RADIANCIES OF CHEERFULNESS

I want to be cheerful and to radiate cheerfulness at all times, under all circumstances, in all conditions and places. I want to do this because I want to do it. Not because it is my duty, or because I shall make some one else unhappy if I do not, but merely and simply because there is a great joy in the fact of cheerfulness itself.

I have a friend into whose presence I never come without feeling the radiant cheerfulness of his nature. His face lights up with a beautiful smile, his hand is immediately stretched out and my hand grasped with a cordial clasp; kind words come to his lips with a sincerity that one can never question, and in the most unaffected, genuine, and simple manner he radiates the cheerfulness and gladness of his own soul.

Did you never meet with such people who were always bright and sunny, who always gave forth a cheery word, always radiated optimism? Everything they say or do makes you feel with Browning:

And all this is done without any flattery or conscious effort on their part to make you feel good. Some of the severest rebukes I have ever received were from this man of whom I have spoken, and yet they were given in such a sweet, gentle manner and with such perfect sincerity that not only was there no irritation aroused, but a sense of gratitude implanted that I had such a real, sincere friend.

I do not wonder that men demand cheerfulness in others. It seems somewhat heartless to put up a notice in your office, as I have seen in many offices, "I have troubles enough of my own. Tell yours to the janitor," or as another version has it, "Don't tell your troubles to me, I have enough of my own," yet it speaks of a fact that is all too universal, namely, that each person does have his own large share of burdens which sometimes seem as if they would swamp him.

As Dr. Gulick once wrote:

All this has to be remembered in our association with men and women. And when we remember, why should we not wish, instead of adding to their burdens, to lighten or help remove them?

That cheerfulness is possible in this world of woe and trial, there can be no question, because every now and again, each of us has met with some person who radiated this quality at all times. And we know that in our own experience, when we have willed to be cheerful and to radiate cheerfulness to others, we have accomplished far more in that line than we otherwise should have done.

Only the other day I picked up a trade journal and in it was a short letter from one business man about another business man who had recently passed away. Let me quote a part of it:

I would far rather leave a legacy like that behind me than to leave an immense fortune over which my heirs would quarrel and go to law and engender ill feelings and then possibly spend in an injurious manner.

It is said of Sister Dora, the noble-hearted woman who gave her life to the iron workers of the "Black Country" in England, that as she went to and fro in the wards of the hospitals, her presence was like a glad burst of sunshine to the poor sick men and women to whom she ministered. Though they were rough, uncouth, even profane and wicked, she never failed in her courtesy and bright cheerfulness, and the result was that patients under her control regained their health far more rapidly than those who were subjected to the depressing influences of moody, cheerless, censorious persons.

The same thing is said of Walt Whitman. When he was in the Government's employ at Washington, with a salary of one hundred and twenty dollars a month, he took forty dollars of this for his own use and spent the other eighty dollars to provide comforts and luxuries for the poor soldier boys in the hospitals. I have heard old soldiers tell of the way they used to feel when he appeared. "It was like the coming of a young Santa Claus." He carried a pack on his back which he would drop by the side of a bed and reaching out his friendly hand, with a radiant smile would say: "Well, how is it with you to-day?" and then, if the soldier were a stranger, he would ask: "Do you use tobacco?" If the man said, "No," he would reply, "That's good." If on the other hand he said, "Yes," Walt's reply would be the same, and he would dive down into his pack and bring out a little tobacco, which he would give with a few kind and cheery words to the poor bed-ridden soldier. If the invalid didn't use tobacco there was a book, a game, or something else that would bring cheer and forgetfulness. Thus he would pass up and down the wards, radiating brightness and good cheer on every hand. There is no wonder that as he passed outside every eye followed him, every heart felt an instinctive "God bless you," and every voice called out, "Come again, soon."

There surely are enough conditions in Nature to help the soul that wants to be cheerful and radiate cheerfulness. Every morning the sun arises with radiating light, brightness and beauty, illuminating and glorifying even the darkest and dullest of the things of earth. The stars shine nightly in all their sincere and calm beauty, radiating the assurance of Infinite power and perpetual care.

In radiant Nature, the butterfly skims the air in its light and fascinating flight, attracting the eye and charming with its exquisite coloring. The dew of morning, receiving the golden rays of the sun, makes the grass and trees appear as if blossoming in millions of diamonds, each a globe of radiating, scintillating brightness and beauty. The birds sing day and night, rain or shine, in sunshine or storm, radiating their cheerfulness and constant optimism. The trees awaken to the caressing touch of the sun and rustle to and fro, speaking in unmistakable language their joy of mere living, and glistening back and forth their appreciation of the gift of warmth and brightness. The flowers grow as freely in the wilds as in the cultivated gardens of man—blossoming evidences of Nature's power to produce gorgeous and resplendent color, perfection in beauty of form and exquisite deliciousness in odor. Even the snail crawls along expressive of delight in the morning, and the worm comes forth from the clod to express its appreciation.

I have watched the mountains with their snow-crowned, virgin-pure peaks soaring into the blue of the heavens and the massive rocks of the mighty canyons of the West basking restfully in the glorious light of day, and even these majestic rock-giants spoke the unmistakable language of joy, and called upon men to be cheerful.

We find exactly the same spirit and influence, if we will but look for it, in mankind. Too often we see but the sordidness, the greed, the selfishness, the cruelty, the rapacity of men, yet we all know that this is but one side, and it is not the reality, it is only the shadow of the real man, that the real man is kind, sympathetic, helpful, generous, true-hearted, and pure. If we fix our eyes upon one tiny spot the size of a dollar that is speckled or black, we can soon shut out all the brightness, beauty, and sweetness outside. I well remember one of the sentimental songs that was current in my boyhood days. It probably had as much of the mock sentiment as any other of these songs, but two lines of the refrain I have never forgotten, and whenever I hear one speaking of the unkindness of humanity, I feel like quoting them:

In spite of the strenuousness of our modern life, as we look around upon the social settlements, the orphan asylums, and the thousands of men and women who adopt helpless orphans, the prisoners' aid societies, where business men actually make a point of finding their help, where possible, from those who have served a term in prison or the penitentiary, and the thousand and one other institutions which show that the Golden Rule is actively in operation in the hearts of men and women—I say these things make me happy and cheerful, and I feel like singing for joy, that innate beauty is as much in evidence, and more, in the hearts and minds of men as it is in Nature.

So I want cheerfulness to be the constant habit of my mind and soul. I do not wish to be cheerful occasionally or semi-occasionally. I would prefer to be a man of one mood and that mood, with its variations, to be a mood of habitual cheerfulness. I regard a cheerful disposition as one of the most precious possessions. It is like a pair of spectacles that have the power of luminosity within themselves. It sees clearly enough but lightens up the darkest and most dreary spots of earth. Cheerfulness is not only a duty, but a philosophy, a religion, a wisdom. The cheerful man is the perpetually wise optimist. A cheerless or gloomy man is the perpetually unwise pessimist. And years ago I learned to test all philosophies and religions by practical life. No philosophy, no religion was good that could not satisfy every-day life. Optimism never fails at any time, but pessimism is worse than a broken reed to lean upon.

Take the pessimists you know, and I can pretty nearly stake my life upon it you will find nearly all of them dyspeptics, with poor circulation, shivering on a cold morning with their hands in their pockets, complaining that they were not awakened early enough, finding fault because the breakfast was not served just right, railing at the car service, ranting about the rottenness of men in public life. They seem to take a pride in believing, as did Dickens' Mantalini in Nicholas Nickleby, that "We are all going to the demnition bow-wows." What a contrast there is between this man and the Cheeryble Brothers of the same book, those great and simple-hearted human reservoirs of cheerfulness and optimism, radiating sweetness, happiness, content, wherever they went, blessing and benefiting every heart willing to accept the sweetness and purity of theirs.

Pessimism is not a working theory of life. It is the substitution of gloomy, deep-blue spectacles for the beautiful luminous ones. As Dr. Gulick says:

On the other hand, optimism cheers, encourages, brightens, beautifies, glorifies, blesses, helps. And I long ago learned that that man, that woman, who succeeds in helping and benefiting and blessing mankind is essentially an optimist.

The other day I saw the act of an optimist. He and a friend were seated in a street car. It was Saturday night, the car was crowded, and by and by two well-dressed men got in, one of them with an unmistakable look of refinement, the other somewhat coarse looking. Both had evidently been drinking heavily. The more refined and elder of the two could barely stand upright, as the car whirled around the curves. The optimist looked up, saw the state of affairs, and in the sweetest, gentlest manner arose and extended his hand and bade the elderly gentleman take his seat. There was no look of reproach or disgust, and yet I know that he was a rigid abstainer and strong temperance worker and one who hated every form of indulgence in alcoholic liquors. The companion of the man who had taken the seat, began to talk in the ordinary mumbling, rambling, effusive style of the drunkard, and the other without either impatience or any sign of disapproval, quietly entered into the conversation, and I speak only the fact when I state that without any preaching or fault-finding, his few earnest, sincere, optimistic words so won the heart of that large, coarse-looking, drunken man that he seemed absolutely sobered and responded to the higher call of the soul.

This is what optimism and cheerfulness do for mankind, hence I want to radiate it more and more.

Mark Twain was full of this spirit of radiating cheerfulness. In one of his darkest hours in San Francisco, before he had gained name or fame, things had gone wrong and a lady friend passing along a street saw him standing beside a lamp-post with a cigar-box under his arm. "Cigars?" she asked. "Where are you going in such a hurry?" "I'm m-o-o-v-i-n-g," drawled Mark, at the same time displaying the contents of the box which consisted of a pair of socks, a pipe, and two paper collars. Even in his darkest hours he was able to look out upon the bright side, and out from those hours of gloom came some of the brightest pieces of wit and cheerful philosophy to irradiate and bless the entire world.

If I were an employer of labor and could get the right men and women to do the work, I would employ a half dozen for my factory or workshop to teach my employees to be cheerful, to laugh and sing at their work. It would be a good paying investment. I would get a great deal more work out of my employees and of a great deal better quality. A hearty laugh is better than a bottle of medicine; a volume of Mark Twain or Marshall Wilder, better than a library of pessimistic philosophy of high sounding phrases.

Cheerfulness takes the jolts out of the rutty road of life. It is an extra pair of springs to the wagon. It is an automobile shock-absorber. It resists the encroachments of the grouch and bids the blue devils avaunt!

The old-fashioned methods of kings having a clown to keep them and their court laughing during meal time was a profound piece of philosophy and wisdom, for the stomach's sake, if for no other reason. The folly of the clown caused laughter, promoted genial humor which increased the flow of all the digestive juices and thus contributed to good digestion and perfect assimilation. The uncheerful father or mother who sits down to the table like a thundercloud and suppresses the bright, happy exuberance of childhood ought to be taken down to the dentist and pumped full of laughing-gas until he or she would laugh for a week. I would make such people laugh until their sides ached and they had to go to bed to get over it, and every time a frown or gloomy look came over the face I would have somebody lift a warning finger (but also a laughing face) and threaten them with another week's dose of laughing-gas.

"But," says the gloomy one, "life has gone wrong with me. How can I be cheerful when I am out of work and sick and have no friends?" Your case is hard, my friend. I recognize it with sympathy, but let me tell you this, that every grouchy look and word will make it harder for you to get work, and will put friendship further away from you. Even as a business proposition, it does not pay. Make yourself laugh and be cheerful, whether you can be or not, for very few men are willing to surround themselves with those who appear to be gloomy, depressed and grouchy. Learn the lesson that it does no good to indulge in self-pity. Whatever the adverse circumstances of life may be, face them like a man.

Years ago I had learned this lesson of refusal to pity myself, and I then wrote:

"I want to radiate a spirit that refuses to pity itself for any of its woes, its afflictions, its misfortunes, its sorrows. There is no weakness so weak as the weakness of self-pity; there is nothing so spiritually debilitating as to brood over one's own sorrows. It is a kind of melancholy selfishness; it neither helps one's self nor others; it is depressing to all concerned. I happened to read to-day in a popular novel a sentence that most truthfully expresses what I believe upon this subject: 'The most absolutely selfish thing in the world is to give way to depression, to think of one's troubles at all, except of how to overcome them. I spend many delightful hours thinking of the pleasant and beautiful things of life. I decline to waste a single second even in considering the ugly ones.'

"It is just as easy to form a habit of dwelling upon the sweet and good and beautiful and happy things of life as upon the bitter and evil and ugly and unhappy things. Brooding enlarges whatever it exercises itself upon, whether it be good or evil, joy or woe. So brood on the good things, cast out the others, and so live that you radiate this joy and determination not to recognize the evil and unpleasant things.

"Self-pity takes the backbone out of one. It robs one of his manhood, his courage, his daring to go on and face all the difficulties before him. It is self-pity that makes the suicide. He looks at his woes, his difficulties, until he cannot bear them, and so goes and takes the big plunge into the dark.

"Brother, sister, quit your self-pitying. There is another side to the darkness. Look up, not down. Remember that, in the words of Robert Browning, 'God's in His heaven, all's right with the world.' So I have long resolved to radiate cheerfulness as much when I am down, as when I am up—when misfortune glowers upon me, as when fortune smiles. It is so easy to interpret our material good as a proof of God's favor, and our material ill as a sign that He is displeased with us. Those who went to Jesus and asked, when the tower of Siloam fell and killed eighteen: 'Were they not sinners above all others because this thing happened to them?' are not without their myriads of counterparts in the world to-day. When a man strikes a new gusher in an oil region, or a good flow of water in a desert country, or his grainfield gives him seventy bushels to the acre, it is easy enough to believe that Providence is smiling upon him, and, therefore, his faith is strong and unquenchable. I have enough of that kind of faith. I can radiate that without an effort or thought. But I desire above all things to radiate a like sure and definite faith when my neighbor strikes a gusher and I do not; when my enemy finds a fine flow of water and my crops are being parched—I want as strong a sense of contentment when Fortune smiles upon the other fellow, as when it smiles upon me."

This leads to another practical radiance. It is that of absolute certainty that things do not happen. There is no such thing as a "happenstance" in the world.

"Nothing happens," is a word often on my inner lips. There is no evil, no wrong, no misfortune to the man who consciously lives with power ever surrounding him. In our short-sightedness, we dream, we think of evil, or ill, or wrong, or misfortune, but if our faith's eyes were always open, we should see nothing but good—and that all circumstances are good in their ultimate results upon us.

Some years ago I met a lady who possessed this spirit of radiant cheerfulness, and yet she was in a sanitarium and had undergone several severe surgical operations.

In conversation with her, I learned that some years before she had found herself afflicted with a tumor in her breast. The surgeon said that nothing but the knife would remove it. This seemed almost like a sentence to death, and my friend and her husband, children, and friends were deeply saddened by the necessity. They all went through a period of deep gloom, of darkness, of despondency. Then there came to her the idea that it was contrary to Nature that she and her loved ones should waste their time, energy, and strength in such repining and sorrow. She remembered the words, "Be careful for nothing, but in everything by prayer and supplication make your requests known unto God," and then there came to her the joy of the promise that followed: "And the peace of God which passeth all understanding shall keep your hearts and minds" in what is sure to be the spirit of peace and love.

So she began to look upon the duty of cheerfulness. She soon saw that it was the only path for her to walk in. The operation was performed. It was serious, and for three years she and her loved ones had to struggle hard to be cheerful and optimistic. But the results more than repaid for the efforts expended, for, when at the end of the three years, the tumor again appeared, even more serious in character, and she had to go to the hospital again, she found that, after the first few dark hours, a great peace stole over her whole being, and as a result of her cheerful radiancy, her husband and children were "adorably cheerful and loving." She has since said:

"I went to the hospital feeling sure that I could find peace in suffering, pleasure in pain, contentment through it all. When I was put upon the operating table this sense of peace and content and lack of fear enabled me to take the anesthetic easily, and after the operation was over, when the pain was terrible, to fight my battle with a happy heart. I faltered a little once or twice when the pain seemed to pile mountains high during the first few days, but when my nurse found that I meant to make the best of everything, she took hold in the right way with a spirit of determination to help me, so it was not long before I really seemed to rise, by means of the very mountains of pain that at first appeared as if they would overwhelm me, to summits of joy, content and satisfaction I could not have known without them.

"As I looked out of the windows, the trees seemed to be putting forth their leaves in richest beauty all for me. The birds—the robins and bluebirds—seemed to come and sing for me. The air grew daily more balmy and sweet, and as I contemplated these things, I found even the tremendous noises of switching cars and the disagreeable sounds of the engine, combined with the racket of the wagons that came rattling over the cobble-stones, came to be quite bearable. Peace and joy were in my heart. I was content, full, satisfied."

And she certainly looked it. She was a radiating reservoir of these glorious and uplifting qualities. How could she be otherwise? So, with this woman's experience in mind I again urge you to be cheerful. Be happy. Acquire the habit of the effort. It soon grows easy. Believe implicitly in the power of Good—and that the apparently bad is contrary to Nature's laws and wishes (being a result of some transgression or ignorance), and that whatever happens is good, for it works out for the best in the end.

And now, to conclude, or as our preacher friends say, "one more word." In my radiancy or cheerfulness, I want to remember to radiate all the time and to all people. It is easy enough to be cheerful in the presence of our superiors and with our companions and equals. But I notice that it is a very different matter with many people to be cheerful with those whom society and the world call their inferiors—the elevator boy, the bell boy, the valet, the chambermaid, the clerk, the stenographer, the laborer, the coachman, in other words, all those whom we call "servants." Many people feel that they are not under any obligation to be cheerful to them, but, oh, what a joy they miss, what a privilege they throw away. Why not especially radiate cheerfulness to the fullest possible extent to those who have less of this world's goods than ourselves? Why not help them bear the burdens of life by your radiant optimism? Let your cheerfulness be real, sincere, honest, manly. Try to concern yourself in their interests and understand somewhat of the battles they have to fight. It does not take up much time or require much effort. It is the spirit of the thing that is felt and that counts. So, be cheerful at all times and radiate your cheerfulness to all sorts and conditions of men. Thus you will go through the world leaving a blessed path of sweetness, brightness, and sunshine behind you which will illuminate, cheer, and bless all who walk therein.