Mother

—Mother's Day


—Home Training

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The Great Men of the World Pay Her the Highest of Tribute—A Carnation Day Thought.

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THE LESSON—That the welfare of the church and of the home rests more with the mothers than with the Sunday School teacher.

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It is interesting to read the recorded words of some of the world's greatest minds in tribute to moth

rhood. The following talk, quoting some of these, should be an impressive lesson to the young and to the mothers as well.

The Talk.

"Who are these mothers for whom we have decorated our school room and ourselves with these beautiful flowers? [Draw, in black outline the carnation blossom; add the stem in solid green, and place the lettering in purple, red or blue, Fig. 56.]

"Surely these mothers must be of great importance or we would not be having a special service for them today. I have been reading a little about mothers, to see if they are really of much value to the world, and I want to repeat some of the things I have read. [It is well to have all of these quotations in note form to be read with accuracy.]

"I find that John Randolph, one of America's greatest statesmen, said, 'I should have been an atheist if it had not been for one recollection—and that was the memory of the time when my departed mother used to take my little hand in hers and cause me on my knees to say, "Our Father who art in heaven."'

"I find that Abraham Lincoln said of his mother, 'All that I am and all that I hope to be I owe to my mother. Blessings on her memory!'

"I find that George Herbert said, 'One good mother is worth a hundred schoolmasters.'

"I find that Oliver Wendell Holmes said,

"'Youth fades; love droops; the leaves of friendship fall;


A mother's secret hope outlives them all.'

"I find that Coleridge said,

"'A mother is a mother still,


The holiest thing alive.'

"I find that Beecher said, 'A mother's heart is the child's school room.'

"I find that Benjamin West, the great artist, said, 'A kiss from my mother made me a painter.'

"I find that General Wallace, in Ben Hur, said, 'God could not be everywhere, so he made mothers.'

"I find everywhere the great men of the world paying loving tribute to these mothers, and after all there is only one real perfect, true and faultless mother in all the world and that is our own mother, whether she be gone before or whether she be still with us. I am sure that every one of us older ones will find ourselves in tune with the expressive words of George Griffith Fetter, who wrote:

"'The noblest thoughts my soul can claim,


The holiest words my tongue can frame,


Unworthy are to praise the name


     More sacred than all other.


An infant, when her love first came—


A man, I find it just the same;


Reverently, I breathe her name,


     The blessed name of mother.'

"And so, I answer the question that I asked at the beginning, who are these mothers? Really, it seems to me that the mothers of the world are the power which keeps it moving toward all that is good and high and holy. Mother love has been a power in the world since history commenced, and the scriptures are filled with beautiful demonstrations of it. How we love to read the story of the mother of Moses who hid her child in the bullrushes and then succeeded in being engaged as his nurse. How often has the heart thrilled at the hearing of the story of Samuel and his mother! How strongly the mother love manifested itself at the time of the judgment of Solomon who was called to determine the possession of the child claimed by two women. And what could be more beautiful than the pictures of the devotion of the mother of Jesus to Him who was to be the Savior of the world?

"Verily, 'the hand that rocks the cradle is the hand that rules the world,' through the love of good which the mother hopes for her child. The mother of today in America has a greater problem than ever before. The boys of today are the men of tomorrow. The boys will be what the mothers make them; and with this thought, I want to change our drawing slightly to indicate the ever-present problem which is never safe except in the hands of the right kind of mothers of the boys of today and of the future generations. [Add the words to complete Fig. 57.]

"May God bless you, mothers, and help you to help these boys and these girls to meet the great problems which are before them. You must help them. Without you, they are on unsafe ground, treading perilous paths."