in a few months she had ten thousand poor fellows under her care. She did much more than organize; she would traverse at night, her little lamp in her hand, the four miles of crowded hospital wards and Longfellow's famous lines are no poetic fiction, many a dying man turned to kiss her shadow as it fell.
Miss Florence Nightingale was the first woman to receive the Order of Merit, the coveted distinction formerly reserved exclusively for men. She received the freedom of the City of London in 1908 and was a Lady of Grace of the Order of St. John of Jerusalem.—Belfast (Ireland) Telegram.
(1789)
LIFE, A NOBLE
I have seen at midnight the gleaming headlight
of a giant locomotive, rushing onward
through the darkness, heedless of danger
and uncertainty, and I have thought the
spectacle grand. I have seen the light come
over the eastern hills in glory, driving the
lazy darkness, like mist before a sea-born
gale, till leaf and tree and blade of grass
sparkled as myriad diamonds in the morning
rays, and I have thought that it was grand.
I have seen the lightning leap at midnight
athwart the storm-swept sky, shivering over
chaotic clouds, 'mid howling winds, till cloud
and darkness and the shadow-haunted earth
flashed into midday splendor, and I have
known that it was grand. But the grandest
thing, next to the radiance that flows from
the Almighty's throne, is the light of a noble
and beautiful life, shining in benediction
upon the destines of men, and finding its
home in the bosom of the everlasting God.—John
Temple Graves.
(1790)
LIFE A TREE
A Scandinavian allegory represents human
life as a tree, the "Igdrasil," or the tree of
existence, whose roots grow deep down in
the soil of mystery; the trunk reaches above
the clouds; its branches spread out over the
globe. At the foot of it sit the Past, the
Present and the Future, watering the roots.
Its boughs spread out through all lands and
all time; every leaf of the tree is a biography,
every fiber a word, a thought or a
deed; its boughs are the histories of nations;
the rustle of it is the noise of human existence
onward from of old; it grows amid
the howling of the hurricane; it is the great
tree of humanity.
(1791)
LIFE A VOYAGE
Into this world we come like ships,
Launched from the docks and stocks and slips,
For fortune fair or fatal.
—Thomas Hood.
O Neptune! You may save me if you
will; you may sink me if you will; but whatever
happens I shall keep my rudder true.
—Seneca's "Pilot."
Lowly faithful, banish fear,
Right onward sail unharmed;
The port, well worth the voyage, is near,
And every wave is charmed.
—R. W. Emerson.
Thou hast embarked; thou hast made the
voyage; thou art come to shore; now land!
(Text.)
—Marcus Aurelius.
(1792)
Life and Faith United—See Religion Allaying Fear.
LIFE, APPRECIATION OF
Many who carelessly declare this life to be of no desirable value discover how strongly they hold to it if by chance they seem in danger of losing it. Thus Rev. Asa Bullard writes:
My father had a blacksmith-shop; and
sometimes when not called away on professional
duties, he would do little jobs in
his shop in the evening. One evening, when
I was a little boy, I asked him to let me go
with him and see him make nails.
He said I would get sleepy and cry to come back. I thought I shouldn't; and so was permitted to go with him. He fixt me a nice seat on the forge, where I could see him blow the bellows, heat the nail-rod red hot, and then hammer out the nails. It was real fun to watch him for some time.
By and by I began to grow tired and sleepy; and then I wished I was back at the house and in bed; but I did not dare to say anything about it. At length father looked up, and seeing that I was very sleepy and ready to cry, he asked:
"What is the matter, Asa?"
I said: "I wish I was never made!"
Father drew the hot nail-rod out of the fire and raised it as tho he was going to strike me, when I exclaimed:
"I don't want to be killed, now I am made!" Then, with a hearty laugh, he took me home to mother.—"Incidents in a Busy Life."
(1793)
