St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1901-03-09
SATURDAY, MARCH 1901

The promise that it shall be well with
you does not imply that you are to be
free from trouble. There is no escaIse
from that. We all have family rela-
tions, and some of them will be MAX
ing exit from this world, so that be-
reavement is the universal inherit
ance.. So also is financial loss. The
difference between the prospered and
those not prospered is the difference
in the amount they can afford to lose.
The more wealth a man has the more
he can lose, but one man can afford
to lose a million dollars where anoth-
er man cannot afford to lose one dol
lar. On larger or smaller scale all
suffer financial loss. Amid the rapid
ity of the revolutions of the wheel of
national and international finance
monetary perplexity is as common a.
day or night.
So also misinterpretation and slam
der came to all who live active lives.
Our actions, thoroughly honest and
above board, may come under sus-
picion. Every courtroom at every term
of court hears illustrations of the de-
lusion of what is called circumstan-
tial evidence. Innocent men are fined
or imprisoned or electrocnted because
Of an unfortunate conjunction of
events. What is true in courtrooms
is true in all circles of domestic or
social or political or official life. You
have been misunderstood and misrep-
resented or will be misunderstood and
misrepresented. Then how can my
text be true? My explanation is this:
The man without any divine grace in
his heart finds in these troubles irri-
tation and unbelief and melancholia
and despair. A Christian man finds in
them submission and enlarged views
and divine support and reconsecra-
tion. Bereavement to the worldling
brings hard thoughts of God and re-
sistance so violent it dares not fully
express itself. Bereavement brings to
the Christian the thought of heavenly
reunion and more complete laying
hold of God, and more tender appre-
citation of the divine presence, and
deeper gratitude that we were per-
mitted to have the departed one so
long. and more lively sympathy for
the sorrows of others and another evil
dence of Gods love, for whom the
Lord loveth he chasteneth."
Financial loss, which just now said
is sure to come, never breaks up a
man who has strong faith in God. In
most cases it is loss of surplus or it
is the Punishment of luxuries. Most
of the wants of the prosperous classes
are artificial wants. The late Mr.. Ar
mour of the S60.000,o0O estate pointed
to one of his clerks on ordinary salary
and said: THAT man has better ap-
petite than /, sleeps better nights and
enjoys life more than l do" Oh, the
gigantic miseries of those who have
too much! A man in Solomon's time
expressed as philosophic and reason
able wish as any man of those times
or of our times. His name was Agur.
and he offered prayer that he might
never have superabundance or q
deficit, crying out: "Give me neither
poverty nor riches" On the one side
he had seen the awful struggle of the
poor to get food and clothes and shell
ter and to educate their children, and
on the other side he had seen the
equity foot and the indigestion. and
the insomnia, and the anxiety about
large investments, and the threatened
paresis often characteristic of those
who are loaded up and loaded down
with too many successes. Those peo-
pie who are generally called the mass
es-that is, the most of folks-have
the things absolutely necessary for
their well being. They have no Mu-
rillos on their wall. nor "Belshazzar's
Feast" in the dining room, nor pair
of $4,000 sorrels at their doorway.
Bnt they have something which those
supplied seldom have.
They have better health because, be-
ing compelled to walk, they get the
necessary exercise. and. their diet be-
ing limited to plan food. they do not
srffer from midnight salads and are
not victimized hy rare caterers. They
retire for wholesome sleep at the very
hour in which others are leaving their
homes for the dance OF the card party.
They will sleep the last sleep just as
well in the plain graveyard as those
who have over them an arch Of sculp-
tured granite in costliest metropolis
or most historical abbey.
Do any of us fully realize the fact
that God gives us three things in un-
limited supply. although no formula
OF prayer that I ever heard recognizes
the em-water, air and sunlight? Water
by the riverfull. Water by the lakeful.
Water by the oceanful. Some for ablu-
tion. some for shaking of thirst, some
for baptistery. some for fountains and
aquariums. l never appreciated what
a wonderful thing water is until last
summer ] stood by the fountains before
and around the emperor's palace at Pc
terhof. Russia. i had been familiar
with this wonderful element of nature
from childhood. having been born on
the banks of the beautiful Raritan and
as barefooted boy dabbled in the
brook near my fathers house. But
never realized until last summer what
water could DO in play, or in strange
caprice, or beautific alton. or when
the ladder of the light, or
when skillful workmen took hold of it
to toss it, or whirl it. or shape it into
crowns, or hoist it into columns, or
spring it into arches, or lift it into
stars. or turn it into crescents, or build
it into temples. You forget you ever
saw the less glorious waters at Chats
worth, England, or VersaHl France,
as you stand in the balcony of the pal
ace overlooking the Finland gulf. be-
vildered and transported as you look
at the one display called the Golden
Stairway fountain. The water rolls
down over "a steps one foot high and
% feet long. All of these "a steps are
covered with sheets of FURNISHED gold.
Silver step of the water on stairs Of
gold! What a glee of liquids! Rolling,
dashing, foaming, enrapturing splen-
dors. Chorus of floods! Poetry of wa
tiers. Doxology of torrents. But that
,,.l;cb most irppreSSed me- there and