For, indeed, Trotwood is optimistic. He believes in men and women; he has faith in humanity. He would have men look up, not down; forward, not backward. He is too busy doing to garner doubt and discouragement, those twins which come chiefly from idleness and unclear thinking.
Therefore, think clearly and live purely. For one depends upon the other. Believe in the men and women around you and they will soon begin to believe in themselves. Get into the habit of thinking and speaking kindly, for character as well as life is made up of habits. Believe in humanity. Try to be patient with fools. It is the most difficult of all things to do. Believe in humanity. Sometimes you will get a jolt, but when you come to weigh your own life, you will find that, taking it all in all, the world has been kinder to you than you have deserved.
We may be pardoned for being often personal in this, the first issue of Trotwood’s Monthly, but we beg you to bear in mind that this issue was created hurriedly, and while we are not ashamed of it by any means, we did not have the chance to give it the scope it will soon attain. This is not a sectional monthly. Its aim is to cover the whole country North and South. We are selling farm literature—not farm products—and we will see that all sections, Michigan as well as Alabama, Maine as well as Texas, is represented. If you are not in it it will be your own fault.
A bright literary woman—one who has written novels that have sold—in a personal letter, says: “The publication of a book figures to me as a marriage, in which the author is the woman, the publisher the man, and it is not well to let one’s heart ache too much over mistreated offspring in the way of books. Be glad that it is for a year. Just a year, that the contract is not for life, and that in it divorce is no disgrace, and with the optimistic belief that there is always to be better luck next time.”
Was ever anything better said?
The most encouraging news comes from the bedside of that veteran breeder, Capt. M. C. Campbell, of Cleburne Farm. Capt. Campbell has been very ill for over a month, and once it looked as if the owner of Brown Hal and the breeder of more great Jerseys and pacing horses than any living man, would not recover. But the life he has led has been clean and pure, and his strength was great. Like the great Tennessee pacers he has bred he proved game, and his friends, and they are counted all who know him, are happy to think he is now on the road to recovery. No man in the State has made a higher mark for honesty, manhood and all that makes a man than Capt. M. C. Campbell, and may he live long and prosper.