The Bottineau pioneer., 1890-03-15
Would You Like to Live.
Your Life Over
Agains
The Best Use Should Be
Made of This
Life.

Uvef ARalnI. Ills CeXO was JOU II, =. a An
that man hath will he give for his life. =
He said ;1
That ia untrue. The Lord did not soy it,
but satan said it to the Lord, when the evil
one wanted Job more afflicted. The record
is. $50 went Sntan forth from the presence
OF the Lord and smnte Job with sore boils. g.
and Satan has been the author Of all eruptiye
disease since then, nnd he hopes by poison
ing the blood to poison the soul. But the
result of the diabolcal experiment which left
Job victor proved the falsity of the Satanic
remark All that man hath will he give
for his life." Many captain who.
has stood on the bridge of the steam
er till his passengers got off and he
drowned; many an engineer who has kept his
hand ON the throttle valve, or his foot on the
brake until He most Of the train>was saved,
while he went down to death through the open
drawbndge; many fireman who plunged in
to house to get sleeping child out, sscri.
ficing his life at the attempt, and thousands
OF martyrs who submitted to fiery stake and
knife of massacre and headsman's ak and
guilIotine- rather than surrender principle,
proving that in many a case my text wasnot
true, when it eays: "All that q man hath
will he give for his he.''
The fact is that no intelligent and right
fearing man is satisfied with his past lie. We
have all made 80 many mistakes, stumbled
that ought not to have been said and done
so many things that ought not to have been
done, that we can suggest at least 30 per
cent of Improvement. Now would it not be
grand if the good Lord would say to you:
"You can go back and try it over again.
will by word turn your hair to brown or
blnck or golden, and smooth all the wrinkles
out OF your temple and cheek, and take the
bend ont of your shoulders, and extirpate
the stiffness from the joint and the rheumatic
twiuge from the foot, and you shnll be Il years
OF age and lust what you were when you reach
ed that point before" If the proposition
were made think many, thousands would
search for what was called the Fountain Of
Youth, the waters of which taken would
turn the hair of the octogenarian into the
curly locks of q boy, and however old a per-
son who drank at that ountain he would be
young again. The island was said to be-
longto the group of the Bahamas, but
lay far ont in tie ocean. The
Leon, fellow voyager with Columbus. | have
no doubt felt that If he could discover that
Fountain of Youth he would do as much as
his friend had done in discovering America.
So he put out in 1919 from Porto
Rico and cruised about among the
tain. There is no such fountain. But if
there were and it's waters were bottled up
and sent abroad at thousand dollars bot
tie, the demand would be greater than the
supply. and many q man who has come
through q lie of useessness, and prehaps sin,
to old age would be shaking up the potent
liquid, and if he were directed to take only
k~~ f,,1 ooo1,v has
ious to make sure work he would take table,
spoonful, and II directed to take tablespoon
tui would take q glassful. But some Of you
would have to go back further than to twen-
ty-one years of age to make fair start, for
there are many who manage to get all
wrong before that period. Yea, in order to
get fair start some would have to go buck
rected; yea, to the grandfather and grand
mother and have their lie corrected, Tor
some of you are suffering from bad heredita-
ry influences which started q hundred years
ago. Well, If your grandfather lived his life
over again and your ;ather lived his life over
again and you lived your life over again,
what ciuttered up place this world would
be, place filed with miserable attempts
at repairs. begin to think that it is bet
ter for each generation to have only
one chance and then Tor them to pass off
and give another generation chance.
Besides that, ii we were permitted to live
life over again, it would be a stale and stupid
experience. The zest and spur and enthusi-
asm of life come from the fact that we have
never boen along this road before, and every
thing is new, and we are alert for what may
appear at the next turn OF the road. Sup.
pose you, man in midli e or old age, were,
with your present feelings and large attain
ments, put back into the thirties, or the
twenties, or into the teens, what q nuisance
you would be to others and what an unhappi-
ness to yourself Your contemporaries
would not want you and You would not want
them. Things that in your previous journey
OF life stirred your health'ul ambition. or.
gave you pleasurable surprise, or led you in
to happy Interrogation, would only callfOrth
be blase nt thirty and q misanthrope at for
ty and uncomfortable at fifty. The most in
SANE and stupid thing imaginable would be o
second journey of life. 1t is amusing to hear
people say: 81 would like to live my Ii over
again, il could take mp present experience
and knowledge OF things back with me and
begin under those improved auspices Why
your present attainments in child b mind.
No one rould want such hoy around the
house:
A philosopher at twenty. q scientist at if-.
teen, an archaeological at ten and o domestic
nuisance all thestim An oak crowded into
an dcOfH hOcky MOuHbdtn eN&le GnFu6G
back into the egg shell from which it was
hAtched. .$t
Beside that, would you want to risk the
temptations Of life over again2 From the
fact that you are hereI conclude that though
in many respects your life may have been nm
fortunate and uuconsecrated You have got
on SO far tolerably well, ifnothing more than
tolerable. As for myself, though NV life has
been far from being as copsecratel as /
would like to have had it, / would not like to
try it over again, lest next time would do
worse. Why, just look at the temptations
we have passed through and just look at the
multitudes who have gone completely
under. just call over the roll Of your
school mates and college mates, the
bank, or the operatives in the same factory
with jnst az good prospects asyou, who have
come to complete mishap. Some young
man that told you that he was going to be
millionaire and own the fastest trotters on
Nestchester turnpike and retire by the time
he was 80 years OF nge, you do not hear from
him TOR many years, and know nothing about
him until some day he comes into your store
and asks for fve cents to get mug OF
beer. You, the good mother Of q household
and all your children rising up to call yon
blessed, can remember when you were quite
jealous of the belle OF the village who
was BID transcendently fair and popular.
But while you have these two hnpor-
able and queenly names Of wife and moth
er. she became poor wai of thestreet,
and went into the blackness OF darkness for
ever. Live life over again? Why, many OF
those who are now respectable we're per
mitted to experiment, the extjourney would
be demolition. You got through, AZ Job
says, BY the skin Of your teeth. Next time
would say: II know him now better than
did before and have for so years been study