The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1899-03-12

If one could braid Ralph Waldo Emerson
with Theodore Parker, with John Brown,
with Gladstone, with Robert Burns, and
with Lincoln, then he would have a Navajo
blanket that people would buy and be salts
fed.
People have the defects of the qualities
Thomas Carlyle discussing Jesus and Shak-
speare, spoke of Jesus with extreme rever-
ence, but said he had limitations. He
Falstaff in him" There is humor in the
Bible. but not much mrth. The perfect hu-
man never existed. In fact, we love man
better for a redeeming vice. We feel re-
tated to him. He Is more like one of the
family. How else do you explain the world
wide affection for Robert Burns?
carry about with us something by which
we measure men and things. You
have a desire, a hope, an ideal. and you go
about. to find the thing in man to fill the
bill. In former days a man would search
the woods to find a natural crook for
scythe snath. He would not find what was
in his mind but he would find a stick that
would do, The greatness of man is in. the
fact that he can always suggest something
better than the thing as ii is. There are
much variety, and nobody is quite satisfied
with the house he has built. One is not
quite satisfied with Niagara falls. Things
and men fail short of your standard, and
this standard that you carry about with you
is not a memory II is a hope, prophecy
The only picture of heaven that care about
IS a state and a place in which / can say,
II am satisfied" If I grow / shall never
find that state or place, but shall be larger
myself
Try to buy a horse; let your want be
known. There is always something the mat
ter with horse, something that you could
thing. Perhaps he interferes. or has one
white eye or Is tender ford
In California saw horse: ''Palo Alto"
S2O0.C0N horse but he was of delicate con-
stitution. Two months after | had seen him
he was dead. In western Kansas ! rode
nile nf ~ hrir1
so. Palo Alto could not do that days work.
Demosthenes was great orator, but
hot in the sun. but little too cool in the
shade But think we have to die to find
a better climate. Personally 1 prefer to
stay here rather than take risk.
We think we remember perfect things,
but historically we are mistaken Happy
childhood will not bear investigation. The
Fishing in Wisconsin I longed for dinner,
and spied a lonesome house and made for
ii. Inside the house found two people, a
brother taking some kind OF care of him.
Both were weeping. j inquired where the
balance of the family We're. and found that
they had gone to Sparta, seven miles away.
to a menagerie and circus. The baby did
not understand, but he howled that some
thing Was dead wrong with mat household
sive. was chewing the rag. That little
fellow was suffering as much as he will
ever suffer. He wanted TO hear the band
play and see the elephant go round and the
trick mule. | made him as comfortable as
I could. paid him an enormous sum for
bread and milk and walked to town, and met
the family coming home. and said nothing.
happy childhood is not so common. do
not wish to revisit mine much prefer to
''go on. and on. and on i like The Old
Swimmin Hole" by James Whitcomb
Riley but / remember the boy who could
not go with the rest of US cross lots through
the grass. He had 10 go three times the
distance by the main travelled road-he al
ways had stubbed big toe. not the nail
wholly lifted Off but hanging by a piece
OF painful skin. No cross lots or grass for
him, Will not somebody write the sor-
rows OF childhood?
1 think we find that old homes will not
bear revisiting. everything has shrunk-
rivers and hills. and folks. BY the grace
of a friend / receive Providence r. L..
monthly paper. called Book Notes. I find
that the water OF that decent old city has
been. and Is. regularly poisoned, The water
we drink fsorne of usb is ambrosta COM
pared with the water used by the memora-
BILE city OF Providence. r. i.
There is no use in going back to the coast
of childhood or the coast Of the country.
What we could learn from New England
we have learned. II is time now to put in
practice what we have learned from Emer-
son Claiming Parker. Phillips. and all the
dead great of New England. Colorado Is
good soil IL we will only make II moist with
rain from the East. and perhaps from the
Tar East. IL one goes far enough the West