--- title: Improvement Era description: Monthly periodical of the Mormon church, 1897 onward. This library holds the issues of November 1897 to December 1930. authors: - Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations collections: - periodicals tags: - magazine - improvement-era periodical: Improvement Era volume: 8 number: 5 published: 1905-03 publisher: Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations publisher_place: Salt Lake City language: en type: magazine reference: 'Young Men’s Mutual Improvement Associations, "In Lighter Mood," *Improvement Era* 8, no. 5 (March 1905): 390.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0805unse transcription: Transcribed from the Internet Archive scan of each issue (the item for each issue is named in the issue's own source); unnumbered advertising leaves are omitted, printed page numbers are kept as page markers. identifier: improvementera0805unse start_page: 390 end_page: 390 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1905-03) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0805unse publication_year: 1905 note: The Internet Archive item metadata carries a blanket "© Copyright by Intellectual Reserve, Inc." notice. The library owner judged it inapplicable because this issue was published in 1905, before 1931; a scan-level notice does not restore copyright. --- # In Lighter Mood IN LIGHTER MOOD. An old Scotchman said of a preacher "that he was invisible six days of the week and incomprehensible on the seventh." An Oklahoma man has discovered that there were department stores in ancient Hebrew days. He quotes the fourteenth verse in the fourteenth chapter of Job: "All my appointed time will I wait, till my change come." Teacher: "Willie, who was it that prompted you then? I heard some one whisper that date to you." Willie: "Please, ma'am, I expect it was history repeatin' itself again."— Tit-Bits. "Deed, Mistah Fommeh!" cried 'Rastus Johnsing, caught with the goods on in Mr. Fommeh's turkey coop: "deed, suh, I is n' a-stealin' dis yah bird,—Is a-takin' it in self defense. Hones' I is." "Self-defense? What kind of a lie are you trying to tell me?" "Plea«e, suh, mah wife she say ef I doan' fotch home a tukkey she gwine ter break ebery bone in mah body. An' so I jes' 'bleeged ter pertect mahse'f/'—Judge. Mothers in their training of children often find original ideas in the little ones that will out under some form or other. Thus, in Harper's Weekly, Mrs. Gertrude Atherton, the authoress, is quoted as telling of the tribulations of a friend in New York, who is the mother of a particularly mischievous boy of some seven years. "One evening recently," says Mrs. Atherton, "when the mother was getting the boy ready for bed after what she termed 'a day of unmitigated outrageousness' on the part of her hopeful, she said to him: " 'Now when you say vour prayers tonight, Richard, remember to ask God to make you a better boy. You have certainly been bad to-day.'" Accordingly, the youngster began his petitions to the Almighty in the usual form. Before closing with the customary "Amen," he added, "And please, God, make me a better boy." Then he paused a moment, and, to the utter consternation of the long-suffering mother, he concluded his prayer with unabated gravity: "Nevertheless, not my will, oh, Lord, but thine be done."