Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1899-09-01
BUSINESS TRIALS.
DR.. Talmage Shows How They Re-
fine the Spirit.
Religion in Trade-The Merchants
Office School of Industry, Pa
thence, Integrity and Up
right Living.
copyright. 1899. by Louis Klopsch.l

In this discourse DR.. Talmage argues
that religion may be taken into all the
affairs of life, and instead of being a
hindrance, as many think, is a re-
enforcement. The text is Romans ~:
II: Not. slothful in business; fervent
in spirit; serving the Lord"
Industry. devoutness and Christian
service-all commended in that short
text. What, is it possible that they
shall be conjoined? Oh, yes. There is
no war between religion and business,
between ledgers and Bibles, between
churches and counting houses. On the
contrary, religion accelerates business,
sharpens mems wits, sweetens acerbity
of disposition, fillips the blood of phleg-
mates and throws more velocity into
the wheels of hard work. 1t gives bet
ter balancing to the judgment, more
strength to the will, more muscles to
industry and throws into enthusiasm
more consecrated fire. You cannot in
all the circle of the world show me
man whose honest business has been
despoiled by religion.
The industrial classes are divided into
three groups-producers, manufac-
turers, traders. Producers, such as
farmers and miners. Manufacturers,
such as those who turn corn into food
and wool and fax into apparel. Traders,
such as make profit out of the transfer
and exchange of all that which is pro-
duced and manufactured. A business
man may belong to any one or all of
these classes, and not one is independ-
ent of any other.
When the prince imperial of France
fell on the Zulu battlefield because the
strap fastening the stirrup to the saddle
broke as he chung to it, his comrades
all escaping, but he falling under the
lances of the savages, a great many
people blamed the empress for allow
ing her son to go forth into that bat
tlefeld, and others blamed the Eng
ish government for accepting the sac
rifce, and others blamed the Zulus for
their barbarism. The one most to blame
was the harness maker who fashioned
that strap of the stirrup out Of shoddy
and imperfect material. as it was found
to have been afterward. If the strap
had held, the prince imperial would
probably have been alive to-day. But
the strap broke. No prince independ-
ent of a harness maker! High, low,
wise, ignorant, you in one occupation,
I III duOlleI, ali DOuuO tOSeLneTs
So that there must be one continuous
line of sympathy with each others
work. But whatever your vocation,
if you have multiplicity of engage
ments, ifinto your life there come losses
and annoyances and perturbations as
well as percentages and dividends, if
you are pursued from Monday morning
until Saturday night, and from January
to January by memorable obligation
and duty, then you are a business man,
or you are a business woman, and
my subject is appropriate to your
case.
We are under the impression that the
MOL and tug of business life are pris-
on into which man is thrust, or
that it is an unequal strife, where IN
armed man goes forth to contend. /
shall show you this morning that bust
ness life was intended of God for grand
and glorious education and discipline,
and if 1 shall be helped to say what l
want to say l shall rub some of the
wrinkles of care out of your brow and
unstrap some of the burdens FIRE m your
back. / am not talking of an abstrac-
ton. Though never having been in
business life, I know all about bust
ness men. In my first parish at Belle
vile, n. J., ten miles from New York,
large portion of my audience was
made up of New York merchants. Then
I went to Syracuse. place of immense
commercial activity, and then 1 went
to Philadelphia and lived long among
the merchants of that city, than whom
there are no better men on earth, and
for 25 years I stood at my Brooklyn
pulpit, Sabbath by Sabbath, preaching
toaudiences the majority of whom were
business men and business women. 1t
is not an abstraction of which speak,
but reality with which l am well ac-
quainted.
In the first place, I remark that |
business life was intended as school |
of energy. God gives us a certain |
amount of raw material out of which we |
are to hew our character. Our facul- |
ties are to be reset. rounded and sharp |
ened up Our young folks having grad |
uated from school or college need a |
higher education, that which the rasp- |
ing collision of everyday life alone can
effect. Energy is wrought out only |
in the fire. After a man has been in
business activity 10, 20. 80 years, his
energy is not to be measured by weights
or plummets or ladders. There is no |
height it cannot scale, and there is no
depth it cannot fathom, and there is no
obstacle it cannot thrash.
Now, my brother, why did God put
you In that school of energy? Was it
merely that you might be yardstick
to measure cloth, or a steelyard to
weigh flour? Was it merely that you
might be better qualified to chatter and
higgIe? No. God placed you in that
school of energy that you might be de-
Veloped for Christian work. If the IN