--- 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: 6 published: 1905-04 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. 6 (April 1905): 471–473.' source: url: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0806unse 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: improvementera0806unse start_page: 471 end_page: 473 rights: status: public-domain basis: US publication 1930 or earlier (published 1905-04) source: https://archive.org/details/improvementera0806unse 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 NOTES. ' 469 men have forwarded their answers. Out of the number, we have selected the following, which are samples of the best received: As the stars differ from each other in size and brilliancy, so differ people from each other in temperament, fancies and tastes. All people cannot be taught and led in the same way. Some are strong willed, others mild. In governing them, we must deal accordingly.—Syl- VANUSIVERSON. Solve your own problems, rather than copy entirely from the slate of your neighbor.—Edmund W. Carbine. Some girls have to have their minds made up for them; some don't. —Erin Quist. NOTES. Let no man talk of freedom until he is sure he can govern himself. —Goethe. Every kindness done to others in our daily walk, every attempt to make others happy, every prejudice overcome, is a step nearer the life of Christ.—Dean Stanley. There is no duty so much underrated as the duty of being happy. By being happy we sow anonymous benefits upon the world, which remain unknown even to ourselves, or, when they are disclosed, surprise nobody so much as the benefactor. The giraffe once had a short neck,—that was all he had expressed of himself,—but his pasture ran short and he began to reach up for the pakn leaves. He reached and looked, and reached again. This exercise stretched his neck, until it is now long enough to reach the palm tops, so it has ceased to grow longer. As long as he kept reaching out, his neck kept growing. As long as we aspire, look up and not down, as long as we keep stretching our minds over great problems, we shall continue to grow. Some guilty people might be taken for innocent, if they were not, like the Scotchman, too anxious to have people believe a lie. It is told of a certain prominent Englishman, that while, on one occasion, he was 470 IMPROVEMENT ERA writing a letter in a restaurant, he noticed a Scotchman reading it over his shoulder. The letter concluded as follows: "I would write more if it were not for a inquisitive Scotchman, who is looking over my shoulder and reading every word I write." "It's a Ke, sir," shouted the Scotchman, "I haven't seen a word." The great prizes of life do not fall to the most brilliant, to the cleverest, to the shrewdest, to the most long-headed, or to the best educated, but to the most level-headed men, to the men of soundest judgment. When a man is wanted for a responsible position, his shrewdness is not considered so important as his sound judgment. Reliability is what is wanted. Can a man stand without being tripped; and, if he is thrown, can he land upon his feet? Can he be depended upon, relied upon under all circumstances to do the right thing, the sensible thing? Has the man a level head? Has he good horse sense? Is he liable to fly off on a tangent or to "go off half-cocked?" Is he "faddy?" Has he "wheels in his head?" Does he lose his temper easily, or can he control himself? If he can keep a level head under all circumstances, if he can not be thrown off his balance, and is honest, he is the man wanted.— Success. The most effectual way to avoid the temptation to wrong-doing is to fill the mind, the heart, and the life full of right-doing. The inculcation of good manners and good morals will be the inevitable result of this thorough development of the whole nature of the child to be realized in the school of the future. And for the part that horticulture will take in the work of the school of the future and the moral lesson it will teach the child, let us listen to these words of Henry Ward Beecher: "The sun does not shine for a few trees and flowers only, but for the wide world's joy. The lonely pine on the mountain top waves its dark boughs and cries, 'Thou art my sun!' The grain in the field calls out> 'Thou art my sun!' "God sits glorious in heaven, not for a favored few, but for alland there is no creature so poor or so low that he may not look up with child-like trust and say, 'My Father, Thou art mine!' "—Maxwell's Talisman. IN LIGHTER MOOD. Friend: "Did you get the appointment?" Office-seeker: "Nah! I got the disappointment!" "The evening wore on," continued the man who was telling the story. "Excuse me," interrupted the would-be wit; "but can you tell us what the evening wore on that occasion?" "I don't know that it is important," replied the story-teller. "But if you must know, I believe that it was the close of a summer day."— Commercial Tribune. One day Senator Hoar was joined in the corridor of the Capitol by a former colleague, and as they approached the entrance to the Senate Chamber, Mr. Hoar motioned his companion to pass in first. "After you," said the ex-senator, drawing back. "No, indeed" retorted Senator Hoar; "the X's always go before the wise." "When I hear a man boast that he is conservative," said Thomas Taggart, chairman of the National Democratic Committee, "I am reminded of a story told of William Travers, the stuttering joker, once famous in New York. "Travers went to the halt in which the Siamese Twins were first exhibited in this country. He gazed at them for a time as they sat with the bond of flesh that united them exposed to view. Then Travers, with his face as serious as an owl, remarked, 'B-b-b-brothers, I p-p-presume?'" You must not be sure you have a bov's heart because you have his ear. A teacher recently required an unusually obstreperous boy to remain after school, so that she could have a heart-to-heart talk with him. She kept him for a time, and gave him such counsel as seemed to move his heart. He looked at her straight and attentively, until she felt she had succeeded. She only realized the futility of her effort when, after she had concluded, he said calmly to her: "Teacher, it's your lower jaw that moves when you talk, ain't it?"