Butler citizen. [volume] (Butler, Pa.) 1877-1922, 1904-12-08

Tuesday, and today Is Friday.
Callers loaded with gifts and trades
men bending under packages come and
60 In endless procession. The servants
are at the end of their endurance AS
for the family and the betrothed, they
no longer have life or fixed abode.
Their mornings are spent with dress
makers. milliners, upholsterers. jewel
ers, decoratorS and caterers. After
that comes y rush through offices,
wnere one waits In line, gazing vague
ly at busy clerks engulfed in papers.
A fortunate thing If there be time
when this Is over to run home and
dress for the series of ceremonial din
ners = betrothal dinners, dinners Of
presentation, the settlement dinner-re-
eeptions, balls. About midnight, home
again, harassed and weary, to find the
latest accumulation of parcels and
deluge of letters - congratulations, fe-
licitations, acceptances and regrets
from bridesmaids and ushers, excuses
of tardy tradesmen, And the contre-
temps of the last minute-a sudden
death that disarranges the bridal par
ty. q wretched cold that prevents
favorite cantatrice from singing, and
so forth, and so forth. Those poor
Blanchards, They will never be ready
and they thought they had foreseen
everything!
Such has been their existence for a
month. No longer possible to breathe,
to rest half hour, to tranquilize ones
thoughts. No, this Is not living!
Mercifully, there is grandmother's
room. Grandmother is verging on
eighty. Through many tolls and much
suffering she has come to meet things
with the calm assurance which life
brings to men and women of high
thinking and large hearts. She sits
there In her armchair. enjoying the
silence Of long meditative hours. So
the flood Of affairs surging through the
house ebbs at her door, At the thresh-
old of this retreat voices are hushed
and footballs softened, and when the
young flances want to hide away for
a moment they fee to grandmother.
Poor Children is her greeting.
"You are worn out! Rest little and
belong to each other. All these things
count for nothing. Don't let than alb
sorb you, il isn't worth while"
They know 1t well, these two young
people. How many times in the last
weeks has their love had to make way
for all sorts Of conventions and fulfill.
tiesl Fate at this decisive moment Of
their lives seems bent upon drawing
| their minds away from the one thing
essential, to harry them with host
Of trivialities, and heartily do they mp
prove the opinion Of grandmamma
when she says, between n smile and a
caress, Decidedly, my dear, the world
Is growing too complex. and 1t does not
make people happier-quite the con-
traryr'
/ also am of grandmammas opinion.
| From the cradle to the grave, IN his
needs as in his pleasures, In his con-
| ception of the world and Of himself,
| the man OF modern times struggles
| through a maze Of endless complica-
ton. Nothing is simple any longer
neither thought nor action; not pleas
ure; not even dyins With our own
hands we have added to existence a
train of hardships and Topped off many
/ qualification. I believe that thou
sands of our fellow men, suffering the
| consequences of q too artificial life,
will be grateful if we try to give ex-
| preston TO their discomfort and to JUS
| tify the regret for naturalness which
| vaguely oppresses them.
| Let us first speak of a series of facts
that put into relief the truth We wish
| to show.
The eempiexity Of our life appears in
the number of our material needs. 1t
| Is fact universally conceded that our
| needs have grown with our resources.
| This is not an evil in itself, for the
birth Of certain needs is often the mark
| Of progress. To feel the necessity of
bathing, of wearing fresh linen, inhah-
iting wholesome houses, eating health
full food and cultivating our minds is
sign Of superiority. But II certain
needs exist by right and are desirable,
there are others whose effects are IA
tai which, like parasites. live at our ex-
tense. Numerous and tmperious, they
engross us completely.
| Could our fathers have foreseen that
we should some day have at our dis
| posal the means and forces we now
use In sustaining and defending our
material life, they would have predict
| ed for us an increase of independence,
and therefore Of happiness, and a de-
crease In competition for worldly goods.
| They might even have thought that
through the simpllfcation of life thus
| made possible higher degree of mo-
rality would be attained. None of
these things has come to pass; neither
happiness nor brotherly love nor power
for good has been increased. In the
first place, do you think your fellow
| citizens, taken as a whole, are more
contented than their forerathers and
less anxious about the future? / do
not nsk IL they should find reason to be
SO, but II they really are SO. To see
them live it seems to me that a majorf-
ty Of them are discontented with their
lot and. above all. absorbed In material
needs and beset with cares for the NOR
row. Never has the question of food
J and shelter been sharper or more alb.
sorbing than since we are better nour-
ished, better clothed and better housed
than ever. He errs greatly who thinks
that the query, what shall we eat
and what shall we drink and where
withal shall we be clothedT' presents
itself to the poor alone. exposed as they
are to the anguish of morrows without
bread or roof. With them the ques-
ton Is natural, and yet 1t is with them
that 1t presents itself most simply.
You must go among those who are be
ginning to enjoy n little ease to learn
how greatly satisfaction In what one
has may be disturbed by regret for
what one lacks, and II you would see
anxious care for future material good,
material good in all its luxurious de-
velopment, observe people of small for
tune and, above all, the rich. 1t Is not
the woman with one dress who asks
most insistently how she shall be
clothed, nor is It those reduced to the
strictly necessary who make most
question of what they shall eat tomor-
row. AS an inevitable consequence of
the law that needs are increased by
their satisfaction, the more goods man
has the more he wants. The moro as
sured he Is Of the morrow. according to