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Show tZV -ZZ! 1 Many a poet has written of autumn leaves. They tell most persons a true but neenn melancholy story of how life budded, was green, nourished for a summer, then ri-q ri-q ll6 pened, turned brown, fell and became the jl j j port of winter winds. But that is not JT QQ6C1 the tale with the one who makes a wonder- .f rxJt fl prayer of which our text is a part. lie speaks of an inner self that has gone through moral experiences, not physical. By REV. W. C. BITTINO, 0 aru become as one that is unclean, Detroit. and all our righteousnesses arc as a polluted ----- "-ZZZ ferment ; and wc all do fade as a leaf and our iniquities, like the wind, take us away. And shall we be saved?" This man is kin to us all. We share his confession, con-fession, for who is there of us that in serious moments has not said the t same thing? The truest patriot is a good citizen. Every person in our land who tramples justice in dealing with another, who crushes righteousness righteous-ness in civil or commercial realms, who i3 a mere idler in luxury, whoso occupation is degrading to himself or others, is turning our leaf from green to brown. The shiftless poor, and the idle rich; the anarchist an-archist who wants no law at all, and the equally bad anarchist who thinks to buy exemption from obedience to law; the bribe givers and takers; the criminals of bottom, mid-die mid-die and top of our social order, all help to tear from j our foliage the leaves that are for the healing of na- ( j turns. Every institution that harms our national life 3-must 3-must go, if our glory is to stay. JfcV t ' But, there can be no fading nation unless there mrjj), are faded men and women. There is no such a thing jfy'if Xs as a nation apart front the persons who make it. How JttiaJ many a high purpose has become only the acrobat of S i present moral decline, as our low lives turn it over and Js' over, as the October wind does the faded leaf! fs |
