The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-03-10

port. Children go 1orIn 10 meet their
fathers as, pilots at the Narrows take
the hands of ships. The doorsill of the
home is the wharf were heavy life Is
unladen. There is the place where we
being charged with self adulatioa. There
IS the place where we may lounge with
out being thought ungraceful. There is
the place where hsin we nay express 1 aneco
is the place where We may forget our
annoyanceS and exasperations and trou-
bles. Forlorn earth pilgrim. no home?
Then die. That is better. The grave is
brighter and grander and more glorious
than this world with no tent from march
ing, with 10 harbor from the storm, with
no place OF rest from this scene of greed
and gouge and loss and gain. God pity
the man or the woman who has no home.
Further, home Is a political safeguard.
The safety OF the state must be ouilt
on the safety of the home. Why cannot
France come to a placid republic? Mac
Mahon appoints his ministry, and all
France is aquake lest the republic be
smothered. Gambetta dies, and there are
hundreds Of thousands of Frenchmen who
are fearing the return of a monarchy.
The DreyfuS case is at this moment a
~slumbering earthquake under Paris.
France, as a nation, has not the right
kind of q Christian home. The Christian
hearthstone is the only hearthStone for
a republic. The virtues cultured in the
family circle are an absolute necessity
for the state. If there be not enough
moral principle to make the family ad-
here, there will not be enough political
principle to make the state adhere. No
means the Nomads Of Asia, means the
Numidians Of Africa, changing from
place to place according as the pasture
happens to change. COMPOUNDED be all
those babels of iniquit Y which would
overpower and destroy the home! The
same storm that upsets the ship in which
the family sail will sink the frigate OF
the constitution. Jails and penitentiaries
and armies and navipS are not our pest
defense. The door of the home is the best
fortress. Household utensils are our pest
artillery, and the chimneys OF our dwell
ing houses are the ~grandest monuments
TO safety and triumph. No nome, no re-
public!
Further, home is a school. Old ground
must be turned up with subsoI plow,
and ii must be narrowed and reharroW-
ed, and then the crop Will not be as
large as that of the new ground with
less culture. Now, youth and chlldhood
thrown over their heart and life will
come up in after life luxuriently. Every
time you have given a smile OF appro-
baton all the good cheer Of your life
will come up again in the geniality Of
your children. And every ebullitlon OF
anger and every uncomfortable display
of indignation will be fuel to this dis
position twenty or thirty or forty years
from now-fuel for a bad fire a quarter
of a century from this. You praise the
intelligence of your child too much some
times Wnen you JnlIk ne IS IOI avail
of it, and you will see the result of it be-
fore ten years of age in his annoying al
fectations. You praise his beauty, sup
posing he is not large enough 10 under
stand what you say, and you Will hnd
him standing on a high chair before a
flattering mirror.
THE SEEDS OF CHARACTER.
Words and deeds and m are
the seed Of character, n children are
very ant to be the second edition of their
narentS Abraham hp0at Isaac. so virtue
is apt to go down in the ancestral line,
but Herod begat Archelaus, so 1nlqu!ty
is transmitted. What vast responsibility
comes Upon parents in view OF this SUBJ
ject. -.
Oh, make your home the brightest
place on earth if you would charm your
rectitude and religion. Do not always
turn the blinds the wrong way. Let the
light. which puts gold on the gent1an
and spots the pansy, pour into your
to keep step to a dead march. Do not
cover up your walls with such pictures
as Vests Death on a Pale Horse, or
Tintoretto's Massacre of the Innocents."
Rather cover them, if you have pictures,
with 1.-THE Hawking Party" and The
Mill by the Mountain Stream" and The
Fox Hunt" and the mChildren Am mo
THE Saturday Night Marketing" Get
you no hint of c~heecfulness from grass
hopper's leap and lambs frisk and quaips
ulSll LII ulOoo " 1tAOAA
from the rock at the mountain top clear
down to the meadow ferns under the
shadow of the steps Jones looking to see
where it a find the steepest place TO
leap off at and talking just to hear itself
talk? If all the skies hurtled with tenn
pest and everlasting storm wandered
over the sea and every mountain stream
were raving mad, frothing at the mouth
with mud foam, and there were moth
ing but simoons blowing among the hills,
and there were neither lark's carol nor
humming birds trill nor waterfalls dash,
but only bears bark and panther's
scream and VOLTS howl, then you might
well gather into your homes only the
shadows. But when God has strewn the
earth and the heavens with beauty and
with gladnesS let us take into our home
circles all innocent hilarity, all brightness
and all good cheer. A dark home makes
bad boys and bad girls in preparation for
bod men and bad women.
Above all, my friends, take into your
homes Christian principle. Can 1t be
that in any of the comfortable homes
whose inmates I confront the voice of
plication at night for protection? What!
No thanksgiving in the morning for
care? How, my brother, my sister, will
you answer God in the day of Judgment
with reference to your children? It is a
plain question, and therefore I ask it. In
the tenth chapter of jeremiah God says
lies that call not upon his name. Oh, par
ents, when you are dead and gone and
the moss is covering the inscription Of
the tombstone, will your children look
back and think of father and mother at
family prayer? Will they take the old
family Bible and open it and see the
mark Of tears of contrition and tears of
consoling promise wept by eyes long be-
fore gone out into darkness? Oh, if you
do not inculcate Christian principle in
the hearts Of your children, and you do
not warn them against evil, and you do
not invite them to holiness and to God,
and they wander off into dissipation and
into Fidelity, and at last make ship
wreck Of their immortal soul, on their
deathbed and in the day of judgment
they will curse you!
EARLY RECOLLECT1ONS.
Seated by the register or this stove,
What if on the wall should come out the
history of your children! What a his
tory-the mortal and immortal life Of
your loved ones! Every parent Is writing
the history of his child. He is writing
it, composing it into a song or pointing
it with a groan.
My mind runs back to one Of the best
Of early homes. Prayer like a roof over
it. Peach like an atmosphere in il. Par
'ents personiications Of faith in trial n
comfort in darkness. The two pillars of
that earthly home long crumbled to dust.
But shall / ever forget that early home?
Yes, when the flower forgets the sun
that warmed it. Yes, when the mariner
forgets the star that guided him. Yes,