The Family Circle

New Zealand Tablet, Volume L, Issue 16, 26 April 1923, Page 53

The Family Circle

THE WHISTLING BOY. I like the boy who whistles, For oft his cheery note, Now echoing from the hillside, Now clear and now remote, Is clear as any blackbird’s, As sweet as any flute, The while I pause and muse, And all the world is mute. What trills and what crescendoes, What airy, lilting lays, He scatters through the meadows And strews along the ways! What matter if the song-birds . * Have sought a southern clime? For here’s enough of music And here a summer time. I like the boy who whistles When things are all awry, Who bolsters up his courage And never stops to cry, Who improvises ditties, As cheerful as the day, ' And by his merry piping Drives all his cares away. God bless Die boy who whistles! The world has need of him From grey of early morning Till twilight’s dusky rim. We need him when we’re working, We need him when we rest; Of all the happy youngsters I like the whistler best! LOOK ON THE BRIGHT SIDE. x Whatever the occupation whereby men and women earn their daily bread, their first business is to bring as much happiness to living as they are able, and to strew it about them as they go. We need more optimists and enthusiasts, and we can dispense with pessimists and croakers. We need more of those who are not afraid to bo themselvesnot afraid to have an individuality and to express it, in ways that bless and do not wound. —The Catholic, Pittsburgh. SAY THANK YOU. Say thank you. The frost of ingratitude kills the flower of charity. It discourages kindness. It nips in the bud many good intentions toward needy hearts and homes. Gratitude is a note of happiness out of a glad heart, and it helps to fill the world with the music of joy. It is the fine exercise of a fine soul, and the practice of it educates the heart in the noblest desires and emotions. Gratitude is the only recompense sincere charity wants from those upon whom it bestows its benefits, and it wants that to know whether it has done good or evil in its gifts. Gratitude stimulates the flow of good deeds. Then say thank you. Say it from the heart. Say it with sincere words, spoken so all may hear. Say it with the light of gladness on your face. Say it with your hands. Say it with your life. Say it by kindness to some fellow-man who may need your word, or gift, or handshake. Say it to your fellowman—above all, say it to the God of all grace, who giveth us richly all things to enjoy. WHAT DOTH IT PROFIT? A devout and learned Spaniard used to say, on being praised for his extraordinary knowledge: “What good will it do me after death, since I see so little advantage in it here in life?” Yet his attainments were regarded as a real good. There are minds that do not set themselves an end beyond the grave. There are even believing souls that take up many useless, not to say harmful or deadly things. Neither class possess the utilitarian quality that sees more than merely the palpable benefit of and for the moment.

In thought and action, the right kind of utilitarian does not strain his hearing to catch merely the jnigle of money; neither does he exhaust himself in the reactions of a gross materialism. He enters a greatly different sphere and becomes a true idealist by looking for present good and" fruitful results without overlooking the unseen and the eternal beyond death. How different many a life woijjd be if the one living it were accustomed to asking himself: “How can I make my daily doing best bear on my everlasting interests hereafter?’’

THE CHARM OF HOME LIFE. The pleasures of the home do not necessarily consist of outward things, an elegant home, fine furniture expensive dishes, etc. While these things do, no doubt, add to the study of the home and give pleasure, yet happiness may alone be said to be independent of them— is if the temperament of the people in the home is not such that they demand these things and cannot enjoy life without them. We find people enjoying all these things who are not happy. And do we not find people who have none o these things people who live very humbly and simply, who are most happy in their homes? _ So home is not the building, nor the furniture in if it is rather the atmosphere in the building, and is created ot ;by the inanimate things in the building but the persons seek M Jt ls to thGS< V then, that we are to look when we seek to increase our happiness in the homo. And everything which brings the members of a family nearer together will help toward increasing the family Zr:ZelflY S t,Wt " m hel *> *>» mem hers to be more unselfish, more courteous, more patient, more symhome tret”" 6 ' oVablC *° MCII °‘ her " IUM P to make Above all things there must be love in the hmr o _o ™ that -‘boa,-o*l. all things and oudureth all thine, ” Without these things there cannot be happiness Every true homo contains children, and these brine either happiness or unhappiness to themselves and to the members of the family. ’ 0 the portant fact, children can be and often are the most ini portant source of happiness. These must ho so cn ” fX reared and trained that they will he good and kw o lather and mother and make them happy. “ . The most important training, the most vivid and Wine impressions are those made in the first seven or eight years oa. child’s life i A child understands many thin. s that ™ nk are far beyond it. If he does not understand he ill wonder and memory will preserve those things until taZZm. rStam,ing come V* “4 interpret 11,. t s °m ; CIIMSS P''®™ oo nothing should be said or done that will ,n any way influence the child for worse If parents only realised that they have in their own hands largely the making of these children the forming of Their ract Ti that T y fr™ large V whether these chZ will l will be good or bad men and women, whether they ship useful I 8 or. the reverse, they oftentimes would shape their own lives differently. There are mothers and fathers who discuss everything before children; who do not in the least seek to control themselves, who in the presence of their children say things that children’s ears ought never to hear. The children of I,esc parents usually will not prove to be sources of blessings to parents and parents will bewail the fact that they Z Brooklyn!' 88 ‘ lley "™ giVCn S " ch bad <*«*-- MOTHER. Mother is a little girl who trod my path before meJust .a bigger, wiser little girl who ran ahead— Bigger, wiser, stronger girl who always watches o’er me One who knows the pitfalls in the rugged road I tread. Mother is a playmate who will always treat me kindly— Playmate who will yield me what true happiness demands. She will never let my feet-stray into brambles blindly—- • Mother s just a bigger little girl who understands. Mother’s an older little playmate who’ll befriend meYesteryear she travelled on the path that’s mine to-day! Never need I fear a foe from which she might defend me— Faithful little pal who ran ahead and learned the way.

NUTS TO CRACK. Why is a thump like a hat? Because it is felt. lam forever, yet was never ? Eternity. How do you swallow a door? Bolt it? s “Where docs charity begin?” At C (sea). What makes all women alike? The dark. What man do most men admire? Wo-man. Why is a fool’s mouth like a hotel door? It is always open. When are eyes not eyes? When the wind makes them water. What bird is in season all the year? The weathercock. What will turn without moving? Milk. What can cross a stream in the most brilliant shunshine and not cast a shadow? Sound. WWWS- - HE FARED. A bishop asked the minister in a temporary charge how he got through the service. “Well, bishop, the service was soothing, moving, and satisfying,” was the answer. “How do you mean?” asked the bishop, “Well,” replied the minister, “it was soothing, because over half the congregation went to sleep. It was moving, because half of the other half left before I was through. And it must have been satisfying, inasmuch as I wasn’t asked to come again.” HAD HIM THERE. Mr. Sparks gave a grunt as he limped painfully up to the counter of the chemist’s shop. From behind a pile of germ-destroyers and pain-killers, and various other remedies, a sleek young man appeared. He beamed upon Mr. Sparks, “Good evening. What can I get for you, sir?” “I want a corn cure,” said Mr. Sparks. “A good one.” The young man held out a small bottle filled with a black fluid. “Here is the very thing. I gaurantee this to cure any corn in one night. Only one-and-six, sir.” Mr. Sparks paid the fee and took his purchase home. A week later he limped angrily into the shop again. “That corn cure you sold me,” he snapped, “was no good at all! You’re a fraud! I thought you said you guarantee it to cure a corn in one night?” “Quito so,” said the young man, blandly. ‘Rut I didn’t say which night.” SMILE-RAISERS. Ethel: “My new teacher’s awfully mean,” Mother: “Hush! You musn’t say that!” “Well, she is. What do you think? She borrowed my knife to sharpen a pencil with which to give me a bad mark.” A yacht was coming into the harbor and a number of sailors were watching to see what its name was. At last one of them spelt out the name —P-S-Y-C-H E. “Gosh!” he exclaimed. ‘‘What a way to spell fish!” * , Teacher was endeavoring to make clear to the youngsters the grammatical tenses. “My father had money,” she pointed out, “is the past tense. Now, Grace, what tense would you be employing if you should say ‘ My father has money’?” “That would be pretence,” said Grace very soberly. * A little boy had returned home after having been out to dinner. Said his mother: “I trust that when it came to the extra, helpings you had manners enough to say ‘No’?” “Yes, ma; I said ‘No’ several times.” “You did?” exclaimed his mother, sceptically. “Yes;.Mrs Stout kept asking me if I had had enough!”