The St. Johns herald., 1901-06-22
THE ART OF HAPPINESS.

@ NE of the most pathetic things il ] II U life is the frantic human desire
 W for happiness, and yet the easi 1 ness with which we acquiesce in mel
 ancholy. We are like blind man who
 starts out hunting he knows not fol
 what treasure, going he knows not whither. and after laundering following false clue. folds his hands and gives
 up the quest This is particularly true of women, except that women seldom have the courage of their desires, and
 do not even attempt to search for hap
 niness. When one is happy she has
 been born happy, or had happiness | thrust upon her. She rarely achieves
 happiness for herself.
 It must be confessed that women
 generally look upon happiness pretty
 much as they do a lottery ticket. It's
 big luck if things come your way and you draw the prize, but you deserve no credit for winning, or blame for losing. It doesn't occur to them that there is an art of being happy that they might learn just as they learned to play the piano or paint in water cOIOrs. Perhaps woman has been confirmed in this attitude by the opinion of the rest of the world that has always allotted her the shadows instead of the sun shine. Poetry and romance are full of women's tears, and so entirely has the
 J r. l,OIx that we have come to look upon gay wOman-one who laughs instead of smiles-with a certain degree of sus- picion.
 This is all great nonsense. There is no virtue in a person going about in the dOleful dumps all the time, and the most hopeful and inspiring work the new woman can set herself is to study the art of being happy. We have been finding out in the last few years that women have given in to many things, believing them to be the immutable decrees of fate, that were the result of nothing but their own stupidity, and that all tEat was needed to change them was a SllSnC eHOfC.
 There was a time when we recon ciled ourselves to sickness as a mySte- rious dispensatiOn of Providence. Now we know that it is generally bad plumb ing and unbOiled water, and a lack of knowledge of the laws of health, and there's not one sickly woman where there used to be a dozen. So it was with poverty. When a woman was left without money she tamely gave in and settled down on some of her relatives to eat the bitter bread of dependence the balance of her life Now she huS- ties out and makes living for herself, and in many cases her last estate is more prosperous than her first
 Men display far more sense on this subject than women do. If a man let his clerks shortcomings and mistakes her servants, he would be in the hands of a doctor with nervous prOStratiOn half the time If he borrowed as much trouble about the outcome of every business venture as his wife does over the way a company dinner will turn out, he would be a raving lunatic in side of a week, and if he had the same amount of apprehension as to whether he could meet every note in bank as she feels as to whether the baby will get the measles, he would end his trou- bles by committing suicide.
 Even in the great sorrows that tear a mans heart as much as they do a wOman's he shows his greater wisdom. He goes out among his fellows where there is something to distract his mind from the dull ache of loss. She stays at home, shrouds herself in crepe and brOOds. Happily for us all, better un- of these matters is coming to us, and it may be that the next great discovery women make will be that there is no use in giving in to mel anchOly without at least making a fight for happiness.-New Orleans Picayune.