance that you are not strikingly handsome. Neither was Abram Lincoln, but Abraham Lincoln had some sense; and I'll wager he felt thankful time and again that he vast named Bildad the Shuhite instead of plain Abra- ham. You observe when you con suit the glass that you are not pigeOn-toed, or knock-kneed, or bow | legged, or cross-eyed. Isn't that | something to be thankful fori see you've never thought about these things as you should.
 Think, man, of your mental capac- ity! A wise Providence gave you | skull big enough to hold a whole lot | of brains. The brains are there too; and you have intellect enough to get along comfortably. True, you are not q Samson, or a Goliath in this way; you're neither Gladstone nor the editor of first class monthly; but you're not an idiot-not quite. Think of that Why, you and might have been an idiot apiecel Mind, I don't say it's out of the range of possibility yet. There's no telling what will happen. At least I think you'd better hustle round and be thankful that the place where your name ought to be is still blank On the roll at the lunatic asylum. Smart people might get to be very 'carce from now on; remember that.
 Notwithstanding all these things,
 hear that you growled day before because you had hen of doubtful antiquity for dinner in- tead of roast turkey or baked ,oose. But you say your neighbor lad turkey and cranberry sauce and whole lot of good things beside. Iery likely he did. He had the too. You mustn't want your neighbor has. It's cvetousness.
 The Bible says you musn't covet. l f you can't have the kind of food our 4eighbor has, you are far better ed than many others-the tribe ! hat eats grub worms. for instance. f you keep one eye on your neigh or all the time, you'll never be \ hankful for your own condition. 'ou let your neighbor alone, and be lankful he hasn't said anything c 'orse about you than what you've $ card. [ I know if you are not thankful [ ,r wha. you eat, you are not thank C Il for what you wear; but think of le poor wild African, without rag , his back. 1 once saw a small is pache on . cold, frosty morning ir ci