Connecticut western news., 1898-10-13
THE MOTHERS OF MEN
pR. TALMAoE SHOWS HOW WOMEN
 SHAPE DESTINY.


 snees of Heredity-It h the Home CT Forgsts.
 Icopyright. 1898, by American Press Asso-
 ciation.l
 WASHINGTON, Got. 9.-The augmen tation of parental influence as the cen turios go by, Dr. Talmage here sets forth, while discoursing about one of the grandmothers of Bible times. The text is II Timothy l, 5, ''The unfeigned faith that is in thee, which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois" In this pas toral letter which Paul, the old minis ter. h writing to Timothy, the young miaister, the family record is brought out. Paul practically says: "Timothy, what good grandmother you had You ought to be better than most folks because not only was your mother good, but your grandmother was good also Two preceding generations of piety ought to give you a mighty push in the riaht direction. r The fact was that T1nothy needed encouragement. He was In poor health, having a weak seomaoh, and was dyspeptic, and Paul peescr1bed for him a tonic, ia little wine for thy stomach's sake"-not msoh wine, but . little wine, and only as . medicine. And If the wine then haA ben e much adulterated with log. wood and strychnine as our modern wanes hs woald not have prescribed aAy. xa@ ss .
 sBut Timothy, not strong physically, is,snoooraged spiritually by the recital of gzandmo<herly excellence, Paul hint ins to him, as hint this day to you, tat Ged sometimes gathers up as in rssasvoir. away ba6k of the active gen. sealinns 6R today, : godiy influence, and ten; in lssponse to prayer lets down the power upon children and grandchildren ard Rrsat-grandchildren. The world is woe1nlly In want of table of statistics sn reeaxd to what Is the protractedness and immendty of influence of one good woman h the church, and world. We have nooouats of how much evil has hssnW1Gught by woman who lived nearly 100 years ago, and of how many criminals her descendants furnished for the psnitentiary and the gallows, and how many hundreds of thousands of dollars they ooat our country in their axraignment and prison support as we'll - in the property they burglarized and destroyed. But will not some one come cut with brain comprehensive enough and hsart warm enough and pen keer, snnnGh to give us the facts in regard to so9ns rood woman'of 100 years ago and lek - hnow how many Christian men -.a >oA ,.oR<,vvr,o~o and rcofuI people have been found among her de- sndndants and how many asylums and odl1Sgss and churches they built and AoM many millions of dollars they oon- tt3hated for huzaanitarian and Christian pNrnsssf o
 g TAs wenen Who Won.
 The good women whose tombstones wIee planted in the eighteenth century arss more alive for good in the nine- taenth century than they were before. ~ tho good women of this nineteenth c(ntnry will b more alive for good in tAe, tWentaeth century than now. Mark you, I have no idea that the grandmoth- sfaWsre any better than their grand dsuekters. You cannot get very old peo- pls;t6 hlk much about how things were when they were boys and girls. They have . retiCenoe and . noncommittalism whiCx makes mo think they feel them selves to be the cussodians of the repu- tasiou of their early comrades. While our dear old folks are rehearsing the 1ollies of the present if we put them on the witness stand and cross examine 1hem n to how things were 70 years Ago tke silepoe becomes oppressive.
 Tho celebrated Frenohman, volney, visited this country in 1796, and he saya of woman diet in those times, eff . premium was offered for 8 regimen most destructive to health, none could be devised moro enicacious for these ends than that in use among these peo- ple. " That eclipees our lobster salad at midnighk Everybody talks about the disdpAtion of modern society and how wqmanly health goes down under it. but 1t was worse 100 years ago, for the chaplain of French regiment in our Revolutionary war wrote in 1762 in his Book of AmeSican Women," saying: ''They are tall and we'll proportioned, their features are generally regular. their complexions are generally fair and without color. At 20 years of age the women have no longer the freshness of youth. At 80 or 40 they are decrepit " In1819 . foreign consul wrote book entitled "A Sketch of the United States 1t the Commencement of the Present Osntury," and he says of the women of thoae times, "At the age of 30 all their charms have disappeared. One glance It tho portraits of the women 100 years ago and their style of dress makes us wonder how they ever got their breath. All this makes me think that the ex- press rail train is no more an improve ment on the old canalboat or the tele- graph no moro an improvement on the old time saddlebags than the women sk our day are m improvement on the yemen of the last century.
 Honor the Aged.
 But still, notwithstanding that those times were % much worse than ours, there was . glorious race of godly wom- sn 70 and 100 years ago who held the world back from sin and lifted it toward virtue, and without their exalted and nanctified influence before this the last good influence would have perished from the earth. Indeed all over this land there are seated today--not so much in churches. for many of them are too fee bl to come-a great many aged grand mothers. They sometimes feel that the world has gone past them. and they havs an idea that they are of little ac- count. Their heads sometimes get aching from the racket of the grandchildren down stairs or In the next room. They steady themselves by the banisters as they go up and down. When they get . cold. t hangs on them longer than it nssd tos They cannot boar to have the szsndohiidren punished even when they deserve 1t and have so relaxed their ideas of family discipline that they would spoil all the youngsters of the heusshod by too great leniency. These old folks are the resort when great trou- baes ooms, and there is calming and soothing power in the touch of an aged