The star. (Reynoldsville, Pa.) 1892-1946, 1903-06-10
a SENSE OF HUMOR.
Vt IS A POTENT FACTOR IN KEEPING
LIFE SWEET TO THE END.

and rs Gay ns GfggIng Youth.
Take your fun while you may;
you'll never be young but once" is
popular fallacy. 1t presupposes two
things - that the young, because Of
youth, must have fun and that as soon
MS 1t is passed the capacity for enjoy.
ing it is over.
Some never grow old, and some are
never young. Age lies In the individu-
al and is not question of dates.
Because person ceases to be able to
giggle at every remark, TO bubble over
with glccfulness at the slightest prov
ocati0n, Is no criterion that real mirth-
fulncss has fed. The delicate sense of
humor that may take the place of this
snowy buoyancy is far more TO be
priced.
A sense of humor Is n potent factor
in keeping life sweet TO the end. A
green and jolly old age is as jolly a.
a gay youth.
A sense of humor can be cultivated,
and It should be as assiduously as for
bearance, kindness or any of the car
dinal virtues.
With the slipping away Of youth de-
spair asserts itself only when 1t Is
thought Joy and mirth must flee also.
Are we sure that youth is so posi-
lively happy as 1t Is supposed to be? Is
there not a restlessness, an uncertain
ty, in the steps of young girl that
causes anxiety to be mingled with ev-
cry move? She is full of theories Ia
imbued with ideals. but how to obtain
the desired ends Is mooted question.
She can never be as securely happy as
Is the married woman, or unmarried.
who has. as 1t were, found her feet
surely and knows how TO get what she
wants, or, at least, knows what she
wants TO get. There is restless look
ing forward for pleasures each day, an
unhappy killing of time before some
promised Joy arrives in the young that
all who have passed 1t can painfully
remember
Girls are so imbued by the thought
| less, with the idea that all JOY ceases
with youth, that they have a feeling Of
commiseration for those who have bid
farewell to this ephemeral period. Lit
tie do they realize how the study OF all
| life, the enlarged power to feel. to see,
to bear, to live, TO enjoy, is the price
less gift of every added year.
There is something pitiful in watch
ing the nervous grasp at JOY in youth.
We see constantly young girls literally
afraid to loosen their hold on one day
or one pleasure TO fulfill an act Of SIM
pie duty.
There Is n not unfamiliar story of a
young girl in a ballroom who was stop
ped as she walked about the floor on
the arm of one of her partners by an
old family friend, who inquired, with
interest, for her mother.
'My dear, I'm glad l saw you," he
repeated. "How's your mother"
No reply. She only clung to the arm
on which she leaned and was hasten
ing by when the old gentleman, seeing
her fear lest her escort should slip
away, laid his hand on the young
mans coat collar.
"My dear, I'll hold him." he cried,
twinkling his eye wickedly. "How's
your motherT
He was not very nice old gentle
man. perhaps, but that he got a full
share of fun out of life none could
doubt and the attitude of the young
girl, holding fast to her prize lest he
should escape, is exactly the attitude
of youth that looks to the early days
for all Its share of Joy.
! was in a group of young unmar-
ried women, some nearing thirty, 9th
ers who had just overstepped this crit
icai date. They were expressing in
graphic language their sensitiveness
about their age.
/ have taken some pains to hunt up
statistics about the attractions and ac-
complshments of women who were
past this age which l commend to
their perusal. In the first place novel
lists are taking women between thirty
and forty for their heroines. 1t Is the
woman who dares to have thoughts
and has cultivated herself to the point
of expressing them who commands
friends and lovers who are worth
while.
Helen of Troy was over forty when
she perpetrated the most famous elope-
ment on record, and as the siege of
Troy lasted twenty years she could not
have been very juvenile when the Ill
fortune of Paris restored her to her
husband, who 1t is said, received her
with love and gratitude.
Cleopatra was past thirty when An
tony fell under her spell, and her fas.
cinations for him had not lessened
when she died ten years later.
Pericles welded Aspasia at the age
Of thirty-six. and she welded undis-
puted influence over men for thirty
years afterward.
Livia was thirty-three when she won
the love Of Augustus, over whom she
maintained her ascendency to the last.
Louis XIV. welded Nine Maintenon
when she was forty-three years of age
Ninon, celebrated beauty and wit