The Windham County reformer. (Battleboro, Vt.) 1876-1897, 1881-03-11
The Soul and Immortality.
From a sermon by Rev. G. C. Merriam

| d
THAT old expression ''the loss of SOUL
may well suggest to us thought quite
different from that of endless suffering; the
thought rather of mans higher nature SO
squandered and wasted that nothing re-
mains of it, Jesus speaks of a man who
has spent his whole energies to getting
wealth, planting always wider fields, build
| ing larger barns; a man careless OF honor,
| tenderness, faith; man who makes one
think of some of our money-kings. At
midnight comes to him the words, ''Thou
fool this night thy soul shall be required
OF theen We seem to hear the poor
shivering wretch make answer: ''Lord, |
have no SOUL lost it long ago." Truly,
what does it profit man to gain the whole
world and lose his own soull Yet, how
much of the time are we working on that
very ne,-eagerly seeking ''the world"
that is, wealth for ourselves, pleasure for
ourselves, ease, comfort; things that per-
ish in the using; things that leave no en-
rchment; and meantime, just so far,
losing our soul, missing the disinterested-
ness, the fidelity, the pure affections, Whose
growth makes up and constitutes the soul.
A real soul death never can harm. For it
we may be absolutely fearless. But, those
who shall be found having no sou, having
thrown it away, or frittered it away, of
them, what shall we Think In them,
too. let us trust the divine eye sees some
germ that is worth preserving. Even for
them we need not despair. But for our
selves there is this one thing to do, living
or diving; to make for the things that are
of real account,-to live in things eternal.
So of that relation where the question of
the future comes more closely home to us
than anywhere else,-as to those whom
we love better than we do ourselves How
many closely-knit friends, -comrade with
comrade, lover with his betrothed, hus-
band and wife, mother and child, ask with
intense questioning, viii death be the end
OF our lovei and before that question per-
haps feel themselves powerless Poweress 2
You have mighty power in the matter.
You can work into your love the earthly
or the eternal quality. Just so far as it is
self forgetting, as it has its exercise and
sphere in shings worthy to endure, as its
bond grows nobler while the years go on,-
so far it takes hold on eternity. Give love
its full nobility Let it be to you not Sc
Guiding, but charging; not shutting you up
in a selfish paradise, but taking you always
into wider, truer tenderer companionship
with other souls. Live together in the
steady facilities, in the noble emotions. for
the great interests. Ensphere your love in
humanity, in nature, in God. Guard it
ceaselessly against that subtle self-seeking
which values your friend not for himself
but for what he gives to you. Nothing on
earth is so impregnable against death as
true love. To mankind there comes an
ever-renewed, solemn testimony that death
is not foe but friend, when his blow falls
ON the most precious of all our possessions,
and instead of destroying gives it higher
birth. That trranscendent, inexpressibe
sense of continued communion and love
sacred and significant beyond all other ex-
periences, to him who has felt II most
incommunicable to him who has felt 1t not
belongs to that relation which in its
earthly estate has had something of the
spiritual and eternal quality. Carlyle has
spoken the true word, first Of the union OF
lives on earth mystical, more than mag
icsl. is that communing Of soul with soul,
both looking heavenward: here properly
soul first speaks with soul; for only in look
ing heayenward, take it in what sense you
nav. not in looking earthward. does whAt
we can call union, mutual love, society,
begin to be possible Ii is the Hearts that
in such an atmosphere have grown together
who can receive that other high word:
'sThe lost friend is still mystoriously here
even as we are here mysteriously, with
Godl Know Of a truth that only the time
shadows have persisted, or are Perishsbls- "