Simply let the marble tell my name,
Then add, 'He was good to his folks.'"
Boys and girls, don't speak back to mother. You love her and don't mean to offend, but it hurts her. She was patient with you in your infancy; be patient with her in her old age. From her birth she has been your loyal, loving slave. She will go away and leave you after a little while, and oh! how you will miss her when she's gone. Deal gently with her now; speak kindly to her and when she's gone memories of your love and kindness to mother will come to you like sweet perfume from wooded blossoms.
Young lady graduate of high school or college, do you realize what your father has done for you, and the sacrifices he has made that you might have what he has never had--a diploma? Go, put your fair tender cheek against the weather-beaten face of your father, print with rosy lips a kiss of gratitude upon his furrowed brow, and tell him you appreciate all he has done for you.
I have been talking to you an hour about what I would do if I could live life over. If I had life to live over would I do any better than I have done? If I am no better now, than I was five years ago, if I am to be no better five years hence than I am now, then I would do no better if I had another trial.
However, I cannot live life over. The sand in the hour-glass is running low and when gone can never be replaced, and I am not much struck on old age. It is said to have its compensations, in that the "aches and asthmas of old age are no worse than the measles, mumps, whooping-coughs and appendicitis pains of youth." Righteous old age should be better than youth. The ocean of time with its breakers and perils face the young, while for the righteous old the storms are past, and they are
"Waiting to enter the haven wide,
See His face, and be satisfied."
I cannot help these grey hairs or the wrinkles on my brow, but I can keep my heart young, and I do. I enjoy the company of old people, but delight more in associating with the young.
Dr. A.A. Willetts lectured on "Sunshine" sixty years ago. In his ninetieth year he was still lecturing; had he lectured on shadows he would doubtless have died many years before, and never been known as the "Apostle of Sunshine."