The commonwealth. (Scotland Neck, N.C.) 1896-1929, 1897-10-14
FIELD LESSONS.
LIFE LIKE THE PLANTS.
AS THE SOWING so THE
REAPING,
Some Rambling Thoughts.
BY "NEMO."
(Copyrighted by Dave & Tabor

BY "NEMO."
Copyrighted by Dave & Tabor.)
To YOUTH OF BOTH SEXES Come
now let Fancy lead us over the fields
barred Of their crops. It is human
privilege to think, and most of us will
not half live unless we live in order
to think, and most of US will not half
live unless we think in order to Give.
With this slight depression let us turn
to the bare fields. One thought at
least we must take away. The winter
is to me type OF old age, for then do
people live on the crops gathered in
autumn after summer of attention
following spring of seeding. That is
old age exactlY-a time for feeding on
the stores Of memory. Little food in
winter means much hunger, cold and
suffering. Little of wise, kind, noble
action and thought to look back upon
means an old age of nagging regrets,
empty hands, and shrunken, chilled
heart. Come now, there is no escap-
ing that conclusion. Every day is
adding to your store of old-age men,
cries. What are they to be? Firm
grains on which you can iced, or husks
and off-scourings unfit for human
being?
Let us venture ON another thought
You cannot name step in the whole
history of crop that Is unimportant.
What about blowing? 1t must be sea-
sonably done and we'll. What about
fertillzing? Suited to the soil and |
the crop. Sowing? Done with the
best available seed. And as for cult
vating? Life and vigor are only
brought by apparently endangering
both in the Seeding. And so on, and
so on your active brains having al
ready 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-alls tor
amusements and thoughts that later
you would faln forget. The mind is
SO whimsical an organ that those
things we need to recall, often most
easily escape us, and the things that
are OF no gain to us we most tenacious
" 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-time of life +,
without the accumulation OF mental
weeds. The chief thing Is to recog-
nize the difference between them and
the good growth, and then "Cultiyate,
cultivate, cultivate" persistentIy COW
ering the tout growths so that they do
not choke the good. You have to be
stern about such doings, for you can
not possibly show me food-plant that
has anything like the vitality of
weed.
Work with will for the summer
day t
Slips like stealthy snake away.
Nothing Will tell that It's hours are
by
Naught but the grain or tie famine
cry. e
How often too the husbandman actu-
ally endangers the growing stalk to
pull away from It's very roots a weed q
that would rob it of its nourish-
ment. He is cruel to be kind. He
endangers life to save it. Thus must
you do, If you would be wise and hap-
py. Bad habits, some of them not on Il
y unwise but positively injurious can
not grow, entwlned around the good. II
without weakening the good. Initiate
he husbandman's ways and wrench
hem out, though the doing OF it A
shakes your very stability for a time.
The good will ultimately take stronger :
md better growth never fear about
hat.
-
The little weed looks 80 harmless at
irst, but the wise man sees ahead and
knows the risk of unclean fields. The I
d'ppant JOKES about the purity of men d
ana women are small in their way, but =
The end is an unclean mind, and an
anclean mind in old age is one of the n
most woe-begone, unworthily deyelop- o
'd, and unsatisfactory products OF hui I
nan lie that you can possibly meet. =
30 wrench and tug at the things that
Universal experience says are noxious.
md not good for mental food-wrencb
Ind tug and out with them, however
much it may hurt! The end, in this .
Ease, will justify the means.
-. =
One more Lesson from the field