San Antonio daily light. [volume] (San Antonio, Tex.) 1886-1907, 1897-05-09
A SERMON FOR FOOLS.

found lurking around the tabernacle
of the Light. o, no! The breed must
be looked for elsewhere. All the same
there are some of the variety within
hearing distance and perhaps a word
r dropped may reach them and produce
fruit. So here goes. The fool, accord
ing to the dictionary, is one who acts
without ordinary wisdom, who lacks
common sense, who is wanting in judg-
hent. The family is not likely to die
out for a generation or two according
to the definition. The old sexton who
thought that himself and the parson
were the only two people in the par
ish who had good sense, and sometimes
thought that the parson might have
more and not hurt him, was not so far
out in his reckoning.
Within theulimits of the definition
there are no doubt an infinite variety
of the family, but the purposes of the
Light preacher this morning are reach
ed by showing up only one of them.
1t is matter of common remark among
observing people that the country is
going to the dogs. This means of
course that the people are going down
hill; that conditions are growing worse;
nation is backsliding. In the broadcast
sense this is not true. The people are
as whole in better condition than ev-
er before; better houses to live in, bet
ter clothes to wear, better surroundings
in their homes, better food on their ia
bles, better advantages for their chill
dren, better everything, better every
where.
1t is true that with this everywhere
BITTERNESS there is less content, less
comfort taken, less pleasure in living,
less restfulness. People are in too
great a hurry to live. They only hus-
tle.They rush from one end of the week
ter the other, as though there were a
IRE in their rear, and they had pitch
on their coat tails. Business is no lon
ger an employment, but it is an alb
sorption. Home gives no respite. 1t
is out of the counting house into the
house in which his wife holds the fort
it is true. but out of the frying pan
into the fire. He carries his
business and his worries and
his speculations and his cares
and his losses into his dining room and
goes to bed with them, and thinks |
twice of getting a divorce from the |
mother of his children before he thinks |
of divorcing his business cares.
His home takes its cue from him. |
The mother of his children schemes |
and worries and frets in the effort to |
put her foot one round higher on the |
social ladder and there is no rest for |
the sole of that foot,nor for any other |
soul, until she gets there. Out of their |
mutual unrest the unrest of their chill |
dren is born. Dissatisfaction sits on |
their young brows like grief on a mon
ument. They come into a world of |
worry to hurry out of childhood into |
the premature cares of a life that shall |
grow increasingly unrestful to it's end. |
This is the law of the present system |
of American living. There are excep- |
tons in the cases of few who are Iiv- |
ing on the millions their dads made, |
and trying to cultivate a contempt for |
trade, but they are only a few
The great body of the people in the |
cities OF this land are born fast, live |
fast wear out soul and feeling fast |
use uD brains and bones and health |
ia st, wear out soul and feeling fast |
and are fast in the grip Of fatal ner- |
vous disorders before they realize that |
they have lived at all. This is not COM |
mon sense therefore it is foolishness.
therefore those who so live are fools |
Quod erat demonstrandum. If there |
was any real need for this condition |
it might be the more patiently borne, |
>.but there is not. The conditions that |
surround life, the life of the every day |
man and woman, are better now than |
ever before in the world. There is |
more to be had within the reach of |
their cabletow now than there was |
within the grasp of their fathers or |
4 Goa ~,
thirty-fourth generation.
But men and women and whole fam |
lilies are not willing to live as their |
fathers and grandfathers and great |
grandfathers lived. Nor is it neces- |
sary that they should. Neither is II |
wise that they should take a departure |
so far from the old methods as to bring |
increasing pains and penalties. There |
is a happy medium, and this is what |
the fool of this fast generation will not |
see. When a man can master his cir |
cumstances by economy and common |
sense then he is a fool to let circum- |
stances in the way of fashion master |
him. The man who lives for his fam
lily and does not measure his grain in |
his neighbours bigger half bushel, is |
not going to get left very badly. II he |
wisely marries wife who has his own |
horse sense that family will do to |
swear by.
It is not in the solid comforts of liv |
ing, in the real needs of a truly pleas !
ant and well furnished home that the |
mischief is done but in the fool at |
tempt to put on peacock feathers when /
plain turkey is all that the circumstan-
ces Justify. This is the nub of the |
Iwholei trouble The stress is put on |
e outside show, and not in the home /
Imforts that count. The man who |
ycovers more ground in his business |
than is financially safe married to a |
woman who tries to cover more |
ground socially than her trail warrants |
IS bound to come to grief Their chill |
dren are born into the Goldfish aristo- /
cracy and the smell stfcketh 70 their