LYDIA LEAVITT
LEAD KINDLY LIGHT
"Lead, kindly light," The words are lightly spoken by the young, who tread life's pathway with nimble feet, whose eager hands are outstretched to gather life's roses, regardless of thorns, whose voice is rippling with laughter and mirth, with blood coursing through the veins and bright eyes looking fearlessly into the future; the words have merely a joyous, musical ring. "Lead, kindly light."
"Lead, kindly light." The words are gravely spoken by the middle-aged, whose feet have grown a trifle weary, whose hands have gathered the roses, only to find them turned to ashes, whose laughter has more sadness than mirth, whose eyes have grown dim, whose lips tremblingly plead, "Lead, kindly light." "Lead, kindly light." The words are whispered by the old, whose tired feet are unable to move, whose palsied hands are helpless, whose head is bowed by the weight of years, whose eyes are sightless, from whose trembling lips are scarcely heard the whispered prayer, "Lead, kindly light."
"Lead, kindly light." The sunken eyes are closed in death, the tired hands are folded, the heart has ceased to beat, the mute lips are stilled, the weary feet are at rest, a look of ineffable peace rests upon the still face, while all the air is filled with sweet music and the murmur of gentle voices pleading, "Lead, kindly light."
A FABLE
In one of the German forests the stood a tree, which could not be classified by any of the learned scientists. It was not more beautiful than many others, but there were distinctive peculiarities which no other tree possessed. Her dress was of a sadder hue than that of her companions, and the birds refused to build their nests in her branches. She was unable to understand the language of her brothers and sisters and so stood alone and unheeded in the dense forest. One morning she awakened and found standing by her side a companion tree, odd, like herself, and she said in her heart:—"I shall be no longer alone. He will understand my language and we shall hold sweet converse." But he, in his heart, was saying—"What strange tree is this? We two are unlike all our companions. I like it not." But she did not hear the murmur of discontent, and her heart grew glad within her at the great joy that had come to her and she said in her heart:—"I will cause him to forget that we are unlike our companions; I will sing to him my softest songs and gradually her dress of sombre green assumed a brighter hue, young buds sprang forth, her branches waved softly in the breeze and she wooed the birds by gentle voice to build their nests in her arms, and,
"In foul weather and in fair,
Day by day in vaster numbers,
Flocked the poets of the air."
At eventide she folded them in her bosom, that their songs might not disturb the sleep of her companion, and while all the forest slept, she alone was awake and, in the silence of the night, she murmured softly, "Ich liebe Dich," and when the sun arose the birds from her arms flew through the forest, singing, "Ich liebe Dich," and all the trees took up the song; the birds, the trees and the brooks caught up the refrain and all the great forest sang, "Ich liebe Dich, Ich liebe Dich."
So the summer passed and her heart grew sad, for she saw the discontent of her companion, but she said to herself, "When the winter comes I will shelter him from the blasts," but he said complainingly, "I would I were like the other trees; I would like my garments to be as those I see around me. I would my limbs were as those of my companions all through the forest." And she heard, and said to herself, "I will make his garments of brilliant green." So she sent from her own roots and branches the sap—her life blood—to enrich the roots and beautify the dress of her companion. When the cold blast of winter swept through the forest she sheltered him with her long limbs, when the snow fell she covered his head with her branches and caught the weight of snow in her own arms; so all through the long winter she sheltered him from the blasts and the weight of snow bore heavily on her branches and at times they grew weary almost to breaking but her great heart never faltered.
So the spring came and day by day she sent from her own store of life-blood to enrich that of her companion and soon his garments assumed the most brilliant hues of all the trees in the forest; the leaves glinted and glistened in the sunlight, and from the branches there was ever a low murmur of song; the birds came to build their nests and rear their young in his arms; and over all there floated a delicate perfume born of the love which she had breathed over him all the long winter. So in all the forest there was none so beautiful and stately as he.
His companion said, "Now will he be happy," but her own great heart began to beat more slowly, the life-blood of which she had given him could not be replaced, and her garments gradually assumed a sombre hue and her arms were empty, for the birds no longer nested there.
One morning she awakened and found her companion gone. He had joined the other trees in the forest; and now the limbs that had borne the weight of snow began to wither, her leaves began to fall, and when the winter came again there was no raiment to cover her.
And the woodman said,
"We will cut this tree down, it is dead."
THE WIND
"Hark to the voice of the wind!" we say, as the windows rattle and house shakes; the winds as they shout in angry voices, clamoring louder in their fury, are telling of storms at sea, of the battles with the ships and the brave hearts that have gone to their death.
"It has been on the desolate ocean
When the lightening struck the mast;
It has heard the cry of the drowning,
Who sank as they hurried past.
The words of despair and anguish
That were heard by no living ear;
The gun that no signal answered—
It brings them all to us here.
Hark to the voice of the wind!"
It shakes angrily the trees whose limbs are swaying in protest against the onslaught; it carries the leaves rustling to the ground, and in its fury uproots the giant oaks, which groan in agony as they are hurled to the ground, lying like soldiers on the field of battle.
"Hark to the voice of the wind!"
Its fury is abated, and softly, like a benediction it enters the room where the weary mother is watching by the bedside of her sick child; it gently fans the fevered head; it touches with a caress the parched lips of the babe, and with murmur of song it lulls the child to rest.
"Hark to the voice of the wind."
It enters the counting room of the tired man of business, bringing a perfume of flowers: he lays down his pen, while his thoughts go back to the home of his boyhood, to the meadows, to the hillside covered with flowers, the new-mown hay, and the tired brain is refreshed, he knows not how, and the unseen messenger is gone—
"Hark to the voice of the wind!"
It visits the silent City of the Dead and gently scatters the leaves over the new-made grave of a young child, sighing softly the while, the voice now rising, now falling, sobbing and moaning, and at last dies away in a melancholy sound, like the strings of an Aeolian harp touched by unseen hands.
"Hark to the music of the wind!"
Human nature approaches the Divine in moments of great sacrifice, forgiveness and self-forgetfulness.
PASSING THOUGHTS
"It seems the fate of woman to wait in silence while men act," 'Men must work and woman must weep.'
How delightful it must be to understand one's own nature thoroughly, to know that no whirlwind will ever sweep us off the beaten track, no stormy passions stir the calm placidity of our life. But is that life? No, give me the glories of expectation, the wildest exhaltation; the heart beating, the brain throbbing, the stormiest passions with force enough to carry everything before them, even if they bring deep grief—that is life.
People who deal in dry, hard facts are not interesting. They may make themselves names in the financial world, may become railway magnates and coal kings, may control the money market; but they are not interesting. They are the prose of life. They who see the clouds forming into fantastic shapes, the glories of a sunset, the shadows in pools, the colour on a bird's wing, the rose tint on the cheek of a child,—they and such as they are the poetry of life.
Man's inhumanity to man is proverbial, woman's inhumanity to woman is diabolical.
"Society, as it exists at present moment in Colonial towns and cities, possesses neither birth, brains or breeding."
"We hear men speak so frequently of womanly women, ending their praises with, 'she is essentially womanly.' I knew one of these womanly women, whose voice was like liquid music, whose ways were gentle, whose eyes filled with tears at the recital of some tale of woe, and always about her was an air of gentle, womanly sweetness and dainty femininity. She had a friend who loved her, one whose voice was not so soft, whose manner was brusque, who was considered, "not quite good form, you know." My womanly woman allowed this friend to take upon herself the burden of a sin which she herself had committed, allowed her to bear the brunt of scorn and contumely of her world, allowed her to die without righting the great wrong. A lonely grave and a plain marble slab mark the spot where she who was "not quite good form," lies: while she, to whom she had given more than life, gathers the rose leaves with dainty grace, for she is so essentially 'womanly.'"
Life: a little joy, great sorrow, some tragedy, and the curtain falls.
Nothing can hurt so cruelly as the hand of love. The hand of hate is velvet in comparison.
There are women who consider the world well lost for the man whom they love and idealize; while upon close acquaintance they would discover that he was not worth even the loss of a dinner.
Twelve "good men and true", will, after mature deliberation, consign a man to the gallows. Twelve women, good and true, will, without any deliberation, send a woman to death by their venomous tongues.
There are a few people who would change their individuality for that of another. We might be willing to exchange positions, to exchange all that is apparent to the eyes of the world, but our inner consciousness, our memories, our thoughts, feelings and desires; all that is part and parcel of ourselves, we hold sacred.
Some minds are so small that a favour weighs heavily upon them.
At times one is inclined to believe that even the gods are guilty of favouritism.
Some people's lives are like a flower, the more they are crushed, the sweeter the perfume they exhale.
There are some people who look so rigidly virtuous and repellant that it is a satisfaction to feel one's self just a little bit wicked.
We look to the higher classes and to the lower for good breeding. Middle class people are proverbially ill-bred. What can equal the airs and assumptions of the retired grocer's wife, who has neither the breeding of a lady, nor the unaffected manner of the working-woman.
What a pity there is such an incessant babbling of human tongues, when the daisies by the wayside, the trees of the forest, the birds in their nests, could tell us such wondrous things if our ears were attuned to hear, but the senses are deadened by the discordant din of dismal sounds.
Love is the one power which transfigures the common things of life.
One-half of our lives is spent in making blunders, the other half in trying to rectify them.
How useless to tell many people to think, for they have nothing to think. A man reasons, a woman divines.
There are so many inconsistencies in life that at times one is appalled. Take marriage, for instance:—A young woman marries a man who is tottering on the brink of the grave; old, blaze, a worn-out roue; but with money enough to gild and gloss the antiquated ruin. She goes before a clergyman and promises to love, honour and obey. Yes; she loves the luxury with which she will be surrounded, the glitter of diamonds, the equipages, the great house, all the paraphanalia of wealth, but she hates the trembling, tottering, blear-eyed object who bought her.
The clergyman gives his blessing, society receives them with open arms, and legalized prostitution is upheld by the majesty of the law and encircled by the sanctified robes of the Church.
The ruling passion of the age: worship of self and worship of pelf.
The age of good breeding has passed; insolence has taken its place.
A woman ceases to think of self when she looks in the face of her new-born child.
There are people who go through life as if they were going to their own funeral—and did not enjoy it.
I would rather have for a friend the most thorough-paced scamp, with a generous heart, than the most respectable, canting, whining, Pharisee.
To stand in a rarefied atmosphere on a mountain height and view the struggles of ordinary mortals below may be poetic, but it is very lonely.
A woman may defy the world for a man she loves, and imagine that he will love her for the sacrifice, but no greater mistake can be made. Men are not so constituted. When he sees her standing alone, dishonored, a mark for the finger of scorn, her charm for him is forever lost.
Realism is the grave of love.
A woman's smile is two edged.
Life is too short to prepare a soul for eternity
A great love is only inspired by a great nature.
It is as wise to cultivate forgetfulness as memory.
Society, a haven for fools; literature and art for brains.
Many people have courage to face anything but themselves.
A woman is always in love, either with herself or with love.
Two things in life man regards with esteem: himself and his pipe.
Truth and sincerity are only found in the face of a child and the eyes of a dog.
A young face and an old heart are sorry companions, but an old face and a young heart are sorrier still.
What people will 'say' is the bugbear of small minds.
Love would cease to exist were it not for the gift of idealizing.
A fly is but a small thing, yet it can disturb the greatest philosopher.
Is a new soul created at every birth, or are we merely corpses warmed over?
Kind words and a sympathetic handclasp have done more to reclaim lost souls than all the tracts ever published.
A minute is a short duration of time, yet in that interval one may experience the whole gamut of human emotions.
If the world valued us as we value ourselves the heavens would not be sufficiently large whereon to inscribe our greatness.
What becomes of the characters who play an important part in fiction; the strong, brave, true fiction-people, whom we love as we read? Is there no place for them in the world peopled by shadows?
There are men who will accept any and every sacrifice from a woman and after making her a wreck, socially and morally, will say to her, "I fear that I am injuring you, so I will sacrifice myself and deny myself the pleasure of your society." Such men would sneak into heaven by a side entrance.
Fate, in a sportive mood, performs some wonderful acrobatic feats with human nature; gives love of oriental luxury to the woman with nothing a year; appreciation of all that is beautiful and artistic, to the ploughman; an epicurian taste to the starving mechanic; while to the woman rolling in wealth is given the manners and tastes of the fish-wife; to the multi-millionaire the habits of the canaille, and fate laughs with glee over the fantastic, incongruous muddle of the thing called Life.