Part 15

Men and women of Chautauqua, let an unworthy servant of the Master, my Master the Lord Jesus Christ, whose I am and whom I serve, get down at your feet and beseech you to meet the greatness of this ideal. It is not enough to be a ship, it must be launched. It is not enough to have all these great qualities that God may give to you, you need to be consecrated. Hear the word of God to Abram amidst the din and clatter and roar of this age, hear him say, high out of the clear heavens, “I am the Almighty God, walk before me, and be thou perfect.” And that this may be your and my happy lot, is my earnest prayer.

FOOTNOTE:

[E] A sermon delivered in the Amphitheater, at Chautauqua, Sunday, August 20, 1882.

MY OWN GIRL.

By FREDERICK LANGBRIDGE.

Fifteen shillings—no more, sir— The wages I weekly touch. For labor steady and sore, sir, It isn’t a deal too much; Your money has wings in the city, And vanishes left and right, But I hand a crown to Kitty As sure as Saturday night. Bless her, my own, my wee, She’s better than gold to me!

I must be honest and simple, I must be manly and true, Or how could I pinch her dimple, Or gaze in her frank eyes’ blue? I feel, not anger, but pity, When workmates go to the bad; I say, “They’ve never a Kitty— They’d all keep square if they had.” Bless her, my own, my wee, She’s better than gold to me!

One day she will stand at the altar, Modest, and white, and still, And forth from her lips will falter The beautiful, low, “I will.” Our home shall be bright and pretty As ever a poor man’s may, And my soft little dove, my Kitty, Shall nest in my heart for aye. Bless her, my own, my wee, She’s better than gold to me!

C. L. S. C. WORK.

By J. H. VINCENT, D. D., SUPERINTENDENT OF INSTRUCTION, C. L. S. C.

Read all of the required books for outlook and inspiration but _study_ one of the books at least for discipline. Read it as you do the rest. Read it more carefully than you read the rest. Read it over and over. Read it to recall what you read. Read it with critical helps of every kind. Having read it _think_ about it. Think _and_ think. Think beyond it. By some thought in it be led out to some other thought not in it, but thought of because of the book. Such chosen book out of each year’s list will become dearer to you than all the rest and will make the mere reading of all the rest more profitable.

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Which book shall I select out of the “required” list for 1882, to read thus thoughtfully and critically? All need not choose the same. Follow your “bent.” Take a part of one of the larger books. Begin with a limited amount. Try pages 124-199 in Prof. Wilkinson’s preparatory “Greek Course in English,” or choose one chapter in Bishop Warren’s “Recreations in Astronomy,” or one period in “Geology,” or “Evangeline.” Try the plan.

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Have you seen Prang’s C. L. S. C. Mottoes? Three of them at one dollar each. In exquisite taste. He issues nothing finer. Friends of C. L. S. C. people could do no more graceful thing than to hang one or more of these mottoes, in Prang’s best style, on the Christmas tree. A good idea!

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A busy housewife says: “I must write you one thing I have found out, for perhaps you have never heard it, certainly no one ever told it me: If a woman wants to find time for almost everything, she must keep house and do her own work.”

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The real object of education is to give children resources that will endure as long as life endures; habits that will ameliorate in disaster; occupation that will render sickness tolerable, solitude pleasant, age venerable, life more dignified and more useful, and death less terrible.—_Sidney Smith._

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A little girl in Silver Creek, N. Y., has organized a “Good Grammar Society.” She has excluded words used by her father (who is a Presbyterian minister), 744; her mother, 107; herself, 98; a little friend, 59; her brother Edward in three days, 14.

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Remember the five o’clock Sabbath C. L. S. C. Vespers. A few members lingering at Chautauqua through the winter will sing our “Day is Dying in the West,” and join in a prayer in the “Hall in the Grove” at five o’clock every Sabbath.

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I have decided to offer a _white seal_ to those graduates of ’82 who are already striving for a _white crystal seal_. This white seal will be given for the reading of the following books:

Wilkinson’s “Preparatory Greek Course in English.”

Packard’s “First Lessons in Geology.”

“Evangeline.”

“Hampton Tracts.”

“Chautauqua Text-Book No. 34.”

“How to Make a Living.” By G. C. Eggleston. Price fifty cents.

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Let every student of the Circle work for the people who most need the C. L. S. C., to enlist them: the idle rich, the busy poor, the college graduate, the uneducated, the old, the young—all who would make head and heart and hands keep harmony in this world of sorrow and weariness and sin.

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Pardon a personal suggestion. Nothing gives to the Superintendent of Instruction greater pleasure than to greet members of the C. L. S. C. Traveling widely as I do, I often come in contact with members. I receive letters occasionally saying: “We saw you on such a train, or in such a place, but did not like to speak to you.” I earnestly ask every member of the C. L. S. C. to introduce himself or herself at once, and by simply using the magic letters C. L. S. C., you have a watchword by which acquaintance may at once be formed.

C. L. S. C. TESTIMONY.

_Michigan._—I have been teaching school in one of the burnt districts, Huron county, Michigan. The school was very large, and the school house very small, and my school work, with a three-mile walk morning and evening, made me feel too tired to study much at night; but, I am very glad to say, I have finished my second year at last, and am ready to commence my third. I commenced the course when I was sixteen, and at almost the same time began teaching. The course of study was just what I needed. It has helped me very much, and I do not intend to be discouraged, even if one year does creep into the next. I have read and studied alone. The nearest local circle, and, I think, the only one in Huron county, is at Port Hope, several miles from my school.

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_New York._—A lady writes: As I am a printer, and use my eyes all day and every day in the week, setting type, I am not sure I shall be able to stand examination, but I am enjoying the Chautauqua course very much.

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_Illinois._—The Chautauqua readings are a great blessing to me, as well as to the world at large. I have a great many days of illness. I can not walk or use my hands or arms much, and am prevented from benefiting my kind, except by trying to be patient under my sufferings, and in learning to _wait_. The Woman’s Missionary Society of our little church meets in my room, and I preside over the few ladies as best I can, endeavoring to imbue them with the spirit of missions, and aiding them in studying the mission fields intelligently.

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_Connecticut._—I’ve had to do the most of the work during vacations, which accounts for my being behind. I thoroughly believe in the plan, as much to _quicken_ and _keep alive_ college graduates as anything else, just what _they_ need. I found that for me it bridged over many a break and filled up many an awkward opening left by a college course. And I must further avail myself of odd minutes for systematic reading in the line of special courses. An uneducated dry-goods clerk, to whom I told the plan, said he could not express his pleasure in knowing of the scheme, and that it was an incentive, such as he had never known before. He joined this term.

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_Ohio._—I find on my floor beside me now “Elizabeth’s Progress to London,” from Abbott’s book—in effigy—made from building blocks, with octagon wheels and elegant chariot, a gay dolly on a made-up chair, with dainty parasol over her. This his majesty, Master Harry, tells me is Queen Elizabeth, and he tells everybody she had a thousand dresses and ought to have been very good. At the right I see cavalry, extractions from Crandall’s menagerie, one steed mounted with an athlete in costume and the feet secured by small blocks. This they proclaim for “William’s horse stepping on embers.” They’ve been at Abbott’s book I see, and so we may be called a family as well as local circle.

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_Massachusetts._—I like the course very much and have seen many things in the CHAUTAUQUAN in praise of it by the students. But one thing, which I think will be a great help to me, I have not seen mentioned, that is the use of the books for reference. If in our hurry we are not as thorough as we would like to be, I think we can remember enough when we find things in our future reading we do not understand, to know which book and where in it to find the information we need. I feel very thankful for the privileges of membership in the C. L. S. C.

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_Tennessee._—I must send you a few words of thanks for the C. L. S. C. I have only been a member one year, but I don’t know how I could do without the reading now. I think I am growing in knowledge—yes, and in the love of our Lord and Savior Jesus Christ. With the new year’s reading I begin life with fresh hope to attain a greater height in the study of God and his works.

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_California._—The C. L. S. C. has been an unspeakable blessing and comfort to me. It has been an eye-opener, a mind-opener, and a soul-opener in the deepest and broadest sense of the word.

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_New Jersey._—The diploma received; it is a beautiful memorial of the C. L. S. C., which I shall greatly prize, and to whose value I shall seek to add, year by year, in the form of “seals” you are so good as to bestow.

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_Minnesota._—I found among my daughter’s papers—Miss Harriet A. Lathrop, a member of the C. L. S. C.—a blank for examination, with an earnest request to hear from her as to her progress. This is to inform you that she passed to her final examination and was promoted May 7th last. She struggled with disease for three years, and then, having fought a good fight, she received the crown of life. I desire, if you please, that you record on your register, not that she fell out by the way, but that she pursued the course as long as she had strength, and then entered into rest. It was through no indifference that she did not respond regularly, but from sheer physical inability. She was patient, faithful, true, tried, and trusty.

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_Massachusetts._—My letter will inform you of the death of a member of the C. L. S. C.—Miss Mary Thurber, of this place [Attleboro]. She was about twenty-three years of age, a young lady of rare value; beautiful, physically and intellectually, and of fine spiritual attainments. She was a helpful member of the M. E. Church, and a teacher in one of our public schools. She had a large circle of friends, but in her home, among her brothers and sisters, she was the fixed star whose brightness hallowed, and the special joy of her parents. She suffered intensely for a few days only, and though shut out from her friends from the contagiousness of her disease (diphtheria), she was patient to the last, and passed from this to her higher associations in peace, last March. She was very devotedly attached to the C. L. S. C., read with eager enthusiasm, and worked for and expected great results from her connection with it. How blessed that the hope of immortality opens up to those who are seeking broader fields of truth, and assures fuller development to the hedged in of time! The entire community sympathize with the sorrowing family.

LOCAL CIRCLES.

[We request the president or secretary of every local circle to send us reports of their work, of lectures, concerts, entertainments, etc. Editor of THE CHAUTAUQUAN, Meadville, Pa.]

The growth of the C. L. S. C. has been without restraint of any kind. The organization is simple, but few officers, a brief constitution, and indeed none of the paraphernalia is required which we usually find dictated from the center of a wide-spread organization. No creed to sign, no shibboleth to pronounce. A person has simply to make out an application for membership, send it to Miss Kimball at Plainfield, N. J., and then read the books. It was natural that kindred spirits, doing the same work, should invent local circles, which, while they are not required, yet are helpful to the students. Mind coming in contact with mind will produce an intellectual quickening. Students will get more out of the books by a system of questioning. Bonds of union will be created by meeting together, and the strong will have opportunity to help the weak, and the weak will learn to appreciate the local organization because of the real helps it affords them in their studies. We invite secretaries to send us carefully prepared reports of the work done in their local circles. Do this for the benefit of others. The calls upon us are numerous for information about how to conduct local circles to make them interesting and profitable. Below we furnish our readers with some suggestive items sent us from flourishing circles. They will bear studying and in most instances are worthy of imitation.

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This is the fifth year of the local circle in Oswego, N. Y., and it numbers about twenty-five members of all denominations, and meets every Monday evening. We bring nearly all our studies into the circle meetings in this way. Each Monday evening a lesson is announced by the President to be studied the following week, and a member appointed to act as teacher, who conducts the lesson on the appointed evening, using maps, blackboard, etc., having a regular class drill. A good deal of enthusiasm and interest is manifested. A critic is appointed each month. We have a literary committee, which reports each week with selections from poetic or prose writers. This committee is appointed each month. We have adopted a new plan of arranging the lessons, which distributes this part of the work among the members. A member is assigned, for instance, the work on geology with instructions to divide it into lessons, which is done and a report handed to the president, with the name of member opposite each lesson to act as a teacher. We occasionally have social gatherings at the homes of members, one of the most enjoyable of which was the art social of last winter. A resolution has been adopted naming our circle “Markham C. L. S. C. of Oswego,” in honor of Rev. W. F. Markham, who organized our circle.

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Members of the C. L. S. C. in Augusta, Me., made no effort to form a local circle here till April, 1882, when the Rev. Dr. J. H. Vincent was present and gave us a talk on the C. L. S. C. work. The outgrowth was a strong sentiment in favor of forming a circle here, and after several preliminary meetings, a local circle was organized September 25. At the last meeting, October 10, the membership was increased to twenty-seven. On that evening we had essays, questions and conversation upon the reading in the course. The order of exercises is prepared by the committee of instruction, and is varied in character, only confining the topics to the subjects of the required reading. We have decided to hold meetings once in four weeks. The members anticipate a very interesting winter’s work.

Our circle in South Marshfield, Mass., was not organized till a year ago, although we were then beginning the third year of our course. Our organization was a direct result of the Round-Table held at Framingham Assembly. We meet every week. The required readings are divided into six parts; each member takes one, on which she prepares questions for the next meeting; the questions in THE CHAUTAUQUAN are read, and parts of the little text-books. The meetings are enlivened by the reading of two or three short essays, and by relating interesting incidents suggested by the lesson. We sometimes sing C. L. S. C. songs, and have readings from standard authors. Our meetings are usually closed by playing one of the Chautauqua games, which we consider not only pleasant, but healthful, as they give us a constant review of our work. We organized our circle this year the first of September, instead of the first of October, in order that we might take up the whole of the first volume of Grecian history, and have found that our interest is continually increasing, and our meetings this year are even superior to those of the previous year. By circulating the “Hall in the Grove,” we have gained one new member, who seems intensely interested.

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In Michigan City we have a membership in our local circle of twenty-eight, twenty-three of whom intend to read the entire course, and five will do as much of the work as they can. The officers are president, vice president, and secretary. Our method of work is, no doubt, similar to other circles. We meet twice a month to review the work. Members are given topics to study and to prepare to ask the circle such questions as they may formulate. In this way the work is not left for a few to carry on, but all become interested and active working members.

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Our local circle of the C. L. S. C. in Bradford, Pa., is one of several in this place, and is designated the “Longfellow Class,” in distinction from the others. We have limited our number to ten members, thinking by that means to promote individual interest. We have but two officers, a president and secretary. We meet weekly, at the homes of the different members. We have no leader appointed for the year, but every four weeks one member of the class is elected conductor of exercises for the ensuing month. The manner of reviewing the lessons varies. The conductor sometimes asks questions, when the topics are freely discussed by all; sometimes the subjects are apportioned to individual members to be talked over, or a synopsis of certain portions given by them. At the close of the lesson, fifteen minutes is devoted to discussing all rhetorical errors made during the evening.

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In Minneapolis, Minnesota, “Centenary Circle” numbers about thirty members. The officers are president, vice president, secretary and treasurer. Meetings are held at the house of the secretary on the first and third Wednesday evenings of the month. Thus far this year the president has conducted the meetings, asking each member of the class questions on the lesson, from which discussions often arise. Last year members of the class were sometimes asked to conduct the meeting. No essays were ever written, but sometimes each member was asked to be prepared on given topics to be recited at the next meeting. No concerts or public entertainments have been given, nor did we observe any of the memorial days except Longfellow’s. We were quite in the dark about the work when we commenced, but very anxious to take up some systematic course of reading, and would not give it up now for any consideration.

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The Hockanum, Connecticut, C. L. S. C. met informally last year, and was organized September 25. Three years ago there was but one member of the C. L. S. C. in the place, the year following three, and last year six. Our membership is now eighteen, and the interest both excellent and increasing. The circle meets every Monday evening at the house of the secretary. At 7 p. m. promptly a brief Scripture reading and prayer opens the meeting. After a few moments given to business, the questions in the text-book and THE CHAUTAUQUAN are asked, and a record kept of those who have done the week’s required reading and memorizing. We are notified that many and varied are the household duties performed with the little text-book perched in divers nooks. The president appoints four readers and a critic for each evening. The reading is selected from some portion of the weekly required reading. This is followed by questions, remarks, or general conversation relative to the subject, etc. The reading closes at nine o’clock, after which we have music and a social chat. The circle has arranged and entered upon a course of ten public lectures on Geology, given every Wednesday evening by the president, in the vestry of the Congregational Church. The occasion is made interesting by the use of black-boards, maps, the Packard plates, neatly mounted on easels, and a cabinet of rocks and shells illustrative of Dana’s “Geologic Story Briefly Told.” The room is also made cheery by a conspicuous grouping of the class mottoes framed in gilt, and other ornamentation luminous with the monogram, C. L. S. C. The attendance is good, and the attention held closely by the youthful tyro who has won laurels by his clear and happy presentation of the subject. It is always a most instructive and enjoyable evening to the circle and their friends. Our circle early voted to observe “Memorial Days,” the observance to fall on the regular evening nearest memorial date. For Bryant’s Day we have arranged for two essays by young ladies, one on the life, the other on the works of the poet. The other members are each to give recitations of choice or favorite selections from Bryant. We are looking forward to a pleasant social time.

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NORWALK, O., October 30, 1882.