Part 37

Jealousy violates contracts, dissolves society, breaks wedlock, betrays friends and neighbors, thinks nobody is good, and that every one is either doing or designing them an injury. Its rise is in guilt or ill-nature; as he that is overrun with the jaundice takes others to be yellow. If jealousy were not a hardened offender, he must have disappeared ere this by the abuse which poets and moralists have alike delighted to heap upon him. Yet he still lives and flourishes, exerts his influence and displays his power, as though he were a favored friend or a welcome guest.

Did jealousy always make its appearance in its ordinary form of detraction, it would be, comparatively speaking, harmless; but it is surprising how many different masks it can assume, and how it lurks and tries to conceal itself under some less mean and unlovable quality. Sometimes it appears in the character of injustice; sometimes it takes the form of rudeness and want of courtesy; occasionally a bitter or sarcastic way of speaking. At other times it borrows the garb of a virtue, and shows itself under what might be mistaken for humility or sincerity; lying coiled up like a serpent under some flower, and darting forth its venemous sting where and when you least expect to find it.

No stronger proof is needed to show how contemptible a fault jealousy is than that no one is willing to acknowledge that they are jealous. It is jealousy that is the root and foundation of many offenses, but they are charged to other causes. Jealousy is singular in this: every trifling circumstance is regarded as confirming and strengthening the previously aroused suspicions. It is a sorer curse, a more certain and fatal blight to the heart on which it seizes, than it can be to those against whom its spite is hurled. Jealousy is as cruel as the grave; not the grave that opens its deep bosom to receive and shelter from further storms the worn and forlorn pilgrim, who rejoices exceedingly and is glad when he can find its repose; but cruel as the grave is when it yawns and swallows down from the lap of luxury, from the summit of fame, from the bosom of love, the desire of many eyes and hearts.

Among the deadly things upon the earth, or in the sea, or flying through malarial regions, few are more noxious than jealousy. And of all mad passions there is not one that has a vision more distorted or a more unreasonable fury. To the jealous eye white looks black, yellow looks green, and the very sunshine turns deadly lurid. There is no innocence, no justice, no generosity that is not touched with suspicions save just the jealous person's own. Once lodged within the heart, for life it rules ascendant and alone. It sports in solitude. It pants for blood, and rivers will not sate its thirst. Minds strongest in worth and valor stoop to meanness and disgrace before it. The meanest soul, the weakest, it can give courage to beyond the daring of despair. No balm can assuage its sting. Death alone can heal its wound. When it has once possessed a man he has no ear but for the tale that falls like molten lead upon the heart.

In nothing is jealousy more commonly shown than when under the fear that some one will supplant us in the affections of another. Here it assumes its most malignant form, here its greatest distress is wrought. The gamester, whose last piece is lost; the merchant, whose whole risk the sea has swallowed up; the child, whose air bubble has burst—may each create a bauble like the former. But he whose treasure was in woman's love, who trusted as man once trusts and was deceived—that hope once gone, there is no finding it again, no restoring it. Let not any too rigorously judge the conduct of a jealous woman or a jealous man. Remember that the maniac suffers. To be sure, the suffering is from selfishness, often it is without the shadow of a cause; but still it is suffering, and it is intense. Pity it, bear with it; you may yourself fall into temptation.

It is said that jealousy is love. This is not true; for, though jealousy may be procured by love, as ashes are by fire, yet jealousy extinguishes love, as ashes smother the flame. Jealousy may exist without love, and this is common, for jealousy can feed on that which is bitter no less than on that which is sweet, and is sustained by pride as often as by affection.

The unfortunate habit of mind which makes one prone to jealousy can not be too strenuously fought against. It were well to constantly remember that jealousy injures and pains no one so much as the person feeling it. It is a self-consuming fire, a self-inflicted torment, an arrow that falls back and wounds only the archer. It becomes one to cultivate a spirit of magnanimity toward all, and to strive to allay, by every means in his power, a too suspicious nature. It has been well said that there are occasions on which a man would have been ashamed of himself not to have been deceived. A man to be genuine to himself must believe and be believed, must trust and be trusted.

Suspicion is no less an enemy to virtue than to happiness. He that is already corrupt is naturally suspicious, and he that becomes suspicious will quickly become corrupt. Suspicion is the child of guilt, the virtue of a coward. It is a vain and foolish pride which would teach that every one is conspiring against your happiness or has designs on your reputation and business. The fact is, probably no one is thinking of you. Yet your jealous disposition magnifies every little circumstance, and thus you are continually making yourself unhappy when no real cause exists. You are to strive against such an unfortunate disposition at all times. And it can be eradicated. It is not the liberally educated, those who have read much and thought more, who are thus suspicious and jealous in disposition; but it is the narrow-minded, the illiterate, and the vulgar.

"For of all sad words of tongue or pen, The saddest are these, 'It might have been.'"

—WHITTIER.

There is not a word in the English tongue which signifies more than the word regret. It expresses every degree of pain in the gamut of sorrow, from the childish regret for a lost plaything, to the remorse which, when the sands of life are almost run, contemplates a wasted life.

There are none who have not felt its potency; no age escapes it, and such will ever be the case as long as it is human to err. But as pain and sickness are the sentinels which guard the life and health of the body, so it is regret which keeps conscience alive in man and sustains the moral faculties in the discharge of duty. Life is full of sorrowful scenes, so much that could not have been avoided; but how much added force there is to sorrow when we reflect that we are to blame—that we knew at the time that we were doing wrong—that we disregarded the warning voice of conscience, contemptuously rejected the proffered advice of others, and have nothing to extenuate the keen regret gathered with the harvest of sorrow sown by our own negligence.

The profoundest sorrow is not brought upon us by the world, by its bitterness, its malice, its injustice, or its persecution. These, indeed, affect us, and make us wiser, more weak, or more brave. We can, if we choose, repel the world's wrongs. We can laugh at the injuries inflicted upon us, and hurl defiance upon them; or, if we can not command this spirit, we may patiently endure what we do not resent. But the sorrows we bring upon ourselves by our own lack of discretion, or heedless obstinacy, when regret adds its sting, then it is that we experience what real sorrow is. We can not then repel its attacks with indifference.

Regret is the heart's sorrow for past offenses,—the soul's prompting to better actions. Have you ever stood by the grave of one dear to you, and been compelled to remember how much happier you might have made that life which has now passed beyond your reach? Has the hasty or unkind word ever come back to you and repeated itself over and over, until you would gladly have given a year of your own life to have recalled it, and made it as if it had never been? Let us remember that those who are now living may soon be dead, and beware of adding to the things done that ought not to have been done, the things undone that ought to have been done. Many a heart has languished for the tenderness withheld in life, but poured out too late in remorse and unavailing regret.

Let us be tender to our friends while they are with us,—not wait till they are gone to find out their good qualities. Let us be kind and gentle now, and not wait for regret to tell us of duty undone. The way of life is so full of occasions that call forth real regret, that it would seem that there was little danger of manifesting regret where it was uncalled for and useless. Yet such spectacles are of daily occurrence. When one has done the best he can, he should let that fact console him, and not give way to causeless regret and a wish that he had done differently.

Under the guiding light of the present it is easy enough to discover the mistakes of the past; and it would be easy to make advantageous changes were we allowed to go back and commence anew in the journey of life. But alas! this is vain. What we should do is so to learn by reason of regret from the lessons of the past that we become fully fitted for the duties of the present. Regret, if deep and hopeless, becomes remorse, which settles down over the heart with a crushing weight, driving from thence all hope, unless, indeed, the angel of forgiveness brings consolation to the soul.

There are many walking the earth whose lives are shadowed by some great sorrow, to which is added the pain of regret caused by their own heedless and inconsiderate actions. With one, it is the sorrow of a reputation gone,—some act of folly swept away the fair name founded on years of honest living. With another, it is the shadow of a grave dark and deep which covers the form of one whom death claimed before he had redressed some wrong done, carelessly perhaps, and with no intention of lasting injury. Hasty and inconsiderate marriages cause much vain repining and regret. The happiness of life is gone; the hopes of a home, endearing companionship, are fled, because hasty and inconsiderate action was taken where care and study was required. Of all regrets, the remorse that must accompany the closing moments of a misspent life must possess the sharpest sting. Life and its possibilities allowed to go to waste from a lack of consideration on our part! Oh, that the young would give heed to the warning voice of experience, and thus escape the vain regrets of later years!

To escape regret, it is necessary to form the habit of doing your whole duty and avoiding impulsive actions. Pause before you say a hasty or a cruel thing. Human life is so uncertain, are you sure that you will have a chance to make it right before death will have claimed the object of your momentary anger? Tears and expressions of regret are of no avail when addressed to cold clay. Pause before doing a hasty or inconsiderate action. It may be of such a nature that you can not undo its effects. It may embitter your whole after life. Reflection is your good angel; give heed to her warning voice. How are you spending your life? Are you living as becomes a man and immortal being? Are you striving to make the most of life and its possibilities? If not, be warned in time, and turn from your ways. When life is nearly ended you will think of the past,—wonder at your actions, and sigh for the days of youth. They will not come to you again; therefore, make the most of them now. Thus will you spare yourself many vain regrets, and your closing days will be days of peace.

"Lull'd in the countless chambers of the brain, Our thoughts are linked by many a hidden chain. Awake but one, and lo, what myriads rise! Each stamps its image as the other flies."

—POPE.

Some one has said that of all the gifts with which a beneficent Providence has endowed man the gift of memory is the noblest. Without it life would be a blank, a dreary void, an inextricable chaos, an unlettered page cast upon the vast ocean of uncertainty. Memory is the cabinet of the imagination, the treasury of reason, the registry of conscience, and the council chamber of thought. It is the only paradise we are sure of always possessing. Even our first parents could not be driven out of it. The memory of good actions is the starlight of the soul. Memory tempers prosperity by recalling past distresses, mitigates adversity by bringing up the thoughts of past joys, it controls youth and delights old age.

Memory is the golden cord binding all the natural gifts and excellences together, and though it is not wisdom in itself, still it is the primary and fundamental power without which there could be no other intellectual operations. Memory is often accused of treachery and inconstancy, when, if inquired into, the fault will be found to rest with ourselves. Although nature has wisely proportioned the strength and liberality of this gift to various intellects, yet all have it in their power to improve it by classing, by analyzing and arranging the different subjects which successively occupy their minds. By these means habits of thought and reflection are required, which will materially conduce to the invigorating of the understanding, the improvement of the mind, and the strengthening and correction of the mental powers.

A quick and retentive memory both of words and things is an invaluable treasure, and may be had by any one who will take the necessary pains. Educators sometimes in their anxiety to secure a wide range of studies fail to sufficiently impress on their scholars' minds the value of memory. This memory is one of the most valuable gifts God has bestowed upon us, and one of the most mysterious. The more it is called upon to exercise its proper function the more it is able to do, and there seems to be no limit to its power. It is not what one has learned, but what he remembers and applies that makes him wise. Still memory should be used as the storehouse, not as a lumber-room. The mind must be trained to think as well as remember, and to remember principles and outlines rather than words and sentences.

It is an old saying that we forget nothing, as people in fever begin suddenly to talk the language of their infancy. We are stricken by memory sometimes, and old reflections rush back to us as vivid as in the time when they were our daily talk. We think of faces, and they return to us as plainly as when their presence gladdened our eyes and their accents thrilled in our ears. Many an affection that apparently came to an end, and dropped out of life one way or another, was only lying dormant. A scent, a note of music, a voice long unheard, the stirring of the Summer breeze may startle us with the sudden revival of long forgotten feelings and thoughts.

Memory can glean, but can never renew. It brings us joys faint as the perfume of the flowers, faded and dried of the Summer that is gone. Who is there whose heart is dead to the memories of his childhood days? Old times steal upon us, quietly making us young again, even amid the din of business and the whirl of household cares! The care-worn face relaxes its tension and the saddened brow clears for a time as some well-remembered scene rushes through the mind, bringing back the childhood home and the loved faces which met around the daily board.

We love to think of days that are past if they were days of happiness, and even experience a sad pleasure in recalling days of sadness. The man or woman who loves to look back upon the direction and counsel of a wise father and faithful mother will seldom do an unworthy or unjust act. And we find the most degraded at times marveling as to what led them into sin, because the remembrance of a happy home is theirs—a home of purity, of a father's and mother's loving counsel and upright example.

When sorrow and trial, care and temptation, surround us how often do we gain courage and renewed strength by thinking of the past. The bankrupt loves to think that he started on a fair basis from the cradle. And the worldly woman, who seems plunged in the vortex of fashionable pleasure, stops to think that it was not always thus, that a devoted mother taught her nobler things, and an earnest father bade her live for some real object in life. Just that moment's reflection may sow the seed which will develop into a life of charity and good works among her fellow-mortals. And that condemned criminal—who knows what memory recalls to his view? Perhaps it was a home from whence the incense of daily prayer ascended to God—where kind words enforced a cheerful obedience to wise counsels. Disturb him not; the influence is holy—'tis memory's voice urging him to final repentance.

We love to think of the unbroken circle; the curly heads of the children, and the various dispositions that marked them; the childish employments and aspirations; the mischievous pranks and merited punishment; and the quiet hour when the mother, gathering the little ones about her, told them of the better life to come, and sought earnestly to teach them that here below we live as school children, gaining an education that shall fit us for the brighter home hereafter. But these thoughts are not altogether of joyous scenes. Change and death appeared on the scene, and strangers came to dwell in the home of our childhood.