Our Congress is made up mostly of practical every-day men. They have no speeches to make, and no past political reputation to nurse, and no national fame to achieve. I like the new crop of statesmen better than the old, although it is a shorter crop. They do not drink so much rum, and not so large a proportion of them will die of delirium tremens. They may not have such resounding names as some of their predecessors, but I prefer a Congress of ordinary men to a group of Senators and Representatives overawed and led about by five or six overgrown, political Brobdingnagians.
While in Washington we had a startling occurrence. A young man in high society shot another young man, who fell dead instantly.
I wonder that there is not more havoc with human life in this day, when it is getting so popular to carry firearms. Most of our young men, and many of our boys, do not feel themselves in tune unless they have a pistol accompaniment. Men are locked up or fined if found with daggers or slung-shot upon their persons, but revolvers go free. There is not half so much danger from knife as pistol. The former may let the victim escape minus a good large slice, but the latter is apt to drop him dead. On the frontiers, or engaged in police duty, firearms may be necessary; but in the ordinary walk of life pistols are, to say the least, a superfluity. Better empty your pockets of these dangerous weapons, and see that your sons do not carry them. In all the ordinary walks of life an honest countenance and orderly behavior are sufficient defence. You had better stop going into society where you must always be ready to shoot somebody.
But do not think, my dear Fred, that I am opposed to everything because I have this evening spoken against so many different things. I cannot take the part of those who pride themselves in hurling a stout No against everything.
A friend called my attention to the fact that Sanballat wanted to hold consultation with Nehemiah in the plain of O-no. That is the place where more people stay, to-day, than in any other. They are always protesting, throwing doubt on grand undertakings; and while you are in the mountain of O-yes, they spend their time on the plain of O-no. In the harness of society they are breeching-straps, good for nothing but to hold back.
You propose to call a minister. All the indications are that he is the right man. Nine-tenths of the congregation are united in his favor. The matter is put to vote. The vast majority say "Ay!" the handful of opponents responded "O no!"
You propose to build a new church. About the site, the choice of architect, the upholstery, the plumbing and the day of dedication there is almost a unanimity. You hope that the crooked sticks will all lie still, and that the congregation will move in solid phalanx. But not so. Sanballat sends for Nehemiah, proposing to meet him in the plain of O-no.
Some men were born backward, and have been going that way ever since. Opposition to everything has become chronic. The only way they feel comfortable is when harnessed with the face toward the whiffletree and their back to the end of the shafts. They may set down their name in the hotel register as living in Boston, Chicago, Savannah or Brooklyn, but they really have been spending all their lives on the plain of O-no. There let them be buried with their face toward the west, for in that way they will lie more comfortably, as other people are buried with their face to the east. Do not impose upon them by putting them in the majority. O-no!
We rejoice that there seems more liberality among good men, and that they have made up their minds to let each one work in his own way. The scalping-knives are being dulled.
The cheerfulness and good humor which have this year characterized our church courts is remarkable and in strong contrast with the old-time ecclesiastical fights which shook synods and conferences. Religious controversies always have been the most bitter of all controversies; and when ministers do fight, they fight like vengeance. Once a church court visiting a place would not only spend much of their own time in sharp contention, but would leave the religious community to continue the quarrel after adjournment. Now they have a time of good cheer while in convention, and leave only one dispute behind them among the families, and that arising from the fact that each one claims it had the best ministers and elders at their house. Contention is a child of the darkness, peace the daughter of the light. The only help for a cow's hollow horn is a gimlet-hole bored through it, and the best way to cure religious combatants is to let more gospel light through their antlers.