CONTENTMENT.

Better Things.

Better than grandeur, better than gold,
Than rank or titles, a hundredfold,
Is a healthful body, a mind at ease,
And simple pleasures that always please.
A heart that can feel for a neighbor's woe,
And share his joy with a friendly glow,
With sympathies large enough to enfold
All men as brothers, is better than gold.

Better than gold is the sweet repose

Of the sons of toil when their labors close;
Better than gold is the poor man's sleep,
And the balm that drops on his slumbers deep.
Better than gold is a thinking mind,

That in realms of thought and books can find.
A treasure surpassing Australian ore,

And live with the great and good of yore.

ALEXANDER SMART.

Divine Contentment.

How often is divine contentment the quickest road to that which otherwise you may struggle for and not obtain! Let go, and you get. Grasp, and you lose. Fill your soul with yearning, and struggling, and striving, and go about with your brows knitted and saying, "Oh, life is a weariness to me, for that which I desire, its crown and flower, never comes to me," and it will not

come.

But come away from that yearning and striving,

and take the other plan and say:

Then

"Well, God knoweth best, and if it is to be it will come to me; and if it is not to be, I have Him. See what I have. May I rest more upon what I have than upon what I have not." you will grow strong and brave in the midst of seeming desolation, and you will be able to say with the apostlea man who had to be looked after, or he might have perished for lack of earthly supplies-"I have all and abound; and I have learned in whatsoever state I am therewith to be content."-MCNEILL.

Condensed Comments.

The hungry sea

Hath need of all the stars to make it bright.

A stream's content with one.

ANNA KATHERINE GREEN

Fretting most of us call a minor fault and not a vice; but there is no vice except drunkenness which can so utterly destroy the happiness of a home.-HELEN HUNT JACKSON.

Contentment is natural wealth; luxury is artificial poverty.--SOCRATES.

A contented mind is a continual feast.—THE BIBLE.

COURAGE.

To Victis.

I sing the hymn of the conquered who fell in the battle of life

The hymn of the wounded, the beaten, who died, o'erwhelmed in the strife;

Not the jubilant song of the victors, for whom the resounding acclaim

Of nations was lifted in chorus, whose brows wore the chaplet of fame,

But the hymn of the low and the humble, the weary, the broken in heart,

Who strove and who failed, acting bravely a silent and desperate part;

Whose youth bore no flower on its branches, whose hope burned in ashes away;

From whose hands slipped the prize they had grasped at, who stood at the dying of day

With the wreck of their life all around them-unpitied, unheeded, alone

With death swooping down o'er their failure and all but their faith overthrown.

While the voice of the world shouts its chorus, its pæan for those who have won;

While the trumpet is sounding triumphant, and high to the breeze and the sun

Gay banners are waving, hands clapping, and hurrying

feet,

Thronging after the laurel-crowned victors, I stand on the

field of defeat,

In the shadow, 'mongst those who are fallen, and wounded and dying, and there

Chant a requiem low, place my hand on their painknotted brows, breathe a prayer,

Hold the hand that is helpless, and whisper: "They only the victory win

Who have fought the good fight and have vanquished the demon that tempts us within;

Who have held to their faith unseduced by the prize that the world holds on high;

Who have dared for a high cause to suffer, resist, fightif need be, to die."

Speak, history! Who are life's victors?

long annals and say

Unroll thy

Are they those whom the world called victors, who won the success of a day?

The martyrs of Nero? The Spartans who fell at Ther

mopyla's tryst,

Or the Persians and Xerxes? His judges or Socrates? Pilate or Christ?

W. W. STORY.

Courage in Adversity.

When loss of property and loss of repute are come, when the severance of friendships has come, when the future is overcast with disappointment and hopes are shattered, and we know nothing of what is to come ex

cept simply this, that we know God's will must be done, and try to do what is pleasing in His sight, and leave all to Him, the endurance which then reveals itself is the masterful power of the human will. Men trained in the experience can not be frightened nor disheartened by troubles, however great.-R. S. STORRS.

Nerve Thy Spirit.

Yet nerve thy spirit to the proof,
And blench not at thy chosen lot.
The timid good may stand aloof,

The sage may frown; yet faint thou not,
Nor heed the shaft too surely cast,

The foul and hissing bolt of scorn;
For with thy side shall dwell, at last,
The victory of endurance born.
Truth, crushed to earth, shall rise again;
The eternal years of God are hers;
But Error, wounded, writhes in pain,
And dies among her worshipers.

WILLIAM CULLEN BRYANT.

The Art of Life.

The great art of life, so far as I have been able to observe, consists in fortitude and perseverance. I have rarely seen that a man who conscientiously devoted himself to the studies and duties of any profession, and did not emit to take fair and honorable opportunities of offering himself to notice when such presented themselves, has not at length got forward. The mischance of those