Truly, the inhumanity of man to man makes countless thousands mourn. One of the most unhappy and discordant men who ever lived, and who devoted the larger part of his time to writing unchari- tably of women and reviling their claims for larger liberty, was the son of an insane mother. He imbibed his father's contempt and scorn for the mother who, unconscious of her surroundings, gave birth to children. His memoir is to be found in all libraries, and yet there is no word of condemnation for that father who was simply not more, not less, than a brute. Had his son become an Ishmaelite instead of a misanthrope the fact should not have occasioned surprise. The crime of infanticide is denounced as inhuman in mothers, yet 364 THE hearthstone; or, life at home. fathers are equally responsible for it. Women are driven to it in many cases through fear of bitter suffering. Children are begotten not unfrequently when there is grim want to be faced, and the dread of burdens too heavy to bear leads to this awful crime. Justice to children demands that life should not be given where there is not the means to support it ; and a time will come when governments will deal directly with the question of parentage, but it will not be in this age. We are rioting in what we call liberty, but what is really license. There is nothing men so quickly resent as admonition regarding a too numerous progeny, or of becoming the fathers of imbeciles and idiots or depraved offspring. Time will be when the nation will hold itself directly responsible for such a popu- lation as fills our charitable institutions. The State will directly con- cern itself about the children of irresponsible and unworthy parents, and then, and not till then, will the injustice now visited upon helpless innocents be at an end. DEATH IN THE HOME. " The living are the only dead ; The dead live, — nevermore to die; And often, when we mourn them fled, They never were so nigh ! " ,EREMY TAYLOR, "the Shakespeare of divines," has said that human beings probably suffer as much in the process of being born as in that of dying. It may ^^ well be so, for death itself is seldom painful, and even the most painful illnesses, when they terminate fatally, are generally marked by a cessation of pain some time before the close. Death is generally a tranquil falling asleep, and if it were not for the materialism of the human mind, which regards the stopping of the physical machinery as the extinction of the spiritual principle, it would be very difficult to account for the superstitions with which death has in all ages been associated. To a higher philosophy and a more spiritual insight death is really not so much to be lamented as pain, yet parents and relatives would rather see a sufferer linger than sink into the placid sleep of death. There is surely some selfish- ness in this, although its cause is the natural affection which hangs upon the well-known voice and lives in the sunshine of the loved one's face. Yet it is certainly paradoxical, if not unaccountable, that the old heathens should have had the fortitude to bear the parting better than Christians who have a stronger hope than they of being reunited in another world.

AI-modernized reading of the original text

Truly, the inhumanity of man to man makes countless thousands mourn. One of the most unhappy and discordant men who ever lived, and who devoted the larger part of his time to writing uncharitably of women and reviling their claims for larger liberty, was the son of an insane mother. He imbibed his father's contempt and scorn for the mother who, unconscious of her surroundings, gave birth to children. His memoir is to be found in all libraries, and yet there is no word of condemnation for that father who was simply not more, not less, than a brute. Had his son become an Ishmaelite instead of a misanthrope the fact should not have occasioned surprise. The crime of infanticide is denounced as inhuman in mothers, yet 364 THE hearthstone; or, life at home. fathers are equally responsible for it. Women are driven to it in many cases through fear of bitter suffering. Children are begotten not unfrequently when there is grim want to be faced, and the dread of burdens too heavy to bear leads to this awful crime. Justice to children demands that life should not be given where there is not the means to support it ; and a time will come when governments will deal directly with the question of parentage, but it will not be in this age. We are rioting in what we call liberty, but what is really license. There is nothing men so quickly resent as admonition regarding a too numerous progeny, or of becoming the fathers of imbeciles and idiots or depraved offspring. Time will be when the nation will hold itself directly responsible for such a population as fills our charitable institutions. The State will directly concern itself about the children of irresponsible and unworthy parents, and then, and not till then, will the injustice now visited upon helpless innocents be at an end. DEATH IN THE HOME. " The living are the only dead ; The dead live, — nevermore to die; And often, when we mourn them fled, They never were so nigh ! " ,EREMY TAYLOR, "the Shakespeare of divines," has said that human beings probably suffer as much in the process of being born as in that of dying. It may well be so, for death itself is seldom painful, and even the most painful illnesses, when they terminate fatally, are generally marked by a cessation of pain some time before the close. Death is generally a tranquil falling asleep, and if it were not for the materialism of the human mind, which regards the stopping of the physical machinery as the extinction of the spiritual principle, it would be very difficult to account for the superstitions with which death has in all ages been associated. To a higher philosophy and a more spiritual insight death is really not so much to be lamented as pain, yet parents and relatives would rather see a sufferer linger than sink into the placid sleep of death. There is surely some selfishness in this, although its cause is the natural affection which hangs upon the well-known voice and lives in the sunshine of the loved one's face. Yet it is certainly paradoxical, if not unaccountable, that the old heathens should have had the fortitude to bear the parting better than Christians who have a stronger hope than they of being reunited in another world.

The hearthstone; or, Life at home