The citizen. (Honesdale, Pa.) 1908-1914, 1911-03-03
PEOPLES FORUM.
keep On The Sunny Side OF Life!'

keep On The Sunny Side OF Life!''
: Editor of THE CITIZEN:
These are days of weather-grumb-
lers and fretters. Charles Lamb tells
! of chronic grumbler who always
! complained at whist, because he had
/ so few trumps. By some artifice his
companions managed to deal him the
whole thirteen, hoping to extort some
( expression of satisfaction, but he
! only looked more wretched than
| ever as he examined his hand.
J well, Tom," said Lamb, haven t
you trumps enough this time?"
YES" grunted Tom, but l have no
other cards"
A great many people in the great
game of life seem to grumble when
they don't get any more "trumps"
out of life than their allotted por-
ton. Perhaps at the last day when
they end the game of life to meet
God they no doubt will grumble to
Him if He does not give them a re-
served seat in Heaven away up front.
The Puritans went through life
tormented with the fear of sin and
terror of the Judgment Day, and
their melancholy taints their de-
scendants. We are a nation of dys-
peptics. We can earn our bread, but
cannot digest it. We believe there
is not a string tuned to mirth, but
has it's chord of melancholy" that
evil always stands behind good and
that the Devil always has the whisk
of his tail in everything 1t seems
impossible for some people to rid
themselves of an inherent gloom
hi MI.
cannot enjoy a beautiful day. To
them it is only one of those Internal
weather Their lives are
set to a minor key, and they hear
only plaintive sounds. Our religious
creeds, philosophy, and hymns are
tinged with the spleen of jaundice of
unfortunate authors who sometimes
mistook bile for inspiration.
Many writer's have honestly be-
lieved they were giving the world val
liable religious doctrines, when in
reality they were writing an account
of their own jaundice and dyspepsia.
Calvin, though unquestionably
honest, was a dyspeptic, and could
eat but once day. Who can say
that his writings were not tinged by
his malady? How can men shut out
from the pure air and sunlight in
converts and studies, away from the
great throbbing, pulsing heart of Ma
ture and humanity, write healthy,
vigorous, religious doctrines for
hardy, healthy, robust, and practi-
cal world?
We should fight against every in
fuence which tends to depress the
mind, as we would against a tempta-
tion to crime. A depressed mind
prevents the free action of the
diaphragm and the expansion of the
chest. 1t stops the secretions of the
body, interferes with the circulation
of the blood in the brain and de-
ranges the entire functions of the
body. Scrofula and consumption Of
ten follow protracted depression of
mind.
That fatal murmur'' which is
heard in the upper lobes of the lungs
in the first stages of consumption, Of
ten follows depressed spirits after
some misfortune or sorrow. Victims
of suicide are almost always in a
depressed state from exhausted vi
tality, loss of nervous energy, dys-
pepsia, worry, anxiety, trouble or
grief
Christ, the great teacher, did not
shut himself up with monks, away
from temptation of the great world
outside. He taught no Iong-faced,
gloomy theology. He taught the
gospel of gladness and good-chear.
His doctrines are touched with the
sunlight, and favored with the flow
ers of the fields. The birds of the
air, the beasts of the fields, and
happy, romping children are in
them. True piety is cheerful as the
day.
Joy is the handspring in the whole
OF endless Natures calm rotation;
Joy moves the dazzling wheels that
roll
In the great timepiece of creation"
Schiller.
E. w. MORRISON,
South Canaan