The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1896-08-31
SOME RAMBLING THOUGHTS
by MEMO.
Copyright.


| Penned by a layman in the spare mo-
ments of a busy career and dedicated to
a better understanding Of life and its
varied opportunities)
Now. young men, strong young men. but
lacking in purpose. as a second article
/ based upon the silver certificate engrav-
/ ing History Teaching YOUTH" let me
! spread out before you the vista Of oppor-
/ tunity that is as much your heritage as
/ anyone's. If 1 be foolish enough to be
/ Impractical in my suggestions you will
know it Immediately. for common sense
/ is not entirely dead within you. though
/ you have frittered away your time in
( things that are worse than play. You
| know, just a well as l. that no amount Of
/ thrashing will ever cause the heavy legs
/ of a Percheron to become light and deli
/ cate like those of MAUD s" SO l shall
not insult your intelligence by saying
that all Of us may equal in fame those
names that are already written high in
our country's history.
But I want you to open wide your mind,
your hitherto purposeless mind, to a great
| thought; the uncommon grandure of com
mon lives that are uprightly lived, even
though they be obscure, unknown. IN
/ chronicled.
Go to the weed that forces its way up
through the chinks of your pavement and
learn from It. You crush it with your
I heel and Il Is gone II dies and you think
of it no more. Yet mat weed has sur
rendered its contribution of effort and
justified its existence. Its little lungs q
i. COZ
ing in the poisonous gases that you and
all handwriting creatures exhale, and q
has been breathing forth its tiny share
of the oxygen that sustains you. More
than that 1t has changed some few par
tcles Of inorganic clay and rock and dirt
into living plant; and death can never
return those particles to their original
state The material 1t leaves behind
when you trample on it, passes TO the
nourishment of other plants, and the hum
blest, feeblest, most worthless weed may
thus serve ultimately to sustain the
greatest thing in creation-You.
Go to some south sea island and amid
the palms and sunshine of one of these
gems of the Pacific, think of its origin.
Ages ago far below the surface, the coral
insect gathered around him his calcareous
cyst He passed away but his work en-
dured, and upon it others in an intermina-
BILE series built their tiny but everlasting
ocean was reached and another island was
born In what respect was that pioneer
insect inferior to those who completed the
work? In nothing. He is unknown, how
ever; yet absolutely essential to all those
who worked with him and followed him.
Go out on the ocean and look around
you 1t is a type Of our humanity. only
the surface of it is broken into waves
Beneath them, to its most abysmal
depths unruffled, even unlighted, waters
slowly move hither and thither. No mat
ter how beauteous the waves. they would
be no longer ocean, if the underlying mass
were lacking Those waves are the great
leaders in the world. But the waters
above are as naught save for the waters
beneath, and you and 1, if our spirits arc
true and our motives clean, will rejoice
az any hight our race may reach; for we
are essential to it. We in our hidden
sphere are holding it up.
Do these things teach you nothing, or
are your ears eternally deaf to truth? To
me the imperishable testimony Of the coral
reef the still, small voice of the humble
flower the gruff music of the waves, come
not merely to teach but to satisfy They
convince us that the life properly lived
and at last snuffed out in obscurity, may
yet, by reason of setting in motion the
forces for good in those we happen against,
have it's essential share in great deeds,
vast accomplishments, and moral victo-
ries You in your little place, which you
must fill to the best of your ability, are
as essential to the well-being of our coun-
try as the best man in it. You are flesh
and blood No more than that is he. You
can influence strongly those around you.
Less than that can he, for the higher he
gets the less of personal contact does he
enjoy. What greater breadth to a mar
row life could you desire? In the world
God has ordered that matter, though It
may change its form a thousand times is
yet in itself indestructible. believe 1t is
also decreed that the deeds and acts and
thoughts that pass from us to others are
surely as enduring as the clements of a
plant Here then is the grandeur Of a
good life and the very horror of a bad
one, acting and reacting through genera
lions to come Be not alarmed because
the world knows you not; be alarmed be-
cause you have not heretofore understood,
or cared to understand, the glory Of that
manhood whereunto you were called when
your mother gave you birth.
We are nearing the point where we part
company for a week This silent printed
page has possibly stirred that soul Of
yours with a new determination to be and
to do. Read it over second time and
then ask the one in whose Judgment you
most trust. whether il is right or whether
il Is wrong ] have not written regarding
daily employment but rather regarding
the conscious and unconscious influences
you may daily exert. ! am satified that
the vista stretched out before you thus
far is wide enough for the one most am
bilious for power, Next week we viii con-
slider the material possibilities lying be-
fore you as an American youth.
An ingenious apparatus to procure air
from the very high attitudes has been de-
vised by NM. Georges Besancon and Gus
,a,,e T4erroitte the meteorologfefe