Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1903-10-07
INTERPRETATION OF LIFE

finish his work.-St. John, w., 81.
Life Is q great desire. From the cry
of til new born iufant TO the sigh of
the departing soul there is reaching
out, a longing after, never satisfied
desire. for something beyond the at
tainment of the present moment.
The soulof man Is so constituted that
It cannot rest satisfied in itself. It
needs some object which it may desire
as the .summum bonum," the highest
good, the all satisfying end, the final
happiness. In order to live, one 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 life
without hope, without desire, life soon
fails. because life is but boundless
hope, great desire, an unfultilled
quest.
We know that 1t sometimes happens
that the pickering light of life in some
soul is kept alive by the power OF an
intense deslre-that when the animal
strength is all gone and science looks
for the end there comes new power
to the rescue Of the soul struggling for
a longer respite, and the spark OF life
Is kept burning until the desire has
been gratif1ed. until the message has
been given or the face of the beloved
one has been looked upon once again
ere the fainting soul falls asleep. And
so it was with the life of the world.
Without hope, without longing, with
out this innate and never failing de-
sire. the world would fail asleep and
all things would be as at the begin
ming. But when God created the heaY-
en- and the earth, when in the eternl-
ties of the past there came forth the
power oe life, there was wrapped up
in that genesis the propellipg, 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 some end In the eternities or
the future SO through the ages one
eternal purpose runs"
Let us understand, then, that our
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 shail
be enabled to reach the goal or thelf
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
emit desires. Let us grasp this fact and
we will trenble ere we choose the
thing that shall be supreme in our
thought and life.
There have always been two waJ
BY which man has tried to gain for
himself the desire of life. The first
has been by collecting and surrounding
himself with things that will minister
to his physical well being. This Is
the primary and lowest conception of
happiness. We can trace 1t back to the
earlier stages OF life. and 1t probably
arose from the instinct of self-preser-
walton. 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-
gon of knowledge. Neither in the
qualification of the physical nor in the
development Of the intellectual has
man found the end for which he ex-
lists.
And now we turn to the great IN
terpreter of life, the one who Is him
self "the way and the truth and the
life" What did he make the supreme
and all important thing in life? The
answer comes without hesitation, the
doing of the win Of God. Jesus saith
unto them, my meat is to do the will
of him that sent me, ard to finish his
work" The world has never seen q
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
himself in perfect obedience there
must have come to him the perfect
happiness.
We can realize the desire of life, we
can attain unto perfect happiness only
in so far as we give ourselves to the
doing of the will of God. There is no
other way. Everything must be made
subordinate and contributory to this
ore 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
question II we are to enter into the
fullness Of life; such is the gospel of
Christianity.
The message Is that happiness and
heaven and the fullness of life with
God are yours when you can say with
the Master, my meat is to do the viii
of him that sent me, and to finish his
work.
rRE RACE PROBLEM.
BY Rev n. n. Thorp
The supreme test to which the Amer
lean people are put to-day IS whether
the equal rights Of all men before the
law shall be maintained in the case
of the coIored race. To retreat from
that position is to betray one Of the