| Show BEING A if you cant be a genius or a field marshal of big business or a crowned queen of the social realm or A 0 wizard of finance f or the eted admitted leader in one of the learned professions you can be a friend if you cant give the rich gifts of tangible things you would like to give if you cant afford to plit pdt at it the feet of those you love the best and most beautiful things the world has to show you can make tho the gift of yourself in the friendly relations of every day in the circle of the family in the round of business and the office or the store or the mill that gift is above every other gur bestowal and it is the gift kif t that you alone can give eve 4 4 lwe are only on poor if we chaote to fo be and the poverty that realty bitters Is the poverty of the inner nature the meagerness and of f the soul we have all known men and women auve V blessing welcome wherever they came who could give little alln the way of things aad sometimes perhaps they grieved for it forgetting that things matter least and affections genuine and tender are what count supremely they never knew t the h e good tacy athey did we e could not tell them when we needed comfort coin fol we sought them out there was of old a beautiful relationship relation sh lp built up in the south bf out country especially between faithful retain ers of a household and ana those whom they had served A little girl matured to womanhood went back to old mammy who had crooned over ovier her In infancy faVey and it i wad was the next experience to going gong back to her own mothers she knew where she was sure of a be ae mending sometimes te medicine we need is most of all to speak out of the of the mind and heart to a listener whose silence means neither ark an inattention nor an indifference but an all compassing safe harbor and sure refuge in our time of trouble the shadow of a rock in a weary land the green oasis after dusty marching inarching days to bo be or not to be a friend the decision changes life and determines whether our orbit be the selfish exclusion of a hermitage or a boundless concern in humanity if we deserve friends we do not want them for the parties they give the presents they make the houses they live in we want them for themselves it their possessions it Is their hearts we care about mrs wiggs of the cabbage patch is the true millionaire counting her riches in her smile her buoyant counsel and her fr friends lends philadelphia public ledger I 1 |
