Ellsworth American. [volume] (Ellsworth, Me.) 1855-current, 1897-10-14
SOME RAMBLING THOUGHTS.
BY "NEMo'.
Copyrighted by Dave & Tabor.I

k,H
live in order to think, and most OF US Will
not half live unless we think In order to
live. with this slight disgression let us
turn to the bare fields. Oue thought at
least we must take away.
The winter is to me IA type OF old age,
for then do people live on the crops
CAT hered in autumn, after summer of
attention following spring OF seeding.
That is old age eNactly--a time for feed
ing on the stores OF memory. Little food
in winter means much hunger, cold aud
suffering. Little OF wise, kind, noble
action and thought to look back upon,
means an Od age OF nagging regrets.
empty hands, and shrunkeu, chilled heart
Come now, there is no esca ping that con-
clusion. Every day il adding to your
store OF old-age memories. What are
they to be: Firm grains on which you
can feed, or husks md of-scourings unfit
for a human being?
Let us venture on another thought:
You cannot name step in the whole his
tory OF a crop that is uninportant. What
about plowing? 1t must be seasonably
Suited to he soil and the crop. Sowing?
Done with the best available seed. And
as for cultivsting9 Life and vgor are
only brought 10y apparently endangering
both in the seeding. And on, and so
on-your active brains having already
possibly outrun me.
Turn the thought on yourself. Why
should you venture in your spring time
to endanger winter stores by letting the
happy years OF joyous, wholesome youth
become mere catch als for amusements
and thoughts that later you would fsin
forget. The mind Is SO whimsical AN or
gan that those things we need to recall
often most easily escape us, and the
things that are OF no gain to us we most
tenaciously remember.
Yet no field is free entirely from weeds.
We scarcely know how they come. Nor
can twenty years pass over our heads in
the spring-tirne OF lie without the
accumulation 81 mental weeds. The chief
thing j. 10 recognize tn" difference be-
tween them and the good growth, and
then "Cu'tiYsie. cultivate. cultivate"
persistcu,iy covering TIE tout proWths -
that they do not choke tire good You
have to nc stern about such aa#nt:-. Tor
you cannot pe--ihsy -ho" me food
plant that In, anything Ike the vitality
OF Il weed.
work with vii, Tor the summer day
SLIPS He 4. steaithy snake away.
Nothing " III ieiI thai T. Hauf- aFe by
>ought bat the grain the famine rrg.
How often, too the husbandmen act
ually cudsneer- the growing stalk TO
pull away from it, very roots IA weed that
would soon rob ii OF lis nourishment
He il cruel to be kind. He endangcrs He
to save 1t. Thus must you do, II you
would be wise and happy Bad habits,
some OF them not only UNIV Use but posi-
lively injurious, cannot grow entwined
around the good, without weakening the
good. Initiate the hus bBudman's ways
and wrench them out. though the doing
OF it shakes your very stability for time.
The good will ultimately take stronger
and better growth; never fear about that.
The little weed looks so harmless at
knows the risk OF unclean fields. The
hippant jokes about the purity OF men
and women are small in their way but
the end is an unclean mind, and an UNI
clean mind in old age is one OF the most
woebegone, uuworthily developed, and
unsatisfactory products OF human life
that you car possibly meet. SO wrench
perience says are noXious, and not good
for mental food-wrench and tug and out
with them, however much ii may hurt!
The end, In this ease, Will justify the
means.
One more lessen from the field, scarcely
related to the above, and yet useful per
haps to you in filling you with the diEni-
ty OF living. The grain OF the present
fields has, under cultivation, advanced
somewhat upon the grain OF the aucients.
Its need, are better understood, etc. Vet
its possibilities for Improvement are only
slight.
But what about human being; your
self, for instance? " hen maize Was al
ready maize, and the beaver already built
its dam, your ancestors aud mine were
savages dwelling in caves. The seed and
the beast are stll the same, but man Is
monarch OF the earth, is a-saulting the air,
and Is bomharding the heavens with his
scientific instruments. Look at nature
around for many lessons, but look nj man
and his attainments to be thrilled with
the glories OF humanity.
To think that the little cooling infant,
personally Just as ignorant as and more
feeble than the cooling infant OF early ages,
can so drink in the accumulated wisdom
OF all time, that few years study enables
him to start where the great before him
have left off-astronomy in relation to
Newton for instance-will make you mar