habit of looking at the bright, happy
side of things, who sees the glory in the grass, the sunshine in the
flowers, sermons in stones, and good in everything, has a great
advantage over the chronic dyspeptic, who sees no good in anything. His
habitual thought sculptures his face into beauty and touches his manner
with grace.

We often forget that the priceless charm which will secure to us all
these desirable gifts is within our reach. It is the charm of a sunny
temper, a talisman more potent than station, more precious than gold,
more to be desired than fine rubies. It is an aroma, whose fragrance
fills the air with the odors of Paradise.

"It is from these enthusiastic fellows," says an admirer, "that you
hear--what they fully believe, bless them!--that all countries are
beautiful, all dinners grand, all pictures superb, all mountains high,
all women beautiful. When such a one has come back from his country
trip, after a hard year's work, he has always found the cosiest of
nooks, the cheapest houses, the best of landladies, the finest views,
and the best dinners. But with the other the case is indeed altered. He
has always been robbed; he has positively seen nothing; his landlady was
a harpy, his bedroom was unhealthy, and the mutton was so tough that he
could not get his teeth through it."

"He goes on to talk of the sun in his glory," says Izaak Walton, "the
fields, the meadows, the streams which they have seen, the birds which
they have heard; he asks what would the blind and deaf give to see and
hear what they have seen."

Of Lord Holland's sunshiny face, Rogers said: "He always comes to
breakfast like a man upon whom some sudden good fortune has fallen."

But oh, for the glorious spectacles worn by the good-natured man!--oh,
for those wondrous glasses, finer than the Claude Lorraine glass, which
throw a sunlit view over everything, and make the heart glad with little
things, and thankful for small mercies! Such glasses had honest Izaak
Walton, who, coming in from a fishing expedition on the river Lea, burst
out into such grateful little talks as this: "Let us, as we walk home
under the cool shade of this honeysuckle hedge, mention some of the
thoughts and joys that have possessed my soul since we two met. And that
our present happiness may appear the greater, and we more thankful for
it, I beg you to consider with me, how many do at this very time lie
under the torment of the gout or the toothache, and this