The Wilmington daily Republican. (Wilmington, Del.) 1890-1902, 1898-11-14
,THE..PPURP 50lsjEi 0ELllIFH
Oh TALMAeE ON THE AIM AND OBJ
t IT, SEcT or EXISTENCE.

I'M lAhMAoE ON InS AIM AMI O0>
t.e, . sEcT or EXISTENCE.
The END Of Life shoula he Action.
Premonitions of Usefulness - The
Necessity of SpecialaEing-ParaAi
Shall he the Reward IT Labor.
copyright. 1898. by American Press Assoc
cdation.l
WASHINGTON, Nov. l8.-To all those who
feel they have no especial mission In the
world, this sermon Of Dr. Talmage will
come 90 cheering revelation; text, John
xviii, 81, ITO this end was born"
After PLATE had suicided, tradition says
that his body was thrown into the Tiber,
and such storms ensued ON and about that
river that his body was takon out and
thrown into the Rhone and similar dis
turbanoes swept that river and its banks.
Then the body was taken out and moved
to Lausanne, and put In a deeper pool,
which Immediately became the center of
similar atmospheric and aqueous disturb
anoes. Though these are fAnoiful and
false traditions, they show the oxecratlon
with which tho world looked upon PLATE.
III was before this man, when he was In
full life and power, that Christ was mr.
raigned as Ii oourtof oyer and terminer
PLATE said to his prisoner, "Art thou
king, thenw and Jesus answered, "To this
end was born" Sure enough, although
all earth and hell arose to keep him down,
he Is today empalaoed, enthroned and
coroneted king of earth and king Of heav-
en-. That ia what he came for and that is
what no accomplished.
BY the time child reaches 10 years of
age the parents tegin to discover that
ohild's destiny, but by the time he or she
reaches 10 years of age, the question is on
the child's lips: "What shall dor What
am going to beP What was made forS"
It is asensible and righteous question, and
the youth ought to keep asking 1t until
It Is 60 fully answered that the young man
or young woman can say with as much
truth as its author, though on less ex-
pansive scale, ITO this end was I born"
r Tho Divine Purpose.
! There ia too much divine skill shown In
the physical mental and moral oonstitu-
ton Of the ordinary human being to sup
pose that he was constructed without any
divine purpose. II you take me out on
some vast plain and show mo pillared
temple surmounted by dome like St
Peters and having a floor Of precious
stones and arches that must have taxed
the brain Of the greatest craftsman to de-
sign, and walls scrolled and niched and
paneled, and wainscoted and painted, and
! should ask you what this building was
put up for and you answered. "For moth
ing at ALL" how could believe your And
&c i,r,v FOv tob holt hat
ordinary human being who has In his
muscular, nervous and cerebral organiza-
ton moro wonders than Christopher Wren
lifted In St. Paul's, or Phidias ever ohisel-
ed on the Acropolis, and built in such
way that 1t shall last long after St. Paul's
cathedral Is as much ruin as the Parthe.
non-that such o being was constructed
for no purpose, and to execute no mission,
and without any divine intention toward
some end The object Of this sermon is to
help you to find out what you are made
for and help you find your sphere and as
sist you into that condition where you can
say with certainty and emphasis and en-
thusiasm and triumph, ITO this end was
! born"
First, discharge you from all RESPONSE
bility for most of your environments. You
are not responsible for your parentage or
grandparentage You are not responsible
for any Of the cranks that may have lived
in your ancestral line and who hundred
years before you were born may have lived
a style Of life that moro or less affects you
today. You are not responsible for the fact
that your temperament Is sanguine, or
melancholic, or bilious, or Emphatic, or
nervous. Neither are you responsible for
the place Of your nativity, whether among
the granite hills Of New England, or the
cotton plantations of Louisiana, or on the
banks Of the Clyde, or the Dneiper, or the
Shannon, or the Seine. Neither are you
responsible for the religion taught In your
fathers house, or the irreligion. Do not
bother yourself about what you cannot
help or about circumstances that you did
not Decree
Take things as they are and decide the
question 30 that you shall be able safely
to say, "To this end was born" How
will you decide itH By direct application
to tho only Being In the universe who Ia
competent to tell you-the Lord Almighty.
Do you know the reason why no Is the
only one who can tell? Because he can see
everything between your cradle and your
grave, though the grave be so years off.
And besides that he is the only Being who
can SEQ what has been happening In the
last 500 years in your ancestral line, and
for thousands Of years clear back to Adam.
and thore Is not one person In all that an
cestral line of 5000 years but has some-
how affected your character, and even old
Adam himself will sometimes turn up In
your disposition. The only Being who can
take all things that pertain to you into
Is God, and he is the one
you can ask. Life is so short We have no
time to experiment with occupations and
professions The reason we have 80 many
dead failures is that parents decide for
children what they shall do or children
wrought on by some whim or
fancy, decide for themselves, without any
implcration of divine guidance. So we
have now In pulpits men making sermons
who ought to be In blacksmith shops MAX
ing plowshares, and we have In the law
those who instead Of running the cases Of
their clients ought to DO pounding shoe
lasts, and doctors who are the worst him
ORANGES TO their patients convalescence
and artists trying to paint landscapes who
ought to DO withdrawing board fences
while there are others making bricks who
ought to be remodeling constitutions or
showing planes who ought to DO trans
forming literatures Ask God about what
worldly business you shall undertake until |
you are SO positive you can In earnestness
smits your hand on your pillow handle or
your carpenters bench, or your Black
stones Commentaries, or your medical
dictionary, or your DIR. Dicks "Didactic
saying, "For this end was
BORN" There are children who early de-
velop natural aflinities for certain styles
Of work. When the father of the astron-
omer Forbes was going to London, he
asked his children what present he should
bring each one Of them. The boy who
was to be an astronomer cried out, Bring
Mo telescopel"
Signs of the Future.
And there arc children whom you find
Ill by themselves drawing on their states
,r on paper ships or houses or BIRDS and
you know they are to be craftsmen or
architects Of some kind. And you find
others cipherinR out difficult problems