The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1897-09-17

old neighbors gather in the old farm
house to do the last Offices of respect.
But as that farming son, and the cler-
gyman, and the senator, and the mer-
chant, and the two daughters stand by
the casket of the dead mother taking
the last look, or lifting their little chill
dren to see once more the face of dear
old grandma, | want to ask that group
around the casket enc question, DO
you really think her life was worth liv-
ing?" A life for God, life for others,
life of unselfishness, a useful life, a
Christian life, is always worth living.
Right Living.
would not find it hard to persuade
you that the poor lad, Peter Cooper
making glue for living, and then
amassing great fortune Until lie could
build a philanthlCIy which has had its
echo in 10, 900 philanthropies all over
the country-I ould not find it hard
to persuade you that his life was worth
living. Neither would find it hard to
persuade you that the life of Susannah
Wesley was worth living. She sent out
one son to organize Methodism and the
other son to ring his anthems ali
through the ages would not find it
hard work to persuade you that the life
of Frances Leeie was worth living, as
she established in England a school for
the scientific nursing of the sick, and
then when the war broke out between
France and Germany went to the front
and with her own hands scraped the
mud off the bodies of the soldiers dying
in the trenches and with her weak arm
standing one night in the hospital
pushing back German soldier to his
couch, as, all frenzied with his wounds,
be rushed to the door and said, LET
me go, let me go to my liebe mutter,
major generals standing back to let
pass this angel of mercy.
Neither would | have hard work to
persuade you that Grace Darling lived
a life worth living-the heroine OF the
lifeboat. You are not wondering that
the Duchess of Ncrthumb erland came
to see her and that people of all lands
asked for her lighthouse and that the
proprietor of the Adelphi theater III
London offered her 500 night just TO
sit in the lifeboat while some shipwreck
scene was being enacted.
But | know the thought in the minds
of hundreds of you today. You say,
"While | know all these lived lives
worth living, l don't think my life
amounts to much. 3" All, my friends,
whether you live life conspicuous or
inconspicuous, it is worth living, If
you live Alright. And l want my next
sentence to go down into the depths OF
all your souls. You are to be rewarded
not according to the greatness Of your
work, but according to the holy indus
tries with which you employed the tai
ents you really possessed. The majority
of the crowns of heaven will not be
given to people with ten talents, for
most of them were tempted only to
serve themselves The vast majority Of
the crowns of heaven will be given to
people who had one talent, but gave 1t
all to God. And remember that our lie
here is Introductory to another. 1t is
the vestibule to a palace, but who de
spises the door of a Madeleine because
there are grander glories within? Your
life, if rightly lived, is the first bar OF
an eternal oratorio, and who desrises
the first note of Haydn's symphonies?
And the life you live now is all tho
more worth living because it opens into
q life that shall never end, and the last
letter of the word thine" is the first
letter of the word "eternityf'