p. 110 | Men and Things

Seventh-day Adventist Publishing Association · Battle Creek, Mich. · Mar 21, 1871

Men and Things.

HOW TO CULTIVATE GOOD MANNERS.

The following thoughts are worthy of the careful attention of every young person, especially of every Christian. Home is the place to learn what we wish to practice abroad:—

MANNERS.—Young folks should be mannerly. How to be so is the question. Many a good boy and girl feel that they cannot behave to suit themselves in the presence of company. They feel timid, bashful, and self-distrustful, the moment they are addressed by a stranger, or appear in company. There is but one way to get over this feeling and acquire graceful and easy manners; that is, to do the best they can at home, as well as abroad. Good manners are not learned from arbitrary teaching so much as acquired from habit. They grow upon us by use. We must be courteous, agreeable, civil, kind, gentlemanly and womanly, at home, and then it will soon become a kind of second nature to be so everywhere. A coarse, rough manner at home begets a habit of roughness, which we cannot lay off, if we try, when we go among strangers. The most agreeable people we have ever known in company are those that are perfectly agreeable at home. Home is the school for all the best things, especially for good manners.

A WORD FOR WOMEN.

Every woman covets good looks, a fine appearance. Some mourn all their life long because they were not possessed of physical beauty. But there is another kind of beauty attainable by all and far more lasting than the former. The following hits it very happily:—

A good woman never grows old. Years may go over her head; but if benevolence and virtue dwell in her heart, she is as cheerful as when the spring of life first opened to her view. When we look upon a good woman, we never think of her age—she looks as charming as when the rose of youth first bloomed upon her cheek. That rose has not faded yet; it will never fade. In her neighborhood she is the friend and benefactor—in the church the devout worshiper and exemplary Christian. Who does not love and respect the woman who has passed her days in acts of kindness and mercy—who has been the friend of man and God—whose whole life has been a scene of kindness and love, a devotion of love and religion? We repeat, such a woman cannot grow old. She will always be fresh and buoyant in spirits, and active in humble deeds of mercy and benevolence. If the young lady desires to retain the bloom and beauty of youth, let her not yield to the sway of fashion and folly; let her love truth and virtue; and to the close of life she will retain those feelings which now make life appear a garden of sweets—ever fresh and ever new.

WHY YOU ARE UNHAPPY.

See here, you poor, unhappy, discontented soul. Do you know what is the matter with you? Read these lines, and face right about:—

THE TWO BUCKETS.—A great deal of trouble is caused by the habit of looking at things “wrong end foremost.” “How disconsolate you look!” said a bucket to his fellow-bucket, as they were going to the well. “Ah!” replied the other, “I was reflecting on the uselessness of our being filled; for, let us go away ever so full, we always come back empty.” “There now! how strange to look at it in that way,” said the first bucket. “Now I enjoy the thought that, however empty we come, we always go away full. Only look at it in that light, and you’ll be as cheerful as I am.”

A SWEET MORSEL FOR TEA-DRINKERS.

I clip the following from a letter from a missionary now in China. It speaks for itself:—

I have not had a good cup of tea since I left California. Every one I know here uses black tea, which has a peculiar taste that I do not like. They laugh at the words, green tea. Said a gentleman here the other day, “There is no such thing as green tea. I notice,” he said, “a great amount of Prussian blue among the articles sent up the river to a certain gentleman of this city, and it goes back in another form. It comes on the leaves of your green tea.”

A THOUGHT FOR IDLE CHURCH MEMBERS.

Why is it that our ministers are so overworked and broken down often? Does not the following suggest the reason?

Because many people in the church refuse their portion of toil, and hardship, and sacrifice, in the cause of religion, others, and especially those engaged in preaching, are compelled to endure much more than their rightful share of privation in order that the work of the church may not stop. Many of the sacrifices and difficulties connected with the ministry are not at all necessary for the interests of religion. They do not promote it; but their entire influence opposes and weakens this interest. These hardships are made necessary only by the indolence, unfaithfulness, and worldliness, of the church. This is the truth,