Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1897-09-22
REV. DIR. TALMAGB.
The Eminent Divlne'S Sunday
Discourse,

DhS~VntOVs
The Different Lives Men Lead-Why Some
Are Successful and Others Fail-A Life
of Sin and Worldly Indulgence Is a
Dire Failure-The Life Worth Living.
TEXT: What is your life?"-James iv.,
H.
If we leave to the evolutionists to CUES.
| where we came from and to the theological
to prophesy 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 empties, but
there can be no doubt the fact that we are
| sailing on it. So am not surprised that
everybody asks the question, rs life worth
| living?'
Solomon, in his unhappy moments, says
it is not, VANITY" "vexation of spirit -
| mo good" are his estimate. The fact is
that Solomon was at one time polyga;nist
and that soured his disposition. One wife
him wretched. But Solomon was converted
from polygamy to monogamy, and the last
| words he 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 lugu-
brious and sepulchral and entitled "Lamen-
tations," he plainly intimates that the
blessings 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 intonation to
| all lands and to all centuries, Wherefore
doth living man complain?'
| A diversity of opinion in our time as well
as in olden time. Here is young man of
| light hair and blue eyes and sound diges-
| tion and generous salary and happily
affianced and on the way to become a 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, yesl' Here is man
who has come to the forties. He is at the
| tiptop of the hill of life. Every step has
been q 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 the food
he does eat does not assimilate. Forty
miles climbing up the hill OF life have been
to him like climbing the Matterhorn, and
| there are forty miles yet to go down, and
| descent is always more dangerous than as
cent. Ask him whether life is worth living
and he will drawl out in shivering and
Luxurious and appalling negative, mo,
no, no."
How are we to decide this matter right
eously and intelligently? You will find the
same man vacillating, Oscillating in his
opinion from detection to exuberance, and
il he be very mcrcurial in his temperament
it will depend very much on which way the
wind blows. II the wind blow from the
northwest and you ask him, he will say
Yes" and il it blow from the northeast
and you ask him he will say, No" How
are we, then, to get the question righteous
ly answered? Suppose We call all nations
| together in great convention on eastern
or western hemisphere, and let all those
who are in the affirmative say, AYE" and
all those who are in the negative say, mo. y
While there would be hundreds of thou
sands Of those who would answer in the af-
firmative, there would be more millions
who would answer in the negative, and
because of the greater number who have
sorrow and misfortune and trouble the noes
| would have it, The answer 1 shall give
\ will be different from either, and yet it will
commend itself to all who hear me this day
| as the right answer. II YOU ask me, 'Is
| life worth living?" 1t answer, 81 all depends
| upon the kind of life you live"
| In the first place, remark that a life of
mere money getting is always a failure, be-
cause you will never get as much as you
want. The poorest people In this country
are the millionaires. 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 after year in storehouses, in Govern
ment securities, in tenement houses, in
whole city blocks. You ought to see them
| jump Wutu tucy near Tie lIt Utll INK.
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 nerves
tremble like harp strings, but no music in
the vibration. They read the reports from
I Wall street in the morning with a concern
ment that threatens paralysis or apolexy,
or more probably they have a telegraph or
telephone in their own houses. so they
catch every breadth Of change in the money
market. The disease of accumulation has
eaten into them--eaten into their heart,
into their lungs, into thetr spleen, into
| their liver, into their bones.
Chemists have sometimes analyzed the
human body, and they say it is so much
magnesia, so much lime, so much chlorate
of potassium. II some Christian chemist
would analyze one Of these financial be-
hemoths, he would find he is made up of
copper and gold and silver and zinc and
lead and coal and iron. That Is not a life
worth living. There are too many earth
quakes In 1t, too many agonies in it, too
many perditions in it. They build their
castles, and they open their picture gal
| leries, and they summon prima dOnnas,
and they offer every inducement for happi-
ness to come and live there, but happiness
| will not come. They send footmanned and
postilioned equipage to bring her. She
| will not ride to their door. They send
princely escort. She will not take their
|
phal arches. She will not ride under them.
They set a golden throne before a golden
plate. She turns away from the banquet.
They call to her from upholstered balcony.
She will not listen. Mark you, this is the
failure Of those who have had large accum-
ulation.
And then you must take into considera-
tion that the vast majority of those who
make the dominant idea of life money get
ting fall far short Of affiuence. 1t is esti-
mated that only about two out of a hun
dred business men have anything worthy
the name of success. A man who spends
his life with one dominant idea of financial
accumulation spends a life not worth liv
! ing.
So the idea of worldly approval. II that
be dominant in a mans life he is miserable.
Every four years the two most unfortunate
men in this country are the two men nom
mated for the Presidency. The reservoirs
| of abuse and diatribe and malediction
gradually fill up, gallon above gallon, hogs
head above hogshead, and about midsum.
mer these two reservoirs will be brimming
full, and hose will be attached to each
one, and it will play away on these two
nominees, and they will have to stand il
and take the abuse and the falsehood. and
the caricature and the anathema, and the
caterwauling and the filth, and they will
be rolled in it and rolled over and over IL
it until they are choked and submerged
turning consciousness they will be barket
at by all the hounds Of political partie.
from ocean to ocean. And yet there are
hundred men to-day struggling for tha
privilege, and there are thousands Of mel
who are helping them in the struggle
Now, that Is not a life worth living. Yo,
can get slandered and abused cheaper thar
that. Take 1t on q smaller scale. Do no
be SO ambitious to have a whole reservoi
rolled over on you.
| But what you see in the matter of higl
political preferment you see in every com
munity in the struggle for what is calle,
social position. Tens of thousands of peo
pie trying to get into that realm, and the
are under terrific tension. What Is socia
position? 1t is a difficult thing to define
but we all know what it is. Good moral
and Intelligence are not necessary, bu
wealth, or q show Of wealth, is absolutel
Indispensable. There arc men to-day q
| n,d OriOuS for THAR 1.-The rtip m "a nj