| Home Making |
Chapter 2 |
Page 11 |
It is of the little avail to bring flowers to a wife’s coffin when you failed to strew flowers on the path while her weary feet were painfully walking over it. It is of little avail to speak her praises now in every ear, to recount her excellences and dwell upon her virtues, when in her lifetime you never had a word of praise for her own ears, nor a loving compliment, nor any token to show to her how much you prized her.
“You placed this flower in her hand, you say,
This pure, pale rose in her hand of clay?
Methinks, could she lift her sealed eyes
They would meet your own with a grieved surprise.
“When did you give her a flower before?
Ah, well, what matter when all is o’er?
* * * * *
“But I pray you, think, when some fairer face
Shines like a star from her wonted place,
That love will starve if it is not fed–
That true hearts pray for their daily bread.”
The time to show love’s tenderness is when it is needed; if we have failed then, the duty never can be rendered at all. No after atonement of lavish affection can brighten the hours that were left unbrightened in passing, or lighten the burdens that were left unlightened when the weary spirit was bowing under them.
Page 11
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