Valentine Democrat. (Valentine, Neb.) 1900-1930, 1903-10-22

-O-~
INTERPRETATION OF LIFE
Ey Re,. P. T. Alton.
Jesus saith unto them, My meat is to
co the will OF him that sent me, and to
finish his work.-St. John, iv., "a.
Life is a great desire. From the cry
Of the new born infant 10 the sigh OF
the departing soul there is a reaching
out, a longing after, a never satisfied
desire. for something beyond the at
lainment Of the present moment.
The soulof nan is so cen ,titutel that
it cannot rest satisfied IN Itself. 1t
needs some object which it may desire
as the "summUm honum," the highest
good. the all satisf. ing end, The final
happiness. In order to live, Il must
desire.
There is an old saying. "As long as
there is life there is hope We can
change that and say just as truly, AS
long as there is hope there IS lie.
Without hope, without desire, life soon
fails, because life is but a b0undlesS
hone a great desire, an unfulflled
quest.
We know that it sometimes happens
that the pickering light Of life III some
soul is kept alive by the power OF an
in+opse desire-that when the animal
strength is all gone and science looks
for the end there comes a new power
TO the rescue Of the soul struggling fof
2 longer respite, and the spark or HE
is kept burning until the desire a
heen gratified, until the message has
been given or the face Of the eio7ed
one has been looked upon once again
ere the fainting soul falls asleep. AnC
So If was with the life of the world.
Without hope, without longing, with
out this innate and never failing de-
sire. the world would fall asleep and
all things would be as at the begin
ming. But when God created the heaY-
Ell and the earth, when in the eterni-
ties Of the past there came forth the
power Of life, there was wrapped up
in that genesis the propelling, uplIft-
ing, expanding force Of a great desire.
Never could that life remain silent or
passive; it must. consciously Or I'M
consciously, reach out, long after,
work for soma end in the eternities of
the future. SO through the ages n
eternal purpose runs"
Let us understand, then, that o.
life is made up of desires-that we
are the creatures of a hope which
passeth our understanding; that we
are the product of all the past efforts
of life to reach it's final destiny; that
we are the conservers Of the ener-
gies by which future generations shall
be enabled to reach the goal OF their
quest.
Let us realize that our happiness in
this world, that our life in the future
world, that our. contribution to the life
of the ages to follow, ali depend upon
the choice and direction Of our pres
ent desires. Let us grasp this fact and
will tremble ere we choose the
thing that shall be supreme in our
thought and life.
There have always been two ways
by which man has tried to gain Tor
himself the desire of life. The first
has been by collecting and surrounding
himself with things that will minister
to his physical we'll being. This is
the primary and lowest conception Of
happiness. We can trace it back to the
stages Of life, and it probably
arose from the instinct Of self-preser-
The other way that man has
tried to satisfy this yearning for a
more perfect life Is the cultivation Of
the intellect and widening Of the hori-
of knowledge. Neither in the
qualification of the physical nor in TIT
development Of the intellectual mas
man found the end for which he ex-
lists.
And now we turn to the great in
terpreter of life, the n who is him
self "the way and the truth and the
What did he make the supreme
and all important thing in life? The
answer comes without hesitation, the
doing of the will of God. Jesus saith
them, my meat is to do the will
of him that sent me, and to finish his
Tie world has never seen a
life so perfectly happy, because no
other life has been so entirely in accord
with the divine will. Jesus Christ came
not only to reveal but to do the will
Of the Father, and because he gave
in perfect obedience there
must have come to him the perfect
happiness.
We can realize the desire of life, we
attain unto perfect happiness only
so far as we give ourselves to the
doing Of the will Of God. There is no
way. Everything must be made
subordinate and contributory TO this
one supreme aim, to do the will of
God. Everything that conflicts with
the will Of God as revealed through
Jesus Christ must be given up without