Little Essays on Life and Character II: Of Anniversaries and the Wings of Time

Irish Jesuit Province

Little Essays on Life and Character II: Of Anniversaries and the Wings of TimeAuthor(s): M. WatsonSource: The Irish Monthly, Vol. 35, No. 407 (May, 1907), pp. 251-254Published by: Irish Jesuit ProvinceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20501145 .

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L 25I ]

LITTLE ESSAYS ON LIFE AND CHARACTER

1I.-OF ANNIVERSARIES AND THE WINGS OF TIME

T 0 a healthy mind there is a mild charm in anniversaries and the variety of yearly commemorations with which we are blest. Some take a delight in centenaries and

tercentenaries. I soar not so high-I limit myself to that natural measure of man's life, a year. To the child, indeed, a year is a century; to the old it is but an hour of a journey that grows in swiftness as it nears the end. But most people look at the twelvemonth as a period divided into four clearly marked

seasons, each of which has its own pleasures, and into the dozen moons that bring to us the anniversaries which shine as gems in the " starry girdle of the year."

Ask an American what national holiday is best kept all over the world, and you will receive the emphatic answer, " The

Fourth of July, sir, the date of the Declaration of Independence."

And, doubtless, the patriotic assertion is not without foundation. All citizens of the United States celebrate the day with abundant feasting and oratory; and if a man were discovered in New

York or Boston taking advantage of that time of pleasant leisure to mend his roof, he would find a few revolver bullets hopping playfully about the tiles to remind him that the day should not be desecrated by work. As an incident connected

with Fourth of July festivities, I may mention the following quaint fact:

A little girl who once shed tears in the midst of rejoicings was asked why she cried, and she said that she had eaten so heartily of sweets and fruit she found herself quite unable to swallow a morsel more. As it was then exactly in the forenoon, she had to spend the rest of the day doing penance, while everyone else

was feasting. Within the golden circuit of the year we rejoice in the great

religious festivals of Christmas, Easter, and Whitsuntide. Among days connected with the names of great benefactors or heroes of the race, there is none kept with such fidelity and

enthusiasm as the festival observed each year by the millions of the sea-divided Gael in honour of their patron, St. Patrick. In addit en to public commemorations of variots kinds, f am lies and individuals have domestic anniversaries of their own. The



252 TTE IRISH MONTHLY

annual recurrence of the wedding day is not dishonoured with neglect in happy homes; and with what a radiance the desert of newspaper advertisements glows whenever it mentions a Silver Wedding or Jubilee, and a Golden! Sometimes from the parents' loving arms death snatches a little child-a flower amid the " bearded grain" reaped at a breath-and the date of the sad event is faithfully remembered, and when it arrives it is

marked by a visit to a wee mound, or tomb, in the green churchyard.

What " breather of this world " with soul so dead as not to welcome an anniversary that recalls some important event in his life ? Yea, verily, two anniversaries each member of the human race may, if he will, keep with dutiful observance, namely, New Year's Day and the momentous hour when he inhaled for the first time the air of this sublunary world. No doubt everybody does not keep his birth-day. The older a

man grows the more defective is his memory of the year that witnessed his birth, and if a relative or a friend remind him of it and wish him many happy returns, he is, alas! not grateful, and exhibits only disgust and annoyance. Young people ought to be chary of approaching an elderly gentleman (or, as they at times disrespectfully call him, an old buck) with such con gratulations. It would be more prudent to ask him artlessly if he is thirty-five, and, though he will smilingly put by the flattering innuendo, he wiNll be secretly gratified and will look upon the speaker as a good-natured and pleasant fellow. Of course, a man has a perfect right to forget his birth-day, if he chooses, and look upon the keeping of anniversaries as senti

mental rubbish. There is no disputing about tastes, and one's taste must, I suppose, be for one's self, sole and su.Fficient

arbiter in this matter. But it is scarcely possible for the most cold-blooded wight to escape paying tribute of some sort to the last moments of the Old Year and the first twenty-four hours of the New; and as I happen to pen these lines at the opening of January, I will jot down the thoughts that now press for utterance.

Christmas has sped by, and another New Year is dawning. Time passes, flying with unwearied wing, and I am passing with it. Every day that breaks, every evening that spreads its "

gradual dusky veil "

over Nature's face, draws me on to the hour when night shall come bearing in its hand the sleep that knows no waking. I await my last sickness, but I am, in truth, all my life slowly dying, though I fail to realize the fact; for I am like those folk who stand on a cliff crumbling so gradually beneath them, that they do not perceive their peril.



LITTLE ESSAYS ON LIFE AND CHARACTER 253

Wisdom now counsels me to pause and reflect on the swiftness of the current that is bearing me so smoothly and irresistibly on its surface. Dr. Johnson relates in one of his essays that, when

Valdesso asked permission of Charles V to withdraw from a public career, the monarch inquired if his wish sprang from disgust. The other replied that his sole motive was the con viction that " there ought to be some time for sober reflection between the life of a soldier and his death." It would in no wise hurt me if a similar persuasion inspired greater sanity of view, and enabled me to live the remainder of my days to better purpose.

Through dearly-purchased experience, I am convinced, that life wins strength and happiness when man's will is brought into harmony with the will of God; and strength, happiness, is just what all of us need. And this harmony, what is it but bringing our desires and purposes into conformity with the divinely established laws that rule the universe, and the life of man ? In keeping those laws there is a rich reward. Whosoever vio lates them must pay the inevitable penalty, and prove that human strength is too puny to make an impression on the immovable barriers which they oppose to lawless human will. Freedom is not reckless license, or unfettered violence, but rather that obedience by which the strong and resolute spirit subjects itself to the yoke of reason and wins through submission the guerdon of true liberty.

And so, what one should most look for is contentment, the

determined cutting off of useless and unreasonable desires. One should restrain greed, and learn the art of doing without things. To aim at fair and virtuous deeds is of more importance than to keep one's gaze fixed on the mere avoidance of evil.

Too scrupulous attention to shun what is wrong contracts and darkens the spirit, and generates the timidity that will not venture on noble actions lest faults should be committed. How often it happens that even when we do our best we fail! And

life, as we view it in our retrospect of the past, lays no flattering unction to our vanity, for it sets before us many blunders and much that we own to be veritable meanness and cowardice.

As I sit here in my quiet room, casting about in my mind for a motto which may serve as a guide during this New Year, I recall some unsigned verses which once appeared in the

Spectator. They run thus:

I asked the New Year for some motto sweet,

Some rule of life by which to guide my feet;

I asked and paused. It answered soft and low:

" God's Will to know."

VOL. xxxv.-NO. 407. T



254 THE- IRISH.h MONTHLY

,Will knowledge, then,

suffice, New Year?" I cried; But ere the question into silence -died,

The answer came: "Nay, this remember,: too

God's Will to do.'

Once more I asked: "Is there still more to tell ? "

And once again the answer sweetly fell:

"Yea, this one thing all other things above

God's Will to love.'

God's will to know-God's will to do-God's will to love: here is strength, contentment, happiness. This green earth is not an abiding eternal pl4ce'. Comrades are carried off from our side; reverses strike -us;; sickness discloses our slight hold upon.life; and the corporal faculties lose gradually their supple ness and power. The silver cord that binds together the body and the soul is weakening urnder the strain of prolonged existence; and we are warned td prepare for the moment when time shall

tbe fXno -more.-- D)ouDbtless, our best preparation is to take a chreeful view of life's dutties, and do, day by day, our work in the world, whatever it may be, with courage, hopefulness, and generosity of spirt

So when that Angel of the darker drink

At last shall find you by the river-brink,

And, offering his cup, invite your soul

Forth to your lips to quaff-you shall not shrintk.

M.W.

IN MAY,

'We knelt before Our Lady's shrine, Udplifting through the evening air

Dur thoughts to her, with zest divine, nUpo the love-fledged wings of: prayer;

When to our wondering ears there came, In low reiterated glee,

The eager-hearted cuckoo's claim To join us in our litany.



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Little Essays on Life and Character II: Of Anniversaries and the Wings of Time