Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1898-01-21
THE WORRIES OF LIFE.
Every Person Should Set Apart Time
for Solitude and Contamination

Every Person Should Set Apart Time
for Solitude and Contemplation
From the London Spectator.
Mr. Stead's second proposal strikes us as
far more useful and far less likely to have
bad results. 1t is that every man who
wants to lead the higher life-the phrase
perhaps, savors little of Pecksniff, but it
in a convenient one-should devote some
part of the day to solitude and contempla-
ton; should, that is, save an hour or half
an hour a day from the cares and amuse-
ments and worries of this life, and devote
1t to the repossesSion of his own soul
That such habit of quiet and meditation
is good for men we cannot possibly doubt
We may drug our souls with rosaries and
vain repetitions, but we may also drug
them with the busy idleness of a hurried
life. We say ''idleness'' advisedy for most
men who lead the ordinary active business
life leave their souls in complete idleness
They hurry and they rush, they are occu-
pied with thousand questions, great and
small; but as Matthew Arnold said, they
never once possess their souls before thew
die. If man is to give his soul it's rights
he must allow it times in which, untroubled
alike by bodily activity and by mere mental
activity, 1t can use it's wings and travel
unfettered In its own region, the region of
pure thought. To most men the notion of
an hour, or even half an hour, with moth
ing to do suggests acute torture. If they
have nothing to do or to read nothing, as
they would say, with which to occupy their
minds, they feel utterly lost. This fact is
proof of how much men need to acquire
the habit of contemplation. The wings of
the soul have become so stiff from want
or use that the mere thought of stretching
them out is painful. The habit of contem-
plation has, then, for most people, to be
acquired by conscious effort. But it is
habit well worth acquiring, and when it
is once acquired it greatly STRENGTHENS and
Vlvihes mans nature. 1t will be said
what is 4 man to think about in the hour
or half hour he gives up to daily medita-
ton? In all probability the devils of wor-
ry-if not worse devils-will seize the on
portunity to run riot in his head Work
and occupation successfully guard the door
against them. but meditation simply throws
1t wide open to these most unwelcome
guests. No doubt for the morbid and the
sem1-insane meditation may have its dam
gers. but the normal man who learns how
to think may easily keep out the ordinary
worries Of life while he sets his mind to
consider and dwell the great issues of
Efe and eternity, and of human conduct.
In such times of meditation man NAV
and should consider in it's widest aspect
his duty toward his neighbor. He will not
mechanically and formally run over lists
Of friends and deaden his thought by rene
tition, but will, instead, think upon the
laws which control human relationships.
Wordsworth tells us that the happy war
rior makes Ibis moral being his prime
care" 1t is in and through contemplation
tnat man may train and develop his
moral being, and may strengthen and de-
velop his soul. 1t has been truly said that
the greatest things that have been done in
the world have been due to the victories
Of the spirit. But to gain the Victories of
the spirit contemplation is as necessary as
is base to an army in the field