Earlier text: Healdsburg AcademyAn Awful Temperance Lecture
A REVOLTING discovery was made in Leeds three weeks ago. The people occupying houses around a dwelling at Briggate, had for several days noticed an overpowering odor, which threatened, if not abated, to spread fever. The sanitary authorities made the necessary investigation, and soon discovered its cause. In an attic they found an elderly man in a state of delirium tremens, and totally unconscious of his surroundings. The room contained not a particle of food or furniture, but huddled up in one corner was the dead body of the drunkard's wife. At the inquest it was learned that the deceased had been confined a week previous, and her husband had failed to pay the necessary attention to the poor woman, who died two days after in the presence of her seven-year-old daughter. The occurrence has caused considerable comment in the London papers. It is an awful temperance lecture, and Dickens in his most graphic description of the squalor, crime, and misery of the lower classes in England, never painted a more awful picture. The Government is not doing its duty towards these unfortunates. Temperance Law and the Ballot
By Wisconsin Temperance Journal
"You can't make temperance by law," cries the rum-seller. Well, you can't set broken legs by law; but you pass laws requiring streets and sidewalks to be passable without danger, in order that no legs may be broken, and by throwing this protection around her citizens the State does a better service than she could by erecting a hospital in which to mend broken bones. The prohibitory law makes the streets safe. Whether the State will license or prohibit temptation is the question which has been carried into politics. That question can only be settled at the ballot box, because laws are made by men elected by votes.—Wisconsin Temperance Journal. We cannot get more out of human life than we put into it. "Just like his luck!" half of the boys said, when Charlie Foster won the State Scholarship. They had made the same remark when his name had been sent in by the principal of the school to the superintendent as his best scholar. In all likelihood these same old school-fellows will keep on saying, "Just like his luck!" if Charlie ever becomes a Judge, or a Senator, or if he marries happily, or makes a fortune. Every step upward is attributed by some men and boys to that unknown quantity called "luck." And curiously enough, just as "Like his luck" is used to account for the success of one's friends, so "Just like my luck" is used to explain our own failures. "It is just my luck! There was not a single question about anything I knew. I had crammed up the capitals of the States, square root, and the conjugations, and I was asked about mountain ranges, compound interest, and the fifth declension. I always was unlucky!" In all this talk about "luck" is there not a good deal of inconsistency? We never employ the word to account for our own successes or somebody else's failures. When the said Charlie Foster misses a catch at base-ball, or catches a crab in a race, we do not cry, "How unlucky he is?" but, "What a muff that Charlie Foster is!" and when we ourselves manage to get on the roll of honor, we resent with virtuous indignation any congratulation on our luck. "Luck, indeed!" we growl; "there was no luck at all. It was just hard work and nothing else." Moreover this talk about luck is, in the first place, somewhat unmanly, not to say cowardly. To trust to luck is a confession that one cannot do anything by one's own labor or one's own intellect. It is really, my boy, an acknowledgment that you have no independence of character, no strength of will, no patience, and no perseverance. Trusting in luck is a very different thing from trusting in Providence. Providence aids those who aid themselves, and just in proportion as they do their work honestly and conscientiously. Luck is a kind of capricious spirit which is expected to set at naught all the laws of nature for our advantage, or to our disadvantage, without the slightest apparent reason why it should intervene at all. If there is such a thing, that can either make or mar us, our first duty is not to be its slave, but to make ourselves its master. We must not stand like beggars at a street corner until luck drops a few coppers into our hats. We must be a law unto ourselves, and not mere playthings of chance. Let us be honest enough to acknowledge our own mistakes. The grumbler who laments, "I never had a slice of bread,
Cut nice and smooth and long and wide,
But it fell upon the sanded floor,
And always on the buttered side,"
fancies himself unlucky. If he were honest, he would blame himself for not keeping good hold of his bread and butter, and if he thought about it, he would see that falling on the buttered side was a natural result of the way in which he was holding it. This notion of luck very often arises from a mixture of conceit and jealousy. We do not like to allow that another has more talent than we have, and has his faculties better. He has, however, if we examine his career, been more studious, more careful, more observant. It would be much more noble of us, instead of repeating like parrots the word "luck," meaning thereby that he has got a reward which he does not deserve, to candidly say, "He has deserved all he has won; he is the better fellow." Another evil arising from this talk about luck is that at last we actually believe in it. Once under the influence of this notion, we exercise no caution or foresight. "Luck," we say, "will bring us through." Fortunately for our future and permanent success, luck does nothing of the sort. In the long run luck is nowhere. You may have heard of games of chance—gambling games, as they are styled—and of lotteries, and the like. You have heard of people being lucky at them. The professional gambler and lottery-keeper know better than that; they know that even in throwing dice there is very little luck. The man who is lucky to-day is unlucky to-morrow; it is in reality skill or trickery, and not luck, that enables the professional gambler to pursue his career. Lucky people, in fact, are people who have thoroughly trained themselves for the battle of life. They have eyes open to perceive a coming danger, and have learned how to avoid it; they recognize a difficulty, and know how to overcome it; they see an opportunity, and know how to make use of it; and they are ready with all their faculties alert, to seize it before it has gone forever. Their success is visible to every eye, and arrests our attention at once. What we do not see, very often what we will not see, but deliberately shut our eyes to, is the foresight they exercise, the careful training they have undergone, the long practice which has made them perfect. There is nothing brilliant or showy about this practice and training, and therefore we have not noticed them. But they are there, nevertheless. To all of us, every day of our lives, opportunities present themselves which pass without our heeding them, or if we see them, without our having the courage and skill to avail ourselves of them. We let them fly, never to return, because we are not ready, and then we cry, "Just like our luck!" As Shakespeare says, "The fault, dear Brutus, is not in our stars,
But in ourselves that we are underlings."
Away with your notions of luck. Be manly and trust to work. Do your duty and let luck do its worst.—Harper's Young People. “OH, dear, it always does rain when I want to go!” cried little Jennie Moore, “It’s too bad; now I’ve got to stay indoors all day, and I know I shall have a wretched day.” “Perhaps so,” said Uncle Jack; “but you need not have a bad day unless you choose.” “How can I help it? I wanted to go to the Park and hear the band, and take Fido and play on the grass and have a good time, and pull wild flowers, and eat sandwiches under the trees; and now there ain't goin' to be any sunshine at all; and I just have to stand here and see it rain, and see the water run off the duck’s back all day.” “Well, let’s make a little sunshine,” said Uncle Jack. “Make sunshine!” said Jennie, “why how you do talk!” and she smiled through her tears. “You haven’t got a sunshine factory, have you!” “Well, I’m going to start one, right off, if you’ll be my partner,” replied Uncle Jack. “Now let me give you three rules for making sunshine: first don’t think of what might have been, if the day had been better. Second, see how many pleasant things there are left to enjoy; and, lastly, do all you can to make others happy.” “Well, I’ll try the last first,” and she went to work to amuse her little brother Willie, who was crying. By the time she had him riding a chair and laughing, she was laughing too. “Well,” said Uncle Jack, “I see you are a good sunshine-maker, for you have got about all you or Willie can hold just now. But let’s try what we can do with the second rule.” “But I haven’t anything to enjoy, because all my dolls are old, and my picture books are all torn, and—” “Hold,” said Uncle Jack, “here’s an old newspaper. Now, let’s get some fun out of it.” “Fun out of a newspaper! why, how you do talk!” But Uncle Jack showed her how to make a mask by cutting holes in the paper, and how to cut a whole family of dolls, and how to make pretty things for Willie out of the paper. Then he got the tea-tray and showed her how to roll a marble around it. And so she found many a pleasant amusement, and when bed-time came she kissed Uncle Jack, and said:— “Good-night, dear Uncle Jack.” “Good-night, little sunshine-maker,” said Uncle Jack. And she dreamed that night that Uncle Jack had built a great house, and put a sign over the door, which read:— SUNSHINE FACTORY.
UNCLE JACK AND LITTLE JENNIE. She made Uncle Jack laugh when she told her dream; but she never forgot what you must remember: A cheerful heart makes its own sunshine.—The Little Folks. CLOCK-TICKS AND HEART-BEATS.
Threescore years and ten
Man draweth his mortal breath;
As the flower of the grass doth he fade and pass,
In the blight of the blast of death.
The moments come, and the moments part,
With silent pinions spread;
Each tick of the clock, and each throb of the heart
Is the knell of a moment dead.
Hark to the clock’s light tick!
Time flies.
Hark to the heart-beats quick!
Man dies! Threescore years and ten,
That slip like grasped sands—
Too brief, too brief for selfish grief,
Too brief for folded hands!
Go forth in the might of a love sublime,
And ere thou fall as a leaf,
Thou shalt reap from the fading fields of time
A deathless harvest sheaf.
Hark to the clock’s light tick!
Time flies.
Hark to the heart-beats quick!
Man dies! —From the Quiver. A CORRESPONDENT from Connecticut to the Manchester Mirror says: When I moved from New York to my small farm, everything was new to the children. It was away from noise and bustle, and I thought they would soon get tired of farm life. I purchased a flock of hens, and as most of my time was occupied away from home, I wanted the children to take care of them. They did well for a time, but soon grew weary. The thought came to me that I could get them interested by giving them a part of the profits. We made a stock company of it. I became President, and my wife Vice-President, my son the Treasurer, and my daughter the Secretary. The book was kept in a regular business form. The meetings of the company were called to order by the President and reports submitted, and important questions discussed, such as "How to break up setting hens," and "Would the company be able to pay quarterly dividends?" We all became very much interested in our company, and it was very successful. The children purchased all the stock of myself and wife and ran the company themselves, they taking the whole management of the hens, and disposing of the eggs. It occupied their leisure hours when not at school, it gave them a start for a business education, and now that the children are grown up and away from our home, I look back and feel a satisfaction in the little trouble we were to, and the amount of pleasure it conferred on our household. And this leads me to say that it is our first duty as parents to make our homes so pleasant that our children will not want to go away until they start for themselves in the battle of life.—Republican. Being Alone.
By T. H. Munger
SECURE for yourself some regular privacy of life. As George Herbert says: "By all means use some time to be alone. God has put each soul into a separate body. We should follow the divine hint and see to it that we do not lapse again into the general flood of being. Many people cannot endure being alone; they are lost if there is not a clatter of tongues in their ears. It is not only weak, but it fosters weakness. The gregarious instinct is animal, the sheep and deer living on in us; to be alone is spiritual. We can have no clear, personal judgment of things until we are separate from them. Mr. Webster used to say of difficult questions, "Let me sleep on it." It was not merely for morning vigor, but to get the matter at a distance where he could measure its proportions and see its relations. So it is well at times to get away from our world—companions, actions, work—in order to measure it and ascertain our relations to it. The moral use of the night is in the isolation it brings, shutting out the world from its scenes, that it may be realized in thought. It is very simple advice, but worth heeding. Get some moments each day to yourself; take now and then a solitary walk; get into the silence of the thick woods, or some other isolation as deep, and suffer the mysterious sense of selfhood to steal upon you, as it surely will. Pythagoras insisted upon an hour of solitude every day to meet his own mind and learn what oracle it had to impart. —T. H. Munger, in Christian Preacher. To enjoy the pleasures of wealth, thou shouldst first experience the fatigue of labor.—Chinese Maxim. —A Danish polar expedition has been arranged to start in July. —A mail of about 2,000 letters was burned at Madison, Wis., March 17. —The prohibitory liquor bill passed the Massachusetts House by a vote of 15 to 8. —The accounts of the loss by the earthquake in Costa Rica were greatly exaggerated. —A snow slide at Genoa, Nevada, covered twenty-two persons, eighteen of whom were killed. —Santa Ana and Orange, Los Angeles, Co., have shipped nearly 15,000 boxes of oranges this year. —It is reported that the Union Pacific Railroad will discharge 150 conductors for alleged misconduct in office. —A bill to establish capital punishment was defeated by a close vote in the Legislature of Wisconsin, March 16. —Three thousand miners in the coal regions of the Cumberland, in Maryland, went on a strike March 15. —The fishing schooner Bellerophon and her crew, fourteen men, were lost off Gloucester, Mass., March 16. Very heavy floods are reported in Brazil. News to March 2 state that the rain had been falling in torrents for six weeks. —A theater in Marseilles, France, burned recently involving a loss of 1,000,000 francs. The actors escaped with difficulty. —Postmaster-General Howe intends to shorten the mail service between New York and San Francisco by one day and a half. —Dr. M. M. Gibson preached in San Francisco in favor of Sunday, taking for his text Isa. 58:13, 14. Rather inappropriate. —The Anti-Chinese bill is not receiving that ready favor in the House of Representatives which it was supposed it would receive. —The Alta says the Savings Banks of San Francisco contain $443,000,000. The deposits have increased $18,000,000 in one year. —The "Pond's Extract" (patent medicine) Company's works, at Williamsburg, N. Y., burned March 17. Loss reported at $150,000. —By a strike of the women and girls in the Pacific Mills, Lawrence, Mass., in consequence of a reduction of wages, 64,000 spindles were stopped. —The Young Men's Hebrew Union of San Francisco has before it for discussion this question: Resolved, That the Sunday Law should be enforced. —The Channel Tunnel has progressed 1,000 yards from the English shore, and the boring proceeds at the rate of nearly one hundred yards per week. —Two men were recently lynched in Wasco Co., Oregon; one for the murder of two men, and the other for expressing satisfaction that it was done! —Subscriptions are being taken for the support of the family of Sergeant Mason. He says he does not want a pardon from one who was made President by Guiteau! —Senator Edmunds having continued to decline a position in the Supreme Court, Judge Blotchford of New York has been nominated and will doubtless be confirmed. —The immigration into Oregon and Washington Territory by water is estimated at 20,000 per month, and the overland immigration into Eastern Oregon at 1,000 per month. —From Lawrence, Mass., March 20: One thousand looms in the Upper Pacific Mill, and the entire Worsted Department were closed to-night, throwing 3000 persons out of employment. —The small-pox is said to amount to a "terrible epidemic" in South Bethlehem, Northampton Co., Pa. Over one hundred cases were developed in a few days, and all business is suspended. —The Olympia (W. T.) Transcript says that the lower Columbia will be the scene of great industry during the coming season. There are now thirty-nine salmon canneries on the river. —It is now believed that De Long and his party died of starvation in Siberia. The North Pole will never prove of much practical benefit to people of this latitude. Better give up the search. —It is useless to attempt to give any idea of the destitution and suffering and destruction of property by the floods in the lower Mississippi country. Nothing even approaching it in horrors has ever occurred before. —News from Ogden, March 17, says: Nine polygamists of this city have resigned and it is said that the vacancies have been filled by others, who are not polygamists in practice. —Fred Newburgh, late Clerk of the Board of Public Works in Ohio, who forged checks on the State Treasury to the amount of $20,000, with 52 indictments against him was convicted on one charge and sentenced to three years in the penitentiary. —Dr. R. H. McDonald resigned the presidency of the Home Protection Association because the officers refused to circulate his (excellent) tracts against the "twin evils," whisky and tobacco. "Cause why?" The officers use tobacco. We side with the doctor. —The stables at Fort Leavenworth, Kas., containing thirty-five horses of troops of Company G. Seventh Cavalry, and Company F. Second Battery, were burned March 15. All the horses perished in the flames, together with their saddles, harness, etc. Loss $8000. —One hundred and thirty complaints against violators of the Sunday Law were made in Sacramento March 20. A jury trial will in all cases be demanded. Thirty-one complaints in San Jose. Eleven arrests in Los Angeles. In some places the law was not regarded at all. —The late storm was attended with more thunder and lightning than we have known before in a residence of several years in California. All along the Coast Range, the thunder was in sharp explosive reports, followed with reverberations after the fashion of eastern storms. —Accounts from Bodie, Cal., say that the late severe storm has occasioned many snow slides in that section. Several men were buried March 15, in Lake Canyon, Three bodies were recovered on Friday night, and left lying on the snow, when another slide buried them forty-five feet deep. —The mail of four days came through on Sabbath, March 18; but the storm on the Sierras increased in violence, and the road was immediately blocked again. So far as eastern mail is concerned, California is not benefited by the construction of the Southern road, by which the through mail should come in the winter. —The Fourteenth Street railroad stables, corner of Fourteenth and Peralta Streets, Oakland, were burned on the night of March 15. Twenty-seven horses were burned. The building was lost, with seventy-five tons of hay and feed, thirty-one sets of harness, and one car. Two men sleeping in the loft, narrowly escaped. —Archbishop Alemany has purchased a lot on the corner of O'Farrell Street and Van Ness Avenue, San Francisco, 384 by 120 feet, at a cost of $71,250, for the erection of a new Catholic Cathedral. The location of the present Cathedral on California Street is no longer desirable because of the rapid encroachments of Chinatown, and the extension of the city west and south. —Dr. Beckwith of the Third Congregational Church in San Francisco, on Sunday, March 19, in a sermon on the Sabbath, said:—Having inherited the Sabbath from God, we have a right to it just as God made it. No man has a right to change its original character and restrict the use of it. Who has a right to change the Sabbath day from that which the Lord sanctified? —588 complaints were entered against violators of the Sunday Law in San Francisco, on Monday, March 20. There are said to be about 4,000 places of business open on that day—perhaps over-rated. The Chief of Police, whose order was published last week, has expressed the opinion that, with the known difficulty of obtaining a jury, they may dispose of two cases a month in Court! —The enemies of the Anti-Polygamy bill tried to defeat it, practically, by means of amendments. This caused the friends of the measure to push it through with all possible dispatch—too much, 'tis found to be defective, and further legislation will be needed. It is a good point gained, however, that our National Legislature has recorded its disapprobation of this disgrace to our country. —A prominent broker in New York, a Spiritualist, was recently married by a spirit clergyman to a spirit bride, the woman having died some time before. The marriage was performed in order to legitimize their children. But whether such "materializations" would be recognized by the law is a question. We suggest for the benefit of Spiritualists that it would be better to marry sometime before death, and save that disgrace to their children. —A dispatch from Truckee, March 20, says: "The great storm is over, and now a better opportunity is given to see its effects. The town of Truckee is literally buried in the snow, the smaller buildings being out of sight, so that a person can walk from the street directly on to the roofs of the houses, and the others are piled up almost even with the balconies of the buildings on Front street." On the western slope of the mountains it was still storming heavily at that date. The railroad officials say this is the severest storm they have ever had to contend with. —The American ship Gatherer arrived at San Francisco on the night of March 14, and the captain was immediately arrested for cruel treatment of his men. According to the accounts the conduct of the captain and officers was brutal in the extreme. One of the sailors was driven to suicide to escape the harsh treatment. As several of the abused men were foreigners, the foreign Consuls are taking steps to secure the punishment of the accused. If one-half of the accounts are true they deserve as severe a punishment as the law will accord to them. Tyranny on the seas is too common, and offenders need to be taught that the law reaches them. —A boiler in Goodwin Bros.' shoe factory in Lynn, Mass., exploded March 15, leveling the building and killing several men. The Fire Department was quickly called out and immediately went to work to remove the debris. From the end of the building near Exchange Street one poor fellow, badly mangled, was taken out. His first words were: "There are more in there." Soon after the dead body of John Moore, an engineer, terribly crushed, was recovered. Half an hour after, another body was taken out. Four men who usually came to work at six o'clock every morning are missing. Almost every house within 500 feet of the place was damaged. —A terrific tornado passed over San Mateo, Cal., March 15, 8.30 A. M. The course of the tornado was from south to north. It first struck the residence of John Parrott, moving his hothouse about two feet on its foundation. It next struck the Episcopal Church, taking off about one-fourth of its roof. It took in its course trees and fences for the space of about 100 yards wide, crushing and twisting them in a fearful manner. No lives were lost. Fifty feet of the roof of St. Matthew's Episcopal Church at San Mateo were blown off. A furious gale prevailed for several hours throughout this county, accompanied with loud thunder and heavy rain. Several buildings were blown down at the residence of Wm. Douglass. A CONTRAST OF TRUE AND FALSE THEORIES.
THIS is a pamphlet of only 84 pages, but its value is not to be judged by its size. It is just what its title indicates: a faithful presentation of Bible truth on this important subject, and an exposure of the false theories prevailing in regard to it. Every believer in Bible truth should read it. Buy it, read it, and lend it to your neighbor. Price 10 cts Address, PACIFIC PRESS, Oakland, Cal. OUR COUNTRY'S FUTURE FORETOLD.
By Uriah Smith
THE UNITED STATES IN PROPHECY.
THIS is a full exposition of a portion of prophecy which applies to our own Government, showing the position the United States holds in prophecy, and the part it has to act in the closing scenes of time. Which is now attracting such general attention, is thoroughly canvassed; and abundant testimony is given to prove that in a few years this will be the In this country. Facts and statistics are largely presented, showing in the most conclusive manner that this government is the one pointed out in the prophecy quoted. 200 pages. Bound, 40 cents. Paper covers, 20 cents. Address, SIGNS OF THE TIMES, Oakland, Cal. COMPANION TO THE REVISED NEW TESTAMENT.
Explaining the Reasons for the Changes made in the Revised Edition, with Explanations to the Appendix of the Revised New Testament,
Which contains the Changes Suggested by the American Committee but were not assented to by the English Committee. Paper covers, 8vo., 25 cents. Cloth. 16mo., 75 cents. Address, PACIFIC PRESS, Oakland, Cal ROYAL OCTAVO, 838 PAGES. 285 ENGRAVINGS
THE PICTORIAL CHILD'S BIBLE.
Consecutive Arrangement of the Narrative and other portions of the Old and New Testaments, In the words of the Authorized Version, embellished with NEARLY 300 FINE ENGRAVINGS AND MAPS THIS is a most beautiful book for children of all ages, and a very VALUABLE HELP TO PRIMARY TEACHERS
Of Sabbath-School Classes. The text is in Great Primer type, and is printed on heavy, calendared paper, making a large and elegant volume, royal octavo size, of 838 pages. While the Bible is a book for all, there are some parts of it which are as milk for babes, and some as strong meat for men. The publishers of the "Child's Bible" have endeavored to put in consecutive form such portions of the Holy Scripture as seem best adapted to the wants and capacities of childhood, in the words of the Bible text. And where the sense requires it, words and clauses have been inserted in brackets, sometimes as summaries of what has been omitted, and sometimes as connecting links. Believing that the youth should know at what cost the English Bible was won and preserved for them, there has been prefixed to this edition an account of the Sacred Scriptures from the time of their origin to the present day, prominence being given to the struggle of the English Reformers for its translation into the English language. The numerous engravings were executed by the best artists of this country and of England and France. They will assist in interesting children in the text, and will aid in the instruction of those too young to read. Price, in Muslin, marbled edge, $5.00 | In Morocco, gilt edge,.......$8.00 Address. PACIFIC PRESS, Oakland, Cal. SMITH'S COMPREHENSIVE DICTIONARY OF THE BIBLE.
By Editor
NEW EDITION, octavo size, 1,200 pages, with many important additions and improvements from the works of the most eminent scholars commentators and travelers. It is designed to be In regard to the pronunciation and signification of Scriptural names; the solution of difficulties respecting the interpretation, authority and harmony of the Old and New Testaments; the history and description of Biblical customs, events, places, persons, animals, plants, etc. In this book it is designed to make everything intelligible to those who understand only the English language, and to place them as nearly as possible on a level with the scholars who are familiar with the original languages of the Scriptures. All the words in the vocabulary are pronounced and divided into syllables, and words or parts of words are respelled whenever this is necessary to indicate the pronunciation. The book contains numerous maps, and is abundantly supplied with superior engravings, which are of real utility to the student. No one who desires to study the Scriptures intelligently will be without a copy of this most excellent book, as its price is within the reach of all. Price, in cloth ............................................................................$5.00
“ in library binding...................................................................... 6.00
Address, SIGNS OF THE TIMES, Oakland, Cal.