“FACING FIFTY.”

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 236, 5 October 1935, Page 2 (Supplement)

“FACING FIFTY.”

FOR MIDDLE-AGED PEOPLE. Major Florence Birks, women’s social secietary of the Salvation Army, has an inspiring article in the New Zealand War Cry,” from which wo have taken the following passages. It is entitled ' Facing Fifty,” and is intended as a message for middle-aged women, but it is as suitable for middle-aged men:— Psychology teaches that both men and women develop a second creative period at 45 to 50 years of age. To those who have lived wisely comes not mellow autumn with its “sere and yellow leaf,” but the. wealth and glory of summer tiine which gives energy and promotes desire for further accomplishments. Your brains and not your birthdays tell your age! Persons are not old until they cease to learn, until they cease to go on improving themselves. Indeed, to. the man or woman who will pay the price, there is no reason why the average mind may not go on developing to the end of life. Cato the Roman Censor learned Greek at 80. Simonides bore off the prize for verse against all his youthful compeers when over 80 years of age. Goethe completed his immortal “Faust” when over 80, and at 60 years of age our own Chaucer wrote “The Canterbury Tales.” Has a woman “made her contribution to the world at '47 ?” Certainly not, unless she wishes it to be so. Let us be encouraged by our woman General, Evangeline Booth who, Atlas like, is bearing the ■world in miniature upon her shoulders when nearly 70 years of age.

No woman is at her best until she has reached mature judgment—4o. Unfortunately, so many women at this age begin to feel that they have “made their coiftribution.” Over and over again women have said to me, “Of course, I have had my day,” and thinking thus they are content to fall into the rear of life’s procession. Wasn’t it Dean Inge W’ho said, “We all have to beware of a kind of fatty degeneration of the conscience which often sets in about 50. We are then not much inclined to fight about anything, least of all against our own faults. We have taken ourselves for better or worse.” And again, Stanley Jones has warned ns: “Every man and woman needs reconversion at 40 on general principles! Because at 40 we settle down, begin to lose sense of spiritual expectancy, begin to take on ‘protective resemblance to environment,’ and to play for safety.” But even when physical strength has gone, middle life has something much more important than physical strength —mature judgment, experience and intellectual attainment. Facing 50 the average woman is apt to be discouraged by mental depression which is the result of nervous exhaustion. To the woman who has worked both physically and intellectually, Nature is sending in her accounts, and the wise woman will endeavour to ease off here and there for a year or two. Fresh air, sound sleep, *good food, with some interests other than one’s business and, above all, a conscious walk with God down the road of life will make all the difference in the world and in a year or two, according to medical science and pur own observation, the woman who has not wasted her youth will be ready for the second round with time and during this period of life her best work will be done. '

Age is a quality of mind, If you have left your dream behind, If hope is cold ; If you no longer look ahead. If your ambition’s fires are dead, Then you are old.

But, if from life you take the best. And if in life you keep the zest. If love you hold, No matter how the years go by, No matter how the birthdays fly, You are not old.

CEASE FROM WORRYING.

(By MARK GUY PEARSE.)

Row quickly we should cease from worry if we did but think within ourselves : What good is it ? Can you undo anything by fretting? Can you change it ? Can you lessen it ? If minding will not mend it, then better not to mind. Some time ago I was at the house of a gentleman in Yorkshire, who said to me: “I used to be a most irritable man. when anything went wrong I fussed and fumed, was miserable myself and made all about me miserable. My religious influence was worse than undone, I suffered in health and I suffered in my business. But one day I pulled myself up and said, ‘Look here, you are a fool!”’ While we are forbidden to call our brother a fool, it is well to hurl the epithet at ourselves if we deserve it. “‘You are a fool,’ I said to myself. ‘lf your religion does not cure your temper, what has it done for you?’ I made up my mind that I would bring all the strength of my will and all the grace of God that I could get to bear upon this besetment. Now, I do not want to boast, but I thank God that it is a very long time since I found myself fretting or worried. I cannot tell you the difference it makes, not only to myself in the happiness of my own life, but in the happiness of those about me.”

YOUNGER CHURCHMEN.

Messrs. Macmillan have published a volume of essays, critical and suggestive, entitled “The Younger Churchmen Look at the Church,” the work of several American ministers belonging to different denominations. Here is an extract from one of the essays: “Some sort of spiritual fellowship is as essential as the family or State or any other form of social organisation. It has been repeatedly pointed out that if all existing churches were destroyed, the human race would at once set about creating new ones. Periodically the suggestion is brought forward that, perhaps, the Church had better confine itself to the conduct of public worship, and dispense with the preaching function. “The obvious reply is that to do so would be to turn the Church over to the priests and to abolish the prophets. The Church needs both types of leadership, and the ideal minister combines the best characteristics of both.” The extract is taken from a chapter headed “Does the World Still Need the Preacher ?”

A PRAYER.

Most gracious God, help us, we beseech Thee, in whatsoever calling we are engaged, to adorn the doctrine of Christ in all things by rendering to others their due, providing tilings honest in the sight of all, and walking humbly with Thee, that our rejoicing may be the testimony of our conscience. Azien.