Travis County Texas Archives History - Letters .....Letter To Mr. & Mrs. J. F. Boring January 23, 1910 ************************************************ Copyright. All rights reserved. http://www.usgwarchives.net/copyright.htm http://www.usgwarchives.net/tx/txfiles.htm ************************************************ File contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by: Claudia Lackey DEL1338@aol.com June 26, 2007, 7:51 pm 2914 Salado St. Austin Tex 1/23/10 Mr. & Mrs. J. F. Boring, Seguin, Texas Dear Brother & Sister: To-day for the first have I had a real opportunity to write to you. We received your card, telling us that you were married and living on the new place, last week. Maggie also returned a card with a promise that a letter would soon follow. It is not my purpose today to write a long panegyrie or vice versa, but to wish you a long, happy, and successful life. To this end I hope you will consider your situation seriously and earnestly with a view to reach such ideal. This being your aim, I hope you will live a clean, noble, upright private life, each striving to command the highest command and respect from the other. Never be guilty of words or deed that will lower mutual admiration. Rather make personal abnegations than to displease the other, since you probably are no exception to the rule that all people are prone to transgression. Therefore always be ready to forgive and be forgiven. It is often said that charity begins at home, and lo! what charity it too frequently is! Keep your home fresh and cheerful. Read as much as possible - and the best of reading matter. A good idea can be gotten just as easily as a bad one. And in fact the principal difference between a cultured lady or gentleman and a come-happy-go-lucky idiot is that the former seized every obtainable good idea and appropriated it while the latter gobbled up the chaff or chased after fruits of jackanapes and popinjays. The effects are too evident to admit of discussion. You have some books of excellent quality, others that are not as good, and a few that are not quite as good as none at all. Introduce new thoughts into your minds. Don’t let them live on old thread bare, hackneyed notions that have been sung over a thousand times. I see people living from year to year without adding a single good new idea or thought to their store of knowledge (however under such conditions much rot usually creeps in) and they are usually unhappy and discontented. The healthy mind craves for a wholesome supply of new thought as well as the body desires and need fresh and a variety of good food. Whenever it is not so cared for, it will in the course of time crystallized into those characteristics so peculiar to ignorant, cranky, eccentric old men and old women. Considering these and a hundred other conditions, I urge you to make it a policy from the beginning to introduce into your home a certain amount of good literature every year. Now, I know that you are both anxious to win a good social economic standing. (Pardon me if I seem a little pedantic to you. I, however, am not trying to tell you anything new; but I’m rather calling your attention to such wonderful opportunities for a good beginning which you are apt to consider lightly in the bliss of your honeymoon.) Nothing will give you good standing and confidence than thoughts, honesty and infallible promptness in meeting all your business obligations. If you dupe a man one time, you have lowered your character that much and have at least one man distrustful of you forever after. If you make one pseudo contract or business engagement, you have laid yourself open to severe criticism. A second one will shatter confidence which may take years to be restored. And after a third one with the same business or person will inevitably place you where you never need expect anything more from their hands or from those who are cognizant of such fact. It is deplorable to see how many men lose good opportunities and make, too often, failures of their lives on this account. I could point out a dozen individual cases. For example I will give one. Last year one of my student friends was troubled a good bit with sickness in consequence I helped him with his work. He soon decided to quit school as soon as he could get a position somewhere. One day I loaned him some of my papers which by special agreement he was to return before a certain day. On the morning of the last allotted day he had not returned the papers. Just at supper time another party called me over the phone, asking me to come immediately to teach a certain school at $75.00 per month. I told him that I could not come whereupon he asked me to recommend him another person. Having my friend in mind, I asked him to give me 24 hr. time which he granted. Thinking that this fellow might return the papers after supper, thus fulfilling his agreement, I would recommend him as he was about what they wanted and which he would have gladly taken. At the end of the 24 hrs. (my friend not having returned the papers which were after all worth only a few hrs. work) I phoned to the party telling him that I had no one to recommend. Being interested in your success and welfare, I express this wish that you always be strictly honest and above reproach in all of your transactions and prompt in your agreements. The conditions will bring you into better social life. Be slow to take offense and make many friends. Remember that one enemy can do more harm than a dozen friends can do good. Let all your actions bespeak modesty and good will to all, i.e., be mild as the dove but wise as the serpent. Keep the good will of your nearer kin and it will be easier to win those farther away. Whenever you have a man of quality, hold to him as his friendship is worth more than that of a dozen happy idiots. Let your actions in general be guided by consideration and modesty. Don’t be odd. Note the commendable qualities of other men and women and make them your own. I will now conclude by saying all the above is an expansion of my wish for your future welfare, prosperity, and happiness. Hoping that it may be an inspiration to lead you on to other and greater things, I remain Your loving brother, E. W. Bartholomae And also that we may hear from you occasionally. E. W. B. File at: http://files.usgwarchives.net/tx/travis/history/letters/letterto36gms.txt This file has been created by a form at http://www.genrecords.org/txfiles/ File size: 6.8 Kb