The Bottineau pioneer. (Bottineau, N.D.) 1885-1895, 1888-10-18
Returns In Good Humor.
Rev. DR.. Talmage breaches Again in his Own
Pulpit, his Subject Being SIN Good
Humor with Onr Circumstances,

jOF MS SuDJecJ Ut MS cnuFcn IN brooklyn:
"In Good Humor with Our Circumstances
His text was Hebrews ch..13, v. 5: BE con-
tent with such things as We have" The great
preachers discourse was az follows:
If l should ask someone, where is Brook
Ign today?"' he would say, A Brighton
Beach, or East Hampton, orShelter Island"
Where is New York today? At Long
May" Where is Boston?" "At Martha.'s
Vineyard" Where is Virginia?" A the
Sulphur Springs" "Where the great multi
tude from all parts o the land?" 'At Sara
toga," the modern Bethesda, where the angel
of health is ever stirring the waters. But,
my friends, the largest multitude are at
home. detained by business or circumstances.
Among them all newspaper men, the hardest
worked and the least compensated; the city
railroad employees, and ferry masters, and
the police and the tens of thousands of clerks
and merchants waiting for their turn of abb
sence. and households with IN invalid who
cannot be moved, and Others hindered by
stringent circumstances, and the great null
titude of well-to-do people who stay at home
because they like home better than any other
place, refusing to go away simply because it
is the fashion to go. When the express wagon,
with it's mountains of runks directed to the
Catskil or Niagara, goes through the streets,
we stand at our window envious and impa-
tient, and wonder why We cannot go as well
as others. Fools that we ore, as though one
could not be as happy athome as anywhere
else. Our grandfathers and grandmothers
had as good a time as we have. long before
the first spring was bored at Saratoga, or
the first deer shot in the Adirondack. They
made their wedding tour to the next farm
house, or, living in New York, they celebrated
the event by an extra walk on the Battery"
Now the genuine American is not happy
until he is going somewhere, and the passion
is so great that there are Christian people
with their families detained in the city, who
com not to the house of God, trying to give
people the idea that they are out of town;
leaving the dOor-plate unsecured for the
same reason, and for two months keeping
the front shutters closed while they sit in the
back part of the house, the thermometer at
80! My friends, if it is best for us to go, let
us go and be happy. If it is best for us to
stay at home, let US stay at home and be
happy. There is a great deal of good CON-
mon sense in Paul's advice to the Hebrews:
"Be content with such things az We havc.''
To be content is to be in good humor with
our circumstances, not pickinga quarrel with
our obscuIity, or our poverty, or our social
position. There are four or five grand rea-
sons why we should be content will such
things ns we have.
The first reason that I mention as leading
to this spirit advised in the text, is the con-
sideration that the poorest of us have all that
is indispensable in life. We make O great
ado about our hardships, but how little we
talk of our blessing. Health of body, which
is given in largest quantity to those who
have never been petted, and fondled, and
spoiled by fortune. we take as q matter of
course. Rather have this luxury, and have
it alone, than, without it, look out of q pal
ace window upon parks of deer stalking be-
tween fountains and statuary. These peo-
pie sleep sounder on a straw mattress than
fashionable invalids on a couch 0 fivory and
eagles down. The dinner of herbs tastes
hpttpr t0 tho annntjto SharDpna1 on n wood.
mans axe or a reaper's scythe. than wealthy
indigestion experiences seated at q table
covered with partridge, and venison, and
pineapple. The grandest luxury God ever
gave q man is health. He who trades that
off for all the palaces of health is infinitely
cheated. We look back at the glory of the
last Napoleon, but who would have taken
his Versailles or his Tuileries if with them he
had been obliged to take his govt? "Oh,"
says someone. at isn't the grosser pleasures
l covet, but it is the qualifications of an
artistic. and intellectual TASTE" Why, my
brother, you have the original from which
these pictures are copied.
What is q sunset on the wall compared with
q sunset hung in loops of fire OH the heavens?
What is q cascade silent on anvas COM
pared with u cascade that makes the noun
tain tremble, it's spray ascending like the de-
parted spirit of the water slain on the rocks?
Oh, there is q great deal of hollow affectation
about O fondness for pictures on the part of
those who never appreciated the original
from which the pictures are taken. A Although
q parent should have no regard for his child,
but go into ecstacy over it's photograph.
Bless the Lord today, o man! 0 womani
that though you may be shut out from the
works of the Church, a Bierstadt, a Rubens,
and a Raphael, you still have access to a
gallery grander than the Louvre, or the
Luxembourg, or the V~atican-the royal gal
lery of the MONDAY heavens, the Kings gal
lery of the midnight sky.
Another consideration leading us to @ spir-
it ofcontentment is the fact that our happiness
is not dependent upon outward circumstan-
ces. You see people happy and miserable
amid all circumstances. In q family where
the last loaf is on the table, and the last
times find a cheerful confidence in God,
while in q very fine place you will see and
hear discord sounding her war whoop, and
hospitality freezing to death in a cherries
parlor. I,stopped one day on Broadway at
the head DIV all street, at the foot of Trinity
Church, to see who seemed the happiest peo-
pie passing. l Judged, from their looks the
happiest people were not those who went
down into Wall street, for they had on their
brow the anxiety of the dollar they expected
to make; nor the people, who came out of
Wall street, for they had on their brow the
anxiety of the dollar they had lost; nor the
people who swept by in splendid equipage,
for they met a carriage that was finer than
theirs. The happiest person in all that
crowd, Judging from countenance, was the
woman who sat at the apple stand knitting.
/ believe real happiness oftener looks out Of
the window of an humble home, than through
the opera glass of the gilded box of q theater.
l find Nero growing on a throne. l find
Paul singing in q dungeon. l find King Ahab
going to bed at noon through melancholy,
while near by is Naboth contented in the
possession of a vineyard. Hannah, prime
minister of Persia, frets himself almost to
death because a poor Jew will not tip his hat;
yers OF Bible times, through fear of dying,
hangs himself. The wealthiest man, 40 years
ago, in New York, when congratulated over
his large estate, replied: "Ah! you don't
know how much trouble l have had in taking
care of it," Byron declared in his last hours
that he had not seen more than 10 happy
days in all his life. do not believe he had
seen IL minutes thorough satisfaction. Ma
polean I. said: Il turn with disgust from
cowardice and selfshness Of man. | hold
lite a horror; death is repose. What l have
suffered the past 20 days is beyond human
comprehension" While, on the other hand,
to show how any one may behappy amid the
most d~isadvantageous circumstances, just
after the Ocean Monarch had been wrecked in
the English channel, q steamer was cruising
along in the darkness, when the captain heard
a song, a sweet song, coming over the water,
and he bore down toward that voice and
it was a Christian woman on q plank of the
the wrecked steamer, singing to the tune of
St. Martins: " .
%"Jesus, lover of my soul,
Let me to thy bosom fly,
While the pillows near me roll,
While the tempest still is high"
The heart right to GOD and man, we are
happy, The heart wrong toward God and
man, we are unhappy,