Rensselaer Republican, Volume 12, Number 15, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 December 1879 — Passing it Along. [ARTICLE]

Passing it Along.

There is a certain amusement of children in which a number of boys or grls stand in a row, and each one of em, receiving a blow from his neighbor on the left hand, “ passes it along,” with good interest, to the child next on his right. All try to give a harder blow than they have received, and the child who has hsfd the fun of making the first stroke, receives at hist the most vigorous push of all. In this childish sport, which too often degenerates into real unkindness, there is a lesson and a warning, for the principle upon which it is based runs all through the lives of grown men and women. Somethings ought to be passed along, and some ought not. Without wise passing along every good thing iu life would come to an end. ’“Come, let us live (for our children,” said Froebel; and i that is the motto upon which the whole fabric of society and of religion is I based. “All literature,” says Holmes, “lives by borrowing and lending. A good image is like iv diamond which may be set a hundred' times in as many generations, and gain new beauties with every change. A good story once told fats itself with fresh scenery and new heroes and heroines, as it lasts from age to ago and passes from land to land. A great ideal character once projected is &h-~ mortal.” All this is as true of life as of literature| every harvest is grown from last year’s seed; every fire is kindled from a spark which has been given us by somebody else; and the whole world is a school in which the past is the present. If a person is possessed of knowledge or power which he puts to no* use, he is grossly abusing a sacred trust; he is a borrower who refuses to repay; he is a thief who steals from children too young to protect themselves. Talents arc not given us to be hidden in napkins. It is folly to talk with Matthew Arnold About culture for its own sake; so long as people need to be taught and helped; so long as any one person.is inferior to us in any wisdpm or wealth or power for good—it is our bounden duty to give them of such as we have. The scholar who studies . all his life, and .never speaks or writes, is a miser -whose soul is the more warped and twisted by every new (possession that comes to him. The traveler who passes* by on the other side is not excused by the fact that he “knows more about medicine that the Good Samaritan who binds up the sufferer's wounds. What wo do, not what we can do, is the measure of our success in life. The clumsy builder is better than the lazy sneeror. Negative goodness is positive badness in that it leaves half undone. In morals, as well as in law, doing nothing may be as, bail as arson, or theft, or murder. The possession of truth carries a duty with it. A recent writer has thus restated this law in vigorous phrase: good carries a privilege of service; anil it is the highest joy of life to hold a place, and have the power to serve, in the grand list of those who build the kjngom. * * * The world is full of people poorer than we—poorer in knowledge, in chances, in homes, in associations. We are apt to demand thgl those less favored should be diligent and honest. To what higher standard, then, do oiu* superior advantages summon us? For every iuch of excellence we ask of them, God wants a fnile of us. He will not take average goodness of (people with such chances. Fit motto, not only for the old mediaeval chivalry, but for that whole higher order of nobility for which the Christian name stands as a pledge, is this beautiful text: ‘We, then, tiiat are strong, ought to bear the infirmities of the weak, anil not to please ourselves.’ ” - But if it is a duty to speed some things, it is no less a duty to stay others. There is a kind of “passing it along” which is the most effective work, for Satan. If we hear a slanderous story or an evil jest; if we, become possessed of means qj injury to others; if there falls iiito our hands a weapon against sound morals, or social good, or Christian faith—it should get no further than our own breasts. There is no more horrible sin than that of leading others into sin. To teach, by word or example, lessons of intemperance, or profanity, or hate, or dishonesty, or unbelief, is to pass along a flame that shall destroy unknown thousands. It is hard to fight our own battles; the battles of others we cannot light, if we have once stirred up war in their lucarts. Every man’s life ought to be a kind of moral filter, through whieh nothing but good shall be allowed to pass to other lives.—b. S. Times.

—The Cincinnati CommerfHaJ, in commenting upon the introduction of a telephone in a Columbus church, says: “It is not impossible that the use of these instruments will work as great a revolution in church-going as the lettercarrier system has wrought in the postollice. Indeed, it-will become a question whether the enormous expenso incident to building costly places of worship may not be avoided without any detriment to the cause of religion. The pastor can as well deliver his discourse from the parsonage as from the pulpit. And it will be all the more enjoyed that it is heard in the privacy of; the family circle. Another economy, and one of great magnitude, will be in the saving of dress. The Snnday suit, the new bonnet and the fashionable dress will no longer be indispensable in every well-regulated family, and the Gospel can be preached to the poor as well as the rich. The occupation of the sexton, however, will be gone, but some provision can be made for him. The car-driver and the coachman will also have a rest, and everybody will be contented to spend the day under his own vine and fig trese.” The quantity of silver obtained in 1878 from British mines was 897,471 ounces, and most of the precious metal w'as found in combination with lead. The total value of the silver thus obtained in the year in question was estimated at £88,296 19s. 6d. In the same year the gold found in British mines weighed 702 ounces, 16 dwts, 8 grg, and was estimated to be of the value of £2,848 15s. 2d. Nearly all this British gold, namely, a fraction over 697 ounces —was procured in Wales. —Some men pay attention who never pay anything else.