Norwich bulletin., 1911-02-25
THE MAN WHO TALKS

It strikes me that welcome is one of the twenty-flve most beautiful words in the English lanxauEe; and it was not in the list. This, quite likely, is higfp and low and the rich and the poor all like to feel that they are well come Misery Staya longer and with moro apparent contentmeht if 1t is made welcome. It has been the habit of man and misery to keep together ever since the dawn of time. Old Homer sang: Twins, even from birth, are misery and man.; and Shake- speare tells us Misery acquafnts a man with strange bedfellows.a" It is tho welcoming spirit that gives that at-hone feeling and makes common good and useful to whom it must be extended if we would reap from it the most satisfactory reward Do not welcome misery and disease as being dfyinely bestowed. for that is making an evil use of blessed thing.
 Our frisnds admonish us to let well enough alone usually when we think that we see son1ethi4g better right in front In view of such an outlook it Is not surprising we think they do not know what they are talking about If your eyes he would be more chary of his advice; and If we saw things through his eyeA there is no doubt we should sometimes find 1t profitable. ThzS is the point at which we do as we please and repent at leisure; and as life runs we do considerable re- penting. The value of the other fel- lows wisdom can be clearly measured by us after we have declined to act upon it., and have been scorched. We seem to be constituted so that wa only take advice when we have to. The man who gets too confiding soon becomes known as an easy jay. Every dilemma in life appears to have two horns; and we seldom steer clear of both. We are pretty sure to let well enough alone if we sense that it is well to do SO.
 It is just barely possible that there are s0uls who never get discouraged in the keen depressing sense. It is not'weH to encourage any feeling for. Man has the power to rise above conditions because he is himself a creator of conditions by making new ones. Some one has said: If a man wants light he must conquer darkness; !" and conquering darkness is the finest steady occupation man has ever given his mind to- Bear in mind that old maxim: Man first makes his habits and then his habits make him." and this led Emerson to affirm: Habit is either the best of servants, or the worst of masters" Where discour- aEement cannot get lodging place it cannot long tarry. Wise is he who regards Encouragement as test of manly power rather than an immov- able weight. If life is the childhood of our immortality why not make i. a pleasant memory?
 Sometimes l think that worrying is hereditary and the best illustration of it that presents itself in this light to my mind is the story of the little girl who wept in sorrow because her paste- board globe was hollow and her doll filed with sawdust Waking up to shams is a cause of grief in the juve- nile world; but the adult world is awake to them all of the time and ap- pears to look upon them as nec0ssi- ty. It fs the view we take of things that makes them nettling or other wise. Some folks think if 2 thing is hereditary 1t must be- borne with, while others regard thing hereditary as an imp unworthy of adoption and immediately cast it out. confess to belonging to the latter class. It has been shown by science that the taints. even. which are ours by birth, can be gotten rid of. Things which do not add to the pleasure of life are better forgotten, or cut out. Where there is 2 will there is a way.
 ] wonder what has become of those old fashioned men of New England who liked to be called Sir" and those d-fa shioned boys and girls who al- ways said, "Yes, sir, and "No, sir and "Yes, ma'am" and No, ma'am. 2 Those were manners that could be bred out of the race; but they do not seem to have. been improved upon. Our forebears% used to be capable ol corners; but now we have reached an age when it seems as if the new corners were capable, of teaching good manners to us. like the polite ways of our aliens, if they are little awk- ward or embarrassed in making them Some educator who thought the old politeness smached too much of, sub Servfence for a republic, knocked t out without having anything of value to put in it's place. I am just old fashioned enough to think that he wrought an improvement, or even sus- tained the standard of politeness whicE once marked our people.
 Since prosrsss is the watchword we may just as well get familiar with
 
 forging straight ahead is progress ans in a sense it may be; but the pro- gressionists have studied out five movements in progress, and there is not a false movement among them To progress you must move inward upward, downward, outward and on ward" You cannot keep in the simple life and pull all those wires for good and it seems as if that old-fashionei warning: "Be sure you are right ani then go ahead" contained every mo. ti6n and every principle involved This last is the thing I am going tt recommend to my readers. We have no objections to the ins and outs ol progress in modern form; but we mus keep in the every day push-just ge simplicity by the hand and walk straight. if we would get there. Pro. gress with us must be an air line, no trapeze performance.
 Bernard Shaw will nsvsr be popular because he insists upon calling thu attention of man to his inconsisteu. 1fcs. Men do not like to hear tho Truth about themselves, hence, the, very much prefer to hear 1t about tn, other fellow. He says: When a mar wants to murder a tiger he calls i sport: when Q tiger wants to murde- | him he calls 1t ferocity.'' If the tiger. selfish ideas could be made knowI perhaps he would not improve on thi. definition, but just reverse it. Tn, "dog-eat-dog" plane of life is wher, things that are brutal are always be.