Los Angeles herald., 1906-12-02
DON'T BE A FOOL

In a personal letter to the editor OF
The Herald announcing his GONZALES
cence from q long attack of Illness
Paul De Longpre, famous painter and
composer, adds this postscript:
"The man who enjoys perfect health
and yet complains about everything is
How true that Isl And how few
of us appreciate it until it is too late!
Perfect health is the gift of God tc
almost every man. 1t is part of the
preparation for the fullest sympathy
with the wonders and beauties of ma
ture. How long his perfect health may
abide with him he cannot know, and
in most cases when it does leave him
he can hold himself responsible for
either ignorantly or willfully violating
the laws of his being.
But while health is still with him
he busies himself, for the most part,
in complaining and fault-finding. He
objects to hot weather. and then he OBJ
jects to cold weather. He complains if
it rains and complains if it doesn't
rain. He swears at the reckless speed
of the street cars when they run fast
and damns the company when the cars
run slow. He shouts at his wife, quar-
rels at his children and goes away
slamming the front door so that all
the windows rattle and you can hear
his fierce footballs as he runs to catch
a car and then swears at the conductor
and motorman who, not having seen
him, fail to stop for him.
You know that kind of a fool There
are plentiful samples of him every
where He is a public and private
nuisance. He is the fellow who howls
with rage at the, greediness of corpora
everything for himself that he can get
his hands on. He is the same fool who
throws away his own money, reckless
ly and foolishly, and then raises red
flag against society because he is poor.
He is the rich man who sets up the
pins for his own selfish interests and
curses the common people when they
observing his selfshness, tear down his
carefully laid plans.
THE man who enjoys perfect health
and yet complains about everything is
a fool"
Men like Paul De Longpre are not
guilty of such foolishness Nobody ever
saw this great painter and composer
without a smile on his face. In the
rain, as in the sunshine; under the
clouds, as under the cerulean blue; IN
the chilly winds and in the warn,
zephyrs, Paul De Longpre's happiness
is proverbial and his handshake like
that of a newly-found brother. 'I am
just now" he writes in his brief epistle
with the coming of our beautiful sun
shine, feeling little stronger" Every.
thing is beautiful to Paul De LongprC
except sickness, separation and death
and even these are ugly only because
they take away the power of apprecia-
tion and sympathy of and for the
beautiful things of earth.
And in this he is right. Fault-find-
ing, complaining and ingratitude are
our besetting sins. We refuse to sec
the roses because there are SHOWS OF
the mountain tops; we shut our eyes
to the blessed sunshine because there
is mud i'm the streets.
Suppose we turn over a new leaf an(
start afresh. Suppose we reverse tn,
order of ou- habits and cease being Z
fool Quit looking at the dark side o
everything and keep our eyes Away
on the brighton, if we do observe tn
dark, see it only to brighten and dis
sipate 1t.
Now, Paul De Longpre had no sor
of idea that his little personal not
would be used as an editorial sermon
but it came as a bit of sunshine fron
out the room of sickness, and was S
characteristic of the man, that the ed
itor felt it would be helpful just to pas
1t along and ask everybody who i
complaining and fretful and ugly Il
disposition to reform himself immedi
ately and get into the sunlight OF life
"The mar who enjoys perfect healt
and yet complains about everything /
fool"
Remember that-all the days OF you
life-and the world will be happier 10
your having lived in it.
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