The weekly examiner., 1901-07-06

heaven. What am grooming about? ? From the same place that man got his cheerfulness can get mine. Why art thou cast down, O my soul, and why art thou disquieted within me Hope thou in God, for shall yet praise him who is the health of my .countenance and my God"
 Again, is your talent that of wit or humor? Use it for God. Much of the worlds wit is damaging. Most of sat- ire has sting in it. Much of carica- ture is malevolent. Much of smart re- tort is vitriolic. In order to say smart things how many will sacrifice the feelings of othersi The sword they carry is keen, and it is employed to thrust and lacerate. But few men in all the world and in all the churches realize that if wit is bestowed it is given them for useful, for improving, for healthful purposes. If we all had more of it and knew how to use it aright, how much it would improve our Christian conversation and prayer meeting talk and sermon! Robert South and Rowland Hill and Jeremy Taylor and Dean Swift and Lorenzo
  wit and their humor to gather great audiences and then lead them into the kingdom of God. Frivolity is repulsive in religious discussion, but I like the humor of Job when he said to his in- solent critics: "No doubt but ye are the people, and wisdom shall die with you," and I like the humor of the prophet Elijah, who told the Baalites to. pray louder, as their god was out hunting or on an excursion or in such lcud conversation that he could not hear them. I like the sarcasm of Christ when He told the self-right- eous Pharisees that they were so good they needed no help: 'sThe whole need not a physician, but that they arc sick" or when in mirthful hyperpo1e he arraigns the hypocritical teachers of His day who were so particular about little things and careless about big things, saying: sYe blind guides that strain at a gnat and swallow camel,' and the Bible is all ablaze with epigram, words surprisingly put and phraseo1ogy that must have made the audiences of Paul and Christ nudge each other and exchange glances and smile and then appropriate the tre- mendous truths of the Gospel. There are some evils you can laugh down easier than you can preach down. The question is always being asked, why do not more people go to church, prayer meeting and other religious meetings? I will tell you. We of the pulpit and the pew are so dull they cannot stand it. But when we ask why people do not go to church we ask misleading question. More people go now to church than ever in the worlds history, and the reason is in all our denominations there is new race of ministers stepping into the pnlpits which are not the apostles of humdrum. Sure enough, we want in the Lords army tue heavy artillery, but we want also more men who, like Burns, a farmer at Gettysburg, took a 1lusket and wen put soI his own ac= count to do a little shooting different from the other soldiers. The church of God is dying of the proprieties.
 Or is your talent an opportunity to set a good example One person do ing right under adverse circunlstapces will accomplish more than many trea- tises about what is right. The census has never been taken of lovely old folks. Most of us, if we have not such one in our own house now, have ia our memory such a saint. We went to those old people with all our trou- bles. They were perpetual evangel- ists, by their soothing words, by their hopefulness of spirit, an inexpressible help. I cannot see how Heaven could make them any 1ovelier than they are or were. But there are exceptions. There is a daughte~ in that family whose father is impatient and the mother querulous. The passage of many years does not always improve the disposition, and there are great many disagreeable old folks. Some of them forget that they were young themselves, and they become untidy in their habits and wonder how, when their asthma or rhelimatism is so bad, other people can laugh or sing and go on as they do. The daughter in that family bears all the peevishness and unreasonable behavior of senility without answering back or making any kind of complaint. If you should ask her wEat her five talents are or her one talent is, she would answer that she has no talent at all. Greatly mistaken is she. Her one talent is to forbear and treat the childishness of the old as well as she treats the child ishness of the young. She is no mu- sician, and besides there may not be piano in the house. She cannot skill fully swing a croquet mallet or golf stick. Indeed, she seems shut up to see what she can do with a ladle and a broom and brush and other house hold implements. She is the personi- fication of patience. and her reward will be as long as Heaven. Indeed, much of her reward may be given on earth. She is in a rough college, from | which she may after awhile graduate | into brightest domesticity. She is a ] heroine, though at present she may |