Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1896-10-31

Instead Of bounding into the vehicle,
wo arc willing to be helped in. At last
the octogenarian falls. Forty years of
decaying. No sudden change. No fierce
cannonading of the batteries Of life, but
fading away, slowly. gradually, as
the leaf-as the leaf
Again, like the leaf. we fade to
make room for others. Next years for
osts will be as grnndly foliaged as this.
There are other generations Of oak leaves
to take the place of those which this
autumn perish. Next May the cradle Of
the wind will rock the young buds. The
woods will be all album with the chorus
of leafy voices If the tree III front OF
your house, like Elijah, takes q chariot
of fire, its mantle will fall upon Elisha.
If in the blast of these autumnal bat
teries so many ranks fall, there are re-
serve forces to take thoir place to defend
the fortress of the hills. The beaters Of
gold leaf will have more gold leaf to
beat. The crown that drops today from
the hoad of tho oak will be picked up
and handed down for other kings to
wear. Let the blasts come. They only
make room for other life
Give Way Chccrfully.
So, when we go, others take our
spheres. We do not grudge the future
generations their places. We will have
had our good time. Let them come on
and have their good time. There is no
signing among these leaves today, be-
cause other leaves are to follow them.
After lifetime of preaching, doctoring,
selling, sowing or digging, let us cheer
fully give way for those who como on
to do tho preaching, dootoring, selling,
sewing and digging. God grant that
their life may be brighter than ours has
been. AS VIC get older do not let us be
affronted if young men and women
crowd us Il little We will have had our
day, and we must let them have theirs.
When our voices get cracked, lot us not
snnrl at those who can MARBLE When
our knees AFRO stiffenod, let us have pa
ticnco with those who go fleet as the
deer. Because our leaf is fading do
not lot us despise the unfrosted. Au-
tumn must not envy the spring. Old
mon must be patient with boys. Dr.
Guthrie stood up in Scotland and said
"You need not think am old because
my hair is white never was so young
as am now. look back to my child
hood days and remember when i'll Will
ter nights in the sitting room the chill
dren played the blithest and the gayest
of all the company were father and
mother. Although reaching fourscoro
years of age, they never got old.
Do not be disturbed as you see good
and great men die People worry when
come important parsonage passes Off the
stage and say, His place will never be
taken" But neither tho church nor
the state will suffer for 1t. There will
be others to take the places. When God
takes ono man away. he has another
right back of him. God is so rich in
resources that he could spare o, 900
Summerfelds and Saurins, if there were
so many. There will be other leaves as
green, as cxquisitely veined, as grace
fully etched, as we'll pointed. However
prominent the place we fill, our death
will not jar the world. One falling leaf
does not shake the Adirondacks A ship
is not we'll manned unless there DO an
extra supply Of handsome working
OH deck, some sound asleep in their
hammocks. God has manned this world
very we'll There will be other seamen
on deck when you and I are down in
tho cabin, sound asleep in tho ham,
mocks.
Not Alone We Perish.
Again, as with the leaves, we fade
and fall amid myriads of others. One
cannot count the number of plumes
which these frosts are plucking from the
hills. They will strew all the streams !;
they will drift into the caverns; they
will soften tho wild beasts lair and fill
the eagles eyrie.
All the aisles of the forest will be COW
cred with their carpet, and the steps OF
the hills glow with wealth of color
and shape that will defy the looms OF
Administer. What urn could hold the
ashes of all these dead leaves? Who
could count the hosts that burn on this
funeral pyre of the mountains?
So we die in concert. The clock that
strikes the hour of our going will sound
the going of many thousands. Keeping
step with the feet of those who Garry US
out will be the tramp of hundreds doing
the same GRAND. Between 80 and 70
people every day lie down in Green
wood. That place has over 200, 900 OF
the dead 1 said to the man at the gate,
"Then, if there are SO many here, you
must have the largest cemetery. )" He
said there were two Roman Catholic
cemeteries in the city, each of which
had more than this. We are all dying.
London and Picking arc not the great cit
les of the world. The grave is the great
city. 1t hath mightier population, Ion
ger streets, brighter lights, thicker dark
nesses. Cesar is there, and all his sub
jects. Nero is there, and all his victims.
City of kings and paupers! 1t has swal-
lowed all our cities. Yet, City OF ST.
lence. No voice, no hoof, no wheel,
no clash, no shifting of hammer, no
clack of flying loom, no jar, no whis-
per. Great City of Silence! Of all its
million million hands, not one of them
is lifted. Of all its million million eyes,
not one of them sparkles. Of oil its mil
lion million hearts, not one pulsates.
The living are in small minority.
II in the movement of time some
great question between the living and
the dead should be put and God called
up all the dead and the living to decide
it, as we lifted our hands and from oil
the resting places of the dead they lifted
their hands, the dead would outvote rs.
l 10 &c fho 6rri,1 and fhn