Wheeling register. [volume] (Wheeling, W. Va.) 1878-1935, 1881-01-03
TIME IS PASSING.

Are You Employing II the Right Wsy p
Another Milestone Has Just Been
Passed
special Dispatch 70 tho Register.
New YORE, Jarusry ,.
The Brooklyn tabernacle was we'll filled
this evening. The opening hymn was:
Our God. our hep in ages past,
Our hope for years % come
Subject; "Your Age"
Text: Gen. xlvii, S-"How CID art thou"
At midnight Of last Friday the gate of
eternity opened TO let in, amid the great
throng Of departed centuries, the soul OF
the dying year. Under the twelfth
stroke Of the brazen hammer OF the city
clock the patriarch fell dead. and the
stars OF the night were the funeral
torches. IL is most fortunate that on
this road OF life there are so many mile
stones, on which We can read Just how
fast We are going towards the journeys
eud. feel that ID is not an inapprOpri.
ate question that | ask this evening
when | look into your faces and say, as
Pharaoh did 10 Jacob, the patriarch,
How old art thou"
People who are truthful on every
Otuer BuDJeCl,
Lie About Their Ages.
so that / do not solicit from YOU any
literal response TO the question | have
asked / would put no one under temp
tation; but | simply want, this evening,
to see by what route it is We are meas
uring our earthly existence. There is a
right way and wrong way OF measur-
ing a door, or wall, or an arch, or
tower; and so there is a right way and
wrong way of measuring our earthly ex-
istence. Ii is with reference 10 this
higher meaning that Iconfront y1u with
the stupendouS question of the text and
ask, "HOw old art thOu?'
There are many who measure their
life by mere worldly qualification when
Lord Dundas was Wisheda happy new
wear, he said: at will have 10 be a
happier year than the past, for l hadn't
one happy moment in al! the twelve
months that have gone" But that has
not been the experience Of most OF Us.
We have found that though the world is
blghted with sin, it is a very bright and
beautiful place tO reside in. We have
had JOYS innumerable. There is no
hostility between the Gospel and the
merriments and the festivities of life. !
do not think that We fully enough APP
Dreciate the worldly pleasures God gives
us. When you recount your enjoy
ments, you do not
Go Far Enough Back
Why do you not go back to the time
when YOU were an infant in your moth
er's arms, looking up into the heaven OF
her smile? Were you never bOy7
We're you never agirl?. Between those
times and this, how many mercies, how
many kindness;s the Lord has bestow-
Ell upon you. It there is any one who
has a right TO the enjOyments of the
world il is the Christian, for God has
given him lease To everything IN the
promise: "All are yours But | have
To tell YOU, that man who measures
his lie on earth by mere worldly gratl-
ficatiOn is a most unwise man. Our life
- not to be game Ci chess. 1t Is not a
dance in a lighted hall to quick music.
II is not the iroth OF an ale pitcher. Ii
Is not the settiings of wine cup. IL is
not a banquet with intOXiCatiOn and
ruiSterirg. IL i the first step on lad
der that mounts into the skies, or the
frs, step on a road that plunges into a
horrible abyss. 30 that in this world
we are only keying up the harp OF etern-
al rapture, or iorgirg the chain OF an
eternal bondage standing before you
tonight. with life on the one side, and
death on the other; song on the one side
and groaning on the other; mansions on
the one side and dungeons on the other;
heaven on the one side and hell on the
other. put to YOU the question OF the
text: How Old art thou?' Towards
what destinr are you tending, and how
fast are YOU getting on towards 1t?
Again, | remark that there are many
who
Measure Their Life on Earth by Their
Sorrows
and their misfortunes. Through great
many OF your lives the plOughshare hath
gone very deep, turning up a terrible
iurrow. You have been betrayed and
misrepresented and set upon and
SLAPPED OF impertlnence and pounded
of misfortune. The brightest light must
have its shadows and the smoothest
path its thOrns. No escape from trouble
OF some kind. Misfortune, trial, vexa-
ton for almost every one. Pope, ap-
plauded OF all the world, has StoOp in
his shoulders that annoys him so much
that lie has a tunnel dug so that he may
20 unohserved from garden to erotto
and from grotto to garden. And so,
sometimes through taste and sometimes
through learned menace, and sometimes
through physical distresses, aye, in ten
thousand ways, troubles come TO her
rass and annoy. And vet it is unfair 20
measure mans life by his misiortunes,
because where there is one stalk OF