The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1897-09-21
WHAT IS YOUR LIFE?
REV. DIR. TALMAGE DISCUSSES
THIS MOMENTOUS QUESTION

and the Kind That Opens Into Eternity,
The Struggle for Wealth, Position and
Happiness.
In this sermon Rev. DR.. Talmage
discusses a subject vital to all, and
never more timely han now, when the
struggle for power, position, wealth
ard happiness Is sc absorbing. The
text is James iv, IA, What is your
life?"
II we leave to the evoluticnis:s 10
guess where we came from and
to the theologians to D~ophesy where
we are going to, we still have left for
consideration the important fact that
we are here. There may be some
doubt about where the river rises and
some doubt about where the river emp
ties, but there can be no doubt about
the fact that we are sailing on 1t. So
I am not surprised hat everybody asks
the question, lis life worth living?"
is LIFE WORTH LIVING?
Solomon in his unhappy moments,
says it is not true. Vanity" "vexa-
ton Of Spirit mo good" are his es-
innate. The fact is that Solomon was
at one time 6. polygamist n thai
soured his disposition. One Wife makes
a man happy; more than one makes
him wretched. But Solomon was con-
verted from polygamy to monogamy,
and the last words ne ever wrote, as
far as we can read them, were the
words mountains of Spices" But
jeremiah says life is worth living. In
a book supposed to be doleful and
lugubrious and sepulchral and entitled
Lamentations" he plainly intimates
that the blessing Of merely living is
so great and grand a blessing that
though a man ave piled on him all
misfortunes and disasters he has no
right to complain. The ancient pro-
phet cries out in startling information to
all lands and to all centuries, h
fore doth a living man complain! q
A diversity of opinion in our time as
we'll as in olden time. Here is a young
man Of light hair and blue eyes and
sound digestion n generous salary
and happily affianced and on the
way to become a partner in a
cial 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 Of the hill of life. Every
step has become a stumble and a
bruise. The people he trusted have
turned out deserters, and the money he
has honestly made he has been cheated
out Of. His nerves are out of tune. He
has poor appetite, and h food he
does eat does not .assimilate. Forty
miles climbing up the hill Of life have
been to him like climbing the Matter
horn, and there are forty miles yet to
20 down., and the descent is always
more dangerous than ascent. ASK him
whether life is worth living, and he
will drawl out in shivering and lugu-
brious and appalling n~egativXe, mo,
no., no!"
How are we to decide this matter
righteously and intelligently? You will
find the same man vacillating, Oscillat-
ing in his opinion from detection to ex-
uberance, and If he be very mercurial
in his temperament it will depend very
much on which way the wind blows.
If the wind blows from the northwest
and you ask him, he yill 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 right
eously answered? Suppose We call all
nations together in a great convention
on eastern or on western hemisphere,
and let all those who are in the affir-
native say, Aye" and all those who
are in the negative a mo-" While
there would be hundreds Of thousands
who would answer in the affirmative,
there would be more millions who
would answer in the negative, n be-
cause of the greater number who have
sorrow and misfortune and trouble
the hoes would have it. The answer I
shall give will be different from either,
and yet it will commend itself to all
who heal me this day as the right
--- n-ly mn T life ynrfh
living?" I answer, 1T all depends upon
the kind of life you live"
MONEY GETTING.
In the first place, 1 remark that a life
Of mere money getting is always a fail
ure, because you will never get rs
much as you ant. The poorest
pie in this country are the millionaire .
There is not a scissors 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
afteryear 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 the in their ex-
element when a bank explCdes You
ought to see their agitation when there
Is proposed a reformation in the tariff.
Their nerves tremble like harp strings,
but no music in the vibration. They
read the reports from Wall street In
the morning with a concernment that
threatens paralysis or apoplexy, or
more probably they have telegraph
or a telephone in their own house, sc
they catch every breath of change in
the money market. The disease of &C
emulation 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, n they say It is SO
much magnesia, so much lime, so much
chlorate of potassium. If some Chris
tian chemist wOul analyZe one of these
financial behemoths, he would find he
is made up of copper and gold anG sill
yer and zinc and lead and coal and
3ron. That is not a life worth living.
There are too many earthquakes in it,
too many agonies in it, too many per-
Gitions in it. They build their castles,
and they open their picture galleries,
~~S %l0xv IVY rrsDoo Io-rn- ord