Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1901-04-29

WIG Nv up 10 every I1dI lucy
make, raising their families in luxu-
rious habits and at death expecting
some kind friend to give their daugh-
tiers employment as music teachers or
typewriters or government employees
Such parents have no right to children.
Every neighborhood has specimens of
such imprOvidence. The two words
that most strike me in the text are
summer and winter" Some people
have no summer in their lives. From
the rocking cradle to the still grave, it
is relentless January. Invalid infancy
followed by some crippling accident or
dimness Of eyesight or dizziness of
hearing or privation or disaster or I'M
fortunate environment makes lifea per-
petual winter. But in most lives there
is a period of summer, although it may
be a short summer, and that is the
time to provide for the future.
One of the best ways of insuring the
future is to put aside all you can for
charitable provision. You put a crum-
bling stone in the foundation of your
fortune if you do not in your plans re-
gard the sufferings that you may allie
viate. You will have the pledge of the
high heavens for your temporal well
fare when you help the helpless, for
the promise is BLESSED is he that con-
sidereth the poor; the Lord will deliver
him in time of trouble" Then there is
another way of providing for the fu-
ture. If you have $1,000 a year in
come, save $1O0; or $4,000 year, save
$500; or $4,000, save $1,000. Do you
say such economy is meanness? / say
it is a vaster meanneSS for you to
make no provision for the future and
compel your friends or the world to
take care of you or yours in case Of
bereavement or calamity.
There are women who at the first in
crease of their husbands resources
wreck all on an extravagant wardrobe.
There are men who at the prospect of
larger prosperity build houses they
will never be able to pay for. There
are people with $4,000 a year income
who have not one dollar laid up for a
rainy day. 1t is a CHASTITY dishonesty
practiced on the next generation. Such
men deserve bankruptcy and impover-
ishment. In almost every mans life
there comes a winter of cold misfortune.
Prepare for it while you may. Whose
thermometer has not sometimes stood
below zero? What ship has never been
caught in a storm? What regiment at
the front never got into battle? Have
at least as much foresight as the insec-
tile world. Examine the pantries of
the ant hills in this April weather, and
you will find that last summers sup
ply is not yet exhausted. Examine
them next July, and you will find
them being replenished. go to the
ant, thou sluggard. Consider her ways
and be wise, which, having no guide,
overseer or ruler, provideth her meat
in the summer and gathereth her food
in the harvest"
Avoid AVarice.
This is no argument for miserliness.
Avarice and righteousness destroy a
man about as soon as any of the other
vices. We have heard of those who
entered their iron money vault for
business purposes, and the door acct
dentally shut, and they were suffocat-
ed, their corpse not discovered until the
next day. But every day and all up
and down the streets of our cities there
are men, body. mind and soul. forever
fast in their own money vaults. Ac-
emulation of bonds, mortgages and
government securities and town lots
and big farms just for the pleasure of
accumulation is despicable, but the put
ting aside of a surplus for your self de-
Tense when your brain has halted. or
your right hand has forgotten it's cum
ming, or your old age needs a manserv-
ant, or for the support of others when
you can no more be a breadWinner for
your household-that is right. that is
beautiful. that is Christian, that is di
vinely approved. That shows that you
have taken Solomon's ant hill for an OBJ
ject lesson. Going out of this world
without leaving a dollar for those who
remain behind, if you have done your
best. you have right to put your head
in calm confidence on the pillow which
Jeremiah shook up in the forty-ninth
chapter of his prophecy, leave thy
fatherless children. l will preserve
them alive, and let thy widows trust in
me-" But if. having the means, through
mortgages or houses or life insurance
for providing for helpless widowhood
and orphanage you make no provision
for post norton need. how dare you go
up and take a palace in heaven and let
your wife and children go to the poor
house or into a struggle for bread that
makes life horror and sometimes ends
in suicide?
But my subject reaches higher than
oralities-foresight for the soul,
provision for eternal experiences, prep
aration for the far beyond. Ant hills,
speak out and teach US a larger and
mightier lesson of preparing food for
the more important part of us! Do
you realize that a man may be mil
lionaire or a multimillionaire for time
nd ha l-r11rnt for. otnrrnitu q rriInnn