News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1897-09-15
LIFE WORTH LIVING.
lT is A LIFE FOR GOD AND A LIFE
FOR OTHERS.

entable Fatlure-The Life That Opens
Into Eternity.
WASHINGTON, Sept. 12.-In this sermon
Rev. DIR. Talmage discusses a subject vital
to all, and never more timely than now,
when the struggle for power, position,
wealth and happiness is so absorbing. The
text is James iv, IA, "What is your life?"
If we leave to the evolutionists to guess
where we came from and to the theologi-
ans to prophGsy where we are going to, we
still have left for consideration the import
ant fact that we are here. There may be
some doubt about where the river rises and
some doubt about where the river empties,
but there can be no doubt about the fact
that we are sailing on it. So am not sur
prised that every body asks the question.
''Is life worth living?"
Solomon in lis unhappy moments says
1t is not VANITY, "vexation of spirit"
"no good" are his estimate. The fact is
that Solomon was at one time a poyga-
mist, and that soured his disposition. One
wife makes man happy. More than one
makes him wretched. But Solomon was
converted from polygany to monogamy,
and the last words he ever wrote, as far as
we can read them, were the words "moun-
tains of spices" But jeremiah says life is
worth living In book supposed to be
Goleful and lugubriOus and sepulchral and
entitled Lamentations he plainly init
mates that the blessing of merely living is
so great and grand blessing that though
a man have piled on him all misfortunes
and disasters he has no right to complain
The ancient prophet cries out in startling
information to all lands and to ell centuries,
Wherefore doth living man complaint"
Conflicting Evidence.
A diversity Of opinion in our time as
well as in olden time. Here is a young
man of light hair and blue eyes and sound
digestion, and generous salary and happily
afIianced and on the way to become part
ner in a commercial firm of which he is
an important clerk. Ask him whether life
is worth living. He will laugh in your
face and say, "Yes, yes, yes!" Here is a
man who has come to the fOrties. He is
at the tiptop CT the Hill Of life. Every step
has been q stumble and bruise. The peo-
pie he trusted have turned out desertCrs,
and the money he has honestly made he
has been cheated out Of His nerves are
out of tune. lie has poor appetite, and the
food he does cat does not assimilate Forty
miles climbing up the hill of life have
been to him like climbing the Matterhorn,
and there are 40 miles yet to go down,
and descent is always more dangerous
than ascent Ask him whether life is
worth living, and lie will drawl out in
shivering and lugubrious and appalling
negative, "No, no, no!''
How are we TO decide this matter right
eously and intelligently? You will LEd
the same man vUClllating, oscillating in
his opinion from detection to exubcrunce
and if he be very merCurial in his tenn
permanent it will depend very much On
which way tho wind blows. If the wind
blow from the northwest and you ask
him, no will say Yes" and if it blow
from the northeast and you ask him he
will say "No." How are we then to get
the question righteously answered? Sup
pose we call all nations together in great
convention on eastern or western hemi-
sphere and let all those who are in the
affirmative say AYE" and all those who
are in the negative say mo" While there
would be hundreds Of thousands who
would answer in the affirmative, there
would be more millions who would an
swer in the negative, and because of the
greater number who have sorrow and mis-
fortune and trouble the Noes" would
have it, The answer shall give will be
different from either, and yet it will com
mend itself to all who hear me this day as
the right answer. If You ask me, sis life
worth living?' | answer, :" 1t all depends
upon the kind Of life you live.
In the first place, remark that a life of
mere money getting is always failure be-
cause you will never get as much as you
want. The poorest people in this country
are the millionaircs There is not a scls-
sors grinder on the streets of New York or
Brooklyn who is so anxious to make money
as these men who have piled up fortunes
year after year in storehouses, in govern
ment securities, in tenement houses, in
whole city blocks. You ought to see them
jump when they hear the fire bell ring.
You ought to see them in their excitement
when a bank explodes You ought TO see
their agitation when there is proposed a
reformation in the tariff. Their uerN Is
tremble like harp strings but no music in
the vibration. They read the reports from
Wall street in the morning with "a concern
ment that threatens paralysis or apoplexy,
or, more probably, they have u telegraph
or a telephone in their own house, SO they
catch every breath of change in the money
market The disease of accumulation has
eaten into them-eaten into their heart,
into their lungs, into their Spleen into
their liver into their bones.
Chemists have sometimes analysed the
human body, and they say it is so much
magnesia, so much lime, so much chlorate
of potassium. If some Christian chemist
would analyze one of these financial behe-
tnotbs bp yyOuld find he IL made nm Of Cou-
per and gold and silver and zinc and lead
and coal and iron That is nota life worth
living. There are too many earthquakes
in it, too many agonies in it, too many
perditions in it. They build their castles,
and they open their picture galleries. and
they summon prima donnas, and they offer
every inducement Tor happiness TO come
and live there, but happiness will not
come. They send footmaned and postil
toned equip8ge to bring her She will not
ride to their door They send prince ly
escort. She will not take their arm They
make their gateways triumphal arches
She will not ride under them. They SEQ
golden throne before "a golden plate. I'll,
turns away from the banquet. They cal
to her from upholstered balcony. She vii
not listen. Mark you, this is the failure
of those who have had large accumulation
Worldly Failure.
And then you must take into considera
ton that the vast majority of those VIII,
make the dominant idea of life money get
ting fall far short of ailluence. 1t is esti
mated that only about two out of a hun
dred business men have anything worth,
the name of success A man who spend
hie Iifo with the ona dominant idea a