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What may be round the next headland we know not; but this we know, that the same sunshine will make a broadening path across the waters right to where we rock on the unknown sea, and the same unmoving mighty star will burn for our guidance. So we may let the waves and currents roll as they list, or rather as He wills, and be little concerned about the incidents or the companions of our voyage, since He is with us.—Alexander McLaren.
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See [Perseverance].
PRESENCE OF MIND
On New-year’s eve at one of the largest restaurants in New York, a woman’s dress caught fire, and, altho surrounded by other diners, the flame was not extinguished until she had received burns from which she subsequently died.
It seems incredible, yet it is a fact. And while the woman blazed, and shrieked in her agony, the men sought to extinguish the flame with napkins and their hands!
As I journey through life in town or in the wilderness, the quality I find most lacking in the human animal is presence of mind; and that is one of the good reasons why I am so persistent and outspoken an advocate of games for boys, especially games where the action is quick and where the boy must needs think, and quickly, under stress of combat, so to say.
Had there been any football players within reach of that poor woman, one of them would probably have had the sense to take off his coat and smother the flame.—Caspar Whitney, Collier’s Weekly.
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