Pioneer life in the Benton Co. WA area
Pioneer Writes on Spring/Column Turns into Sermon
By BURTON 0. LUM
Tri-City Pioneer
Tri-City Herald, Sunday, 20 May 1962
Could the Old Pioneer call to your attention that this is the merry month of May? That in all the twelve months of the calendar year of this Tri-City Region, the countryside is now its loveliest. Mother Nature never goes on a strike. She has her contract to perform, by day and by night. She asks for no contingent or fringe benefits or escalator clauses. She has a job to do and she does it. The grass must grow and cover the earth. The leaves must clothe the trees. The fruit buds swell and break into bloom. The busy bees will pollinize them, that fruit may form and bear. Mother Nature scents the air with the fragrance of spring flowers. Like a mother hen, her warm breast hatches forth each dorment seed and sleeping bulb and root. She crowns with success the labors of the trusting gardener. This is the season of the year that heaven and earth draw close to each other.
Why not enjoy it? Just turn off “The yelping Slug and Slam Box” for a while. Park your old “jalopy” Get down to earth and walk on it again. Spend some of the time you think you have saved in enjoying that which God has given you for free. Your legs need the exercise. Your lungs, the real breath of spring. The lilacs and snowballs are most beautiful. The iris is beyond description. Pansies are raising their faces to the sun. The climbing roses are budding and some of the varieties of bush rose are in bloom. The clucking hen encourages and entreats her brood of fluffy chicks to scratch and hunt for bugs. The spring lambs kick up their heels and swing their tails in merriment. The black birds, robins and meadow larks instruct their broods in flight. The bunny rabbits perk their noses and flick their ears. The entire country side is aglow with new born life. The spring rain washes and rinses each leaf and blade of grass. The breezes of spring reflect the beauty of the meads and meadows that lie below. Each fleecy cloud and thunderhead curtains the lights and tempers the warmth to meet the need.
As we behold these beauties and powers given by God’s grace, why should we fear or listen to the ravings of these soulless fiends whose blood-stained hands and rotted brains seek to destroy and confuse? Should we forsake our way of life and live in burrows in the ground? When one steals from us and tells us lies, should we increase his credit and believe his falsehoods? Would we be prudent if we never counted our losses? Remember that most nations have had a goodly supply of Lewiscite Poison Gas since World War I, and no country has ever used it because of its destructive power. No real peace can be founded on fear because somewhere in the course of events, someone will forget to be afraid. Peace on earth will perhaps never be obtained by physical power. Its solution is a moral issue. It will come from the soul of man and not from the strength of his body. The prudent righteous must protect their liberties physical preparedness until such time that the nations of the earth are sufficiently morally advanced to discern right from wrong. Let us not forget the lessons we learned in our disarmament program during the Harding Administration.
Well, well. The Old Pioneer started out to give you a trip through the present beauties of the Tri-City Region and ends by giving a lecture and sermon on world affairs. Well, maybe a sermon is appropriate. Today is Sunday, is it not?
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