Rensselaer Semi-Weekly Republican, Volume 41, Number 68, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 14 May 1909 — REMEMBER YOUR FRIENDS. [ARTICLE]

REMEMBER YOUR FRIENDS.

By John Anderson Jayne.

All through this great country of ours you have friends scattered far and wide. There are some far off In Portland, Maine, while others are in Portland, Oregon. Some of them are in orange groves of Florida, others are among the pines of Michigan Some are in Pasadena, while there is one. whom you will never forget away up in the Aroostook country, where the snowß of the Pine Tree State linger long after the sun has crossed the equator In Its northern journey. Take a map of our country. Get as large a one as you can. Then take white-headed pins, and you know or suspect you. have a friend, there place a pin. You’ll be surprised to know how many pins you will take and how far and wide your friends are scattered. Then, if you take a map of the world, and still remember your friends you will locate some of them in Australia, others in the Philippines, some in China, some Japan and wherever your eye falls on the map, in pretty nearly evety country you will find that you have friends. Take a moment to remember your friends. Think of the happy days of the past when they were your friends. They nursed you through sickness, they helped you when, you most needed help. They shared their substance with you and gladly gave of their store that your rough and rugged road might be made smoother. There was no sacrifice too great, no labor too severe, but what they did they did it gladly, cheerily, on your account. Think of the dear ones of the past Let great vibrations of love and sympathy reach out after them, who knowß but "what, through the strange wireless telegraphy of soul, your message may come to them and encourage them now, even as they encouraged and helped you in the dayß that are far down the track of years bygone.

If you can write to your friends let them know through the media of the sign language that you are thinking of them. If you cannot pen a good long letter, take paper and pen and ink and send them a line or two that they may know how glad you are to receive letters from your friends. You know the truth of the old lines. ‘"Tis sweet to be remembered As through the world we stray, To know there is one kindred soul To cheer uS on our way.” Because you are bone of, their bone, heart of their heart and brain of their brain, because your heart is linked to theirs by the mystic ties of friendship, they will be glad, oh, bo glad, to hear from you. If you cannot do more than send a souvenir postal card with pictures of good old scenes on it, send that. Sign your name to it. Only in some way let them know that they are not forgotten. Too often it is in this busy, strenuous life we lead that “out of sight means out of mind.” But there is not one so busy or so busy in the next three or four days to come that they cannot send messages of affection to the friends far away. A message sent to a distant friend now will make the meeting sweeter when it comes by and by. Where are your friends today, you are asking. Perhaps they are asking the same question relative to you. As you have a right to know concerning them, so they have the privilege to know concerning you. Therefore think with soul vibration, think in sign language relative to your friends and the friendship will be sweeter and dearer. The fires of friendship that are kept blazing with the fagots of kindly rememberance lighten and brighten life's dreariest way and make It glow with the light of the land where friendships are never severed and friends are never parted.