Courier Democrat. (Langdon, N.D.) 1891-1920, 1891-10-22


selves without any imploration OF
divine guidance. So we have now in
the pulpits men making sermons who
ought to be in the blacksmith shops
making plowshares, and we have in
the law those who instead OF running
the cases of their clients ought to be
pounding shoe lasts, and doctors who
are the worst hindrances, to their
patients convalescene, and artists
trying to paint landscapes who ought
to be whitewashing board fences.
While there are others making bricks
who ought to be remodeling constitu-
tions, or showing planes who ought to
be Transforming literauures. Ask God
about what worldly business you shall
undertake until you are so positive
you can in earnestness smite your
hand on your pillow handle or your
carpenters bench. or your Black
stones Commentaries, or your medi-
cal dictionary, or your Doctor Dicks
Didactic Theology, saying: "For this
end was born" There are children
who early develop natural affinities
for certain styles OF work. Then there
are those
BORN FOR, SOME ESPECIAL WORK,
and their fitness does not develop un-
til quite late. When Philip Doddridge,
whose sermons and books have har-
vested uncounted souls for glory, be-
gan to study the ministry, Dr.. Calamy,
one of the wisest and best men, adj
vised him to turn his thoughts to
other work, Isaac Barrow, the emf
nent clergyman and Christian scien-
tist-his books standard now though
he has been dead oyer two hundred
years-was the disheartenment of his
father who used to say that ifitpleas-
ed God to take any of his children
away he hoped it might be his son
Isaac. So some OF those who have
been characterized for stupidity in
boyhood or girlhood, have turned
out the mightiest benefactors or
benefactresses OF the human race.
These things being so am not right
in saying that in many cases God
only knows what is the most appro-
pirate thing for you to do, and he IS
the one to ask. And let all parents,
and all schools and universities, and
all colleges recognize this, and a large
number of those who spent their best
years in stumbling about and among
businesses and occupations, now try
ing this and now trying that, and fail
ing in all, would be able to 60 ahead
with a definite, decided and tremen-
dous purpose, saying "to this end was
l born"
But my subject now mounts into
the mOmentOuS. Let me say that
you are made for usefulness and
heaven. judge this from the way you
are built. You go into q shop where
there is only one wheel turning and
that by workman's foot Oh q
treadle, and you say to yourself:
'here is something good being done,
yet on a small scale;" but if yon go in
to factory covering many acres, and
you find thousands OF bands pulling
on thousands of wheels, and shuttles
flying, and the whole scene
BEWILDERING WITH ACTIVITIES,
driven by water, or steam, or electric
power, you conclude that the factory
was put up to do a great work on
vast scale. Now, I look at you, and
if l should find that you had but one
faculty of body, one muscle, only one
nerve, if you could see but could not
hear, or could hear and not see, if you
had the use OF only one foot or hand,
and, as to your higher nature, if you
had but one mental faculty, and you
had memory but no judgment, or
judgment but no will, and you had a
soul with only one capacity, l would
say not much is expected Of you. But
stand up, oh man and let melook you
squarely in the face. Eyes capable of
seeing everything Ears capable Of
hearing everything. Hands capable
OF grasplng everything. Mind with
more wheels than any factory ever
turned, more power than any Corliss
engine ever moved. A soul that will
outlive all the universe except heaven,
and would outlive all heaven if the
lives of other immortals were mo-
ment short OF the external. Now, what
has the world q right to expect ofyou?
God is the greatest of economists in
the universe, and he makes nothing
uselessly, and for what purpose didhe
bu Id your body, mind and soul as
they are built? There are only two
beings in the universe who can answer
that question. God knows, and you
ought to know. "What shall l dor"
you ask. My brethren, my sisters, do
not ask me. Ask God. There's some
path of Christian usefulness open. 1t
may be a rough path, OF it may be a
smooth path, a long path or a short
path. 1t may be on a mount of con-
spicuity, or in a valley unobserved,
but it is a path on which you can
start with such faith and such salts
faction and such certainty that you
can cry out in the face of earth and
hell and heaven: ITO this end was I
born" Do not wait
FOR EXTRAORDINARY QUALIFICATIONS
Philip the conqueror gained his great
est victories seated on mule, and if
you wait for some comparisoned
Bucephalus to ride into the conflict
you will never get into the world wide
fight at all. Samson slew the Lords
enemies with the jawbone of the
stup1dest beast created. Siiamgar
slew six hundred of the Lords enemies
with an ox-goad. Under God, spittle
IL II !