The Donaldsonville chief. [volume] (Donaldsonville, La.) 1871-current, 1905-07-01
or artistic resources with which to re-
fresh their faded minds.

SUCH d Way LndI 1t 5COulu 1iOG aC oE1sA1F15A5
Awakening in the night with a sense o.
asphyxiation, he hurried to the window,
broke a pane of glass, took long breath
of fresh air, and returning to bed slept
#soundly all night. IN the morning, 60
his. astonishment, he found he haa
broken in the door of a bookcase!
He experienced, however. a keen
realization ST the tremendousness OF q
force, the utility of which he had hithef-
to doubted. Il it be true that there -
nothing either good or bad but thinking
makes it SO, " and we have left magma
ton out Of our theory of life; our whole
theory has been at fault. It is not
quality for exceptional natures or eA-
allied moments only; it is one Of the
istenee. Il is a magic mirror to double
our pleasures; a prophet to foresee the
results of our present actions and SO
guide those actions Alright; a panseea
for pain and foreboding and hunilia-
ton.
Think not the king did Danish thee,
But thou the king!"
exclaimed wise old John of Gaunt to the
future Henry the Fourth, adding:
What thy soul holds dear. imagine it
To lie that way thou goest,
Not whence thou CONTEST"
See yourself ii Imagination as assert
ing yourself eourag eously, honestly. be
fore others, and making yourself agree
able to all, and you will do it in reality.
and you make yourself so. What we
think we are forever building into our
characters.
The most fascinating men and women
we know are those who cast about the
commonest circumstances of life a
magical illusion. Children all do it.
Some one advised sending boys to school
on the plea that it would knock the non-
sense out OF them. The wise father re-
piled that it was just the nonsense he.
wanted left in. Luther declared that he.
would not lose the wonderful fairy
stories of his childhood for nyisum OF
money. Macaulay attributed his ac-
curaey in history to his love Of castle
building. The past was in his mind
constructed into romance. 1t is moth
ing but sentiment" said one to Ma
poleon. Nothing but sentiment, he
replied. Sentiment rules the world .
The lack OF Imagination makes life
dull, uninteresting, material; robs US of
insight and foresight, and puts fatal
barrier between US and our fellows. We
need some stimulus, as Walter Pater
says, to shape vague hope and transform
| it into effective desire; to carry US year
after year without disgust through the
routine work which is SO large a part
Of life; to open our eyes, to cultivate in
us the delicate sense Of human suffer-
ing; to enable US to touch wounds with
a light hand: to divine the poetic and
moral significance which belongs to
daily life.
Thus we may enrich our life not by
the making OF far-fetched plans, nor by
seeking change and gain, but by the
| faithful putting to profit of what is
within our grasp. Everything good is
on the highway. Looking at checker
board we may see a cross or a pyramid
in red or one in black, at will; yet the
squares have remained fixed. It is our
own shift of attention that has done the
marvel. Just SO, nine times out of ten,
| we could accept the enjoyable elements
in our lives instead Of the Wretched ones.
! I tell you the kind of world we. carry
about in ourselves is the important.
thing, aud the world outside takes it's
color and value from that.
Everybody remembers the story OF the
| little Montague who was stolen and
sold to chimney sweep; how he could
| dimIy remember lying in a beautiful
| chamber, how he carried with him in
all his drudgery the vision of fair
one day, all sooty5 as he was. on a rich
bed and fell asleep; and how a kind
person woke him and questioned him
and pieeed together his broken recol-
| Ieetions. and so made the visions Of his
past real to him again. Lowell sees all
| life typided IN this nursery tale. We all
have cur vague "reminiscences of the
stately home of our childhood-When
we were all poets-and we all remem-
Der the beautiful, motherly face which
Nature bent over US then. But some
how we got stolen away; life becomes to
us a sooty taskmaster, and we crawl
/ through darls passages, till suddenly
some vision Of wiser life redee1ns us.
| Then we leok up from the near daily
Task to the Vision, and realize indeed
| that life may be largely fashioned to our
]. fancy. There can be no nobler aim.
Read how one missed it, and then try
again: Il
Daughters Of Time, the hypocritic Days
aIuf1ed and dumb like barefoot der
wishes.
And marching single in an endless file.
Bring diadems and fagots il their
| hands,
To each they offer gifts after his viii,
Bread, kingdoms, stars, and sky that
holds them all
| I, in my pIeaciled garden, watched the
pomp.
Forgot my morning wishes, hastily
Took a few herbs and apples. and the
Day
Turned and departed silent. I, too late.
Under her solemn fIIet saW.the seorn.
japanese Farmers.
The japanese are the most remark
able farmers in the world The arabic
land in Japan is only scout 10000.