The Cheerful Clan
self-respecting days when no one sent our mothers a calendar with three hundred and sixty-five words of cheer, designed to jack up the lowered morale of the family. The missionary spirit was at work then as now; but it mostly dropped tracts on our doorstep, reminding us that we might be in hell before to-morrow morning.
The gaiety of life is a saving grace, and high spirits are more than the appanage of youth. They represent the rebound of the resilient soul from moods of dejection, and it is their transient character which makes them so infectious. Landor's line,
"That word, that sad word, Joy,"
is manifestly unfair. Joy is a delightful, flashing little word, as brief as is the emotion it conveys. We all know what it means, but nobody dares to preach it, as they preach three-syllabled cheerfulness, and gladness which once had a heroic sound, the "gladness that hath
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