University of Virginia Library

LIFE IS SWEET.
BY MISS CATHARINE M. SEDGWICK.

“LIFE IS SWEET.”

It was a summer's morning. I was
awakened by the rushing of a distant
engine, bearing along a tide of men to
their busy day in a great city. Cool sea
breezes stole through the pine tree, embowering
my dwelling; the aromatic
pines breathed out their reedy music;
the humming bird was fluttering over
the honeysuckle, at my widow; the grass

glittered with dew drops. A maiden
was coming from the dairy across the
lawn, with a silver mug of new milk in
her hand; by the hand she led a child.
The young woman was in the full beauty
of ripened and perfect womanhood. Her
step was elastic and vigorous; moderate
labor had developed without impairing
her fine person. Here face beamed with
intelligent life, conscious power, calm
dignity, and sweet temper. "How sweet
is life to this girl!" I thought, as, respected
and respecting, she sustains her
place in domestic life, distilling her pure
influences into the little creature she
holds by the hand! And how sweet
then was life to that child! Her little
form was so erect and strong—so firmly
knit to outward life—her step so free
and joyous!—her fair, bright hair, so
bright, that it seemed as if a sunbeam
came from it: it lay parted on that brow,
where an infinite capacity had set its
seal. And that spiritual eye—so quickly
perceiving—so eagerly exploring! and
those sweet red lips—love, and laughter,
and beauty, are there. Now she snatches
a tuft of flowers from the grass—now she
springs to meet her playmate, the young,
frisky dog—and now she is shouting
playfully: he has knocked her over, and
they are rolling on the turf together!

Before three months passed away, she
had lain down the beautiful garments of
her mortality: she had entered the gates
of immortal life; and those who followed
her to its threshold, felt that, to the end,
and in the end, her ministry had been
most sweet. “Life is sweet” to the
young, with their unfathomable hopes—
their unlimited imaginings. It is sweeter
still with the varied realization. Heaven
has provided the ever-changing loveliness
and mysterious process of the outward
world in the inspirations of art—
in the excitement of magnanimous deeds
—in the close knitting of affections—in
the joys of the mother—the toils and

harvest of the father—in the countless
blessings of hallowed domestic life.

“Life is sweet” to the seeker of wisdom,
and to the lover of science; and
all progress, and each discovery is a joy
to them.

“Life is sweet” to the true lovers of
their race; and the unknown and unpraised
good they do by word, or look, or
deed, is joy ineffable.

But not alone to the wise, to the
learned, to the young, to the healthful,
to the gifted, to the happy, to the vigorous
doer of good,—is life sweet: for the
patient sufferer it has a divine sweetness.

“What,” I asked a friend, who had
been on a delicious country excursion,
“did you see that best pleased you?”

My friend has cultivated her love of
moral, more than her perception of physical
beauty, and I was not surprised
when, after replying, with a smile, that
she would tell me honestly, she went on
to say: “My cousin took me to see a
man who had been a clergyman in the
Methodist connection. He had suffered
from a nervous rheumatism, and from a
complication of diseases, aggravated by
ignorant drugging. Every muscle in his
body, excepting those which move his
eyes and tongue, is paralyzed. His body

has become as rigid as iron. His limbs
have lost the human form. He has not
been lain on a bed for seven years. He
suffers acute pain. He has invented a
chair which affords him some alleviation.
His feelings are fresh and kindly, and
his mind is unimpaired. He reads constantly.
His book is fixed in a frame
before him, and he manages to turn the
leaves by an instrument which he moves
with his tongue. He has an income of
thirty dollars! This pittance, by the
vigilant economy of his wife, and some
aid from kind, rustic neighbors, bring
the year round. His wife is the most
gentle, patient, and devoted of loving
nurses. She never has too much to do,
to do all well; no wish or thought goes
beyond the unvarying circle of her conjugal
duty. Her love is as abounding
as his wants—her cheerfulness as sure
as the rising of the sun. She has not
for years slept two hours consecutively.

“I did not know which most to reverence,
his patience or hers! and so I said
to them. `Ah!' said the good man, with
a most serene smile, `life is still sweet
to me; how can it but be so with such
a wife?”'

And surely life is sweet to her, who
feels every hour of the day the truth of
this gracious acknowledgment.

Oh, ye, who live amidst alternate sunshine
and showers of plenty, to whom
night brings sleep, and daylight freshness
—ye murmurers and complainers, who
fret in the harness of life, till it gall you
to the bone—who recoil at the lightest
burden, and shrink from a passing cloud,
—consider the magnanimous sufferer,
my friend described, and learn the divine
art that can distil sweetness from the
bitterest cup!