Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1902-01-29
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| hard time for young doctors, young law
yers. young merchants, young farmers,
young mechanics, young ministers. The
struggle of the thirties is for honest ana
helpful and remunerative recognition.
But few old people know how to treat
young people without patronizing them
on the one hand or snukbing them on the
| other. Oh, the thirties Joseph stood
before Pharaoh at thirty; David was
| thirty years old when he began to reign;
the height of SoIomOns temple was thir-
~ cubits; Christ entered upon his active
| ministry at thirty years OF age; Judas
sold him for thirty pieces of silver. oh.
the thirties. What a word suggestive of
triumph or disaster!
Your decade is the one that will prob
| ably afford the greatest opportunity for
victory because there is the greatest ne
cessty for struggle Read the gorlds
history aud know what are the th.rthies
for good or bad. Alexander .ae Great
closed his career at thirty-two; Frederick
the Great made Europe tre'nble with his
armies at thirty-fve; Cortes conquered
Mexico at thirty; Grant fought Shiloh
and Donelson when thirty eight; Raphael
died at thirty seven; Luther was the hero
Of the reformation at thirty-hye; Sir
Philip Sidney got through by thirty-two.
The greatest deeds for God and against
him were done within the thirties, and
your greatest battles are now and be-
tween the time when you cease express
ing your age by putting first a figure 2
and the time when you will cease ex-
pressing it by putting first a figure 3. AS
it is the greatest time of the struggle,
adjure you, in Gods name and by Gods
grace, make it the greatest achievement.
My prayer is for all those in the ire
mendous crisis of the thirties. The fact
is that by the way you decide the pres
ent decade of your history you decide all
the following decades.
The Decade of Discovery.
Next accost the forties. Yours is the
decade of discovery. l do not mean
the discovery of the outside, but the dis
covery of yourself. No man knows him
self until he is forty. He oyerestimates
or underestimate himself. By that time
he has learned what he can do or what
he cannot do. He thought he had com
mercial genius enough to become a mill
ionaire, but now he is satisfied to make
comfortable living He thought he
ldu TuHIOFlCdl power Lndt NOhlN DIiIis
him into the United States Senetu; now
he Is content if he can successfully ar
que a common case before a petit jury.
He thought he had medical skill that
would make him Mott or a Crosse or
a Willard Parker or a Sims; now he finds
his sphere is that of a family physician.
prescribing for the ordinary ailments that
afflict our race. He was sailing on in
fog and could not take a reckoning, but
now it clears up enough to allow him to
find out his real latitude and longitude.
He has been climbing. but now he has
got to the top of the hill, and he takes
a long breath. He is half way through
the journey at least, and he is in a po-
sition to look backward or forward. He
has more good sense than he ever had.
He knows human nature, for he has been
chreated often enough to see the bad side
of It, and he has met so many gracious
and kindly and splendid souls he also
knows the good side of it. Now, calm
yourself. Thank God for the past and
deliberately set your compass for an
other voyage. You have chased enough
thistledown; you have blown enough soap
bubbles; you have seen the unsatisfyiug
nature of all earthly things. Open a
new chapter with God and the world.
This decade of the forties ought to
eclipse all its predecessors in worship,
in usefulness and in happiness.
The Reaping Age.
My sermon next accosts the ffties.
How queer it looks when in writing your
age you make the first of the two figures
8. This is the decade which shows
what the other decades have been If a
young man has sown wild cats snd he
has lived to this time. he reaa2 the har-
vest of it in the fiftes, or if by necessity
he was compelled to overtoil in honest
directions he is called to settle I'D with
exacting nature some time during the
ffties. Many have it so hard in early
life that they are octogenarians at fifty.
Sciaticas and rheumatisms and neural
gias and vertigo and insomnias have
their playground in the ffties. mans
hair begins to whten and, alth ough he
may have worn spectacles before, now he
asks the optician for No. IA or No. II
or No. TO- When he gets a cough and is
almost cured, he hacks and clears his
throat a good while afterward. @ We
who are in the fifties, think of it! A
half century OF blessing to be thankful
for and half century subtracted from
an existence which, in the most marked
eases of longevity. hardly ever reaches
a whole century. BY this time you ought
to be eminent for piety. You have been
in so many battles you ought TO be
brave soldier You have made so many
voyages you OUGHT TO ne a good sailor
So long protected and blessed. ynu ought
70 have a soul full of doxology. In Bible
times in Canaan every fifty years was by
Gods command a year of jubilee. The
people did not work that year If prom
erty had by misfortune gone out of ones
possession. on the fiftieth year it came
back to him. If he fooled it away, il
was returned without a farthing to paw.
II a man had been enslaved, he was in
that year emancipated. A trumpet was
sounded loud and clear and long, and it
was the trumpet of jubilee They shook
hands. they laughed, they congratulated.
What time it was. that fiftieth year,
At Threescore.
Ny sermon next accosts the sixties.
The beginning Of that decade is more
startling than any other. In his chrome
logical journey the man rides rather
smoothly over the figures 2 and 3 and
and 5, bat the figure 6 gives him big
jolt. He says: 1T cannot be that ! am
sixty. Let me examine the old family
record ] guess they made a mistake.
They got my name down wrong in the
roll of births" But no, the older broth
ers or sisters remember the time Of his
advent, and there is some relative a year
older and another relative year young
er. and. sure enough, the fact is estab-