The Birmingham age-herald., 1907-01-06
 } DIR. TA.MAGE'S SERMON
'''''>' sS TIE REV FRSNS.DE WIT T4LMaeg' D. D,

honeycombed the town with his bakery i stores. He cooked bread and pies and cakes for thousands upon thousands of daily customers But after this man had made a fortune as a baker he decided he ! would make another fortune as an edi- 1 tor. He bought one of the great dailies of that city. As a newspaper man he was dead failure. What. he cooked in , his oven was eaten up by his printing presses. Today that once great baker has lost his newspapers and lost his bakeries because he would persist in in- vesting in a business he knew nothing about What. is the practical deduction Today those deserted farm lands of the California mesa cry out: Merchants, stick to your counters. Doctors, stick to your patients. Lawyers, stick to your briefs Ministers stick to your pulpts. Men and women, do not go foraging in financial fields you know nothing about or you mill get stung. If as a financial lamb you have once been feeced. then do not continue to heed and obey the voice of the same shearer Let go. Let go that foolish investment. Let go. When you have uselessly sacrificed your money, let go. Do not continue to sacrifice the remainder Let go. Let go'
 But my theme teaches another practi- cal lesson. I would have the young men encamp with us upon those deserted Cal- ifornia farm lands as well as the older men I would especially have the young man view those deserted fields who against his better judgment is being forced or is forcing himself into a line of work for which he Is not adapted with reverence for the wishes of his father and mother that does the boy credit, but is fatal to his prospects, in life. Come. young man. tell me the ambition of your life. What do you intend to be? "Oh. ' CT want he a railroad or I want to be a doctor. or I want to be lawyer or a civil engineer, or l want to be a musician or an artist, but I can not. You know, father has set his heart on my being business man. We live in a small town in a western state. He started in business there thirty years ago. By frugality and industry he has the largest store in all that region I am his only boy, and he wants me to carry the business on after he is dead and come into the store and help him now that he is growing old. But 1 hate bus mess. Yes. I hate it. But I suppose will have to do 1t to please him. Besides if I do not go into his store all the life time work of my father will be thrown away"
 Follow Your Instinct.
 What, have you no inclination to be a business man? "A absolutely none. My de- sire is to be railroad man. The other day I was on the outskirts of Los An geles. and there I saw a back yard fitted with a miniature railroad track. There a little boy not more than eight years of age, out of wood had built a whole rail- road system He had his bridges and tunnels and switching tracks and freight cars and passenger trains and depots and car sheds. All these he had made with his own penknife. This little fellow said he was the president of the railroad sys- tenn and his younger brother was the conductor. but he was evidently the whole brain and force of that system. Now that was the way I used to find my pleasure when boy. l was always thinking engines and building engines My playground was the railroad yards My sweetest music was a locomotives s whistle. But father wants me to go into his store, and I suppose I will have to go." Don't you do 1t, my brother; don't you do it. l care not how much of your fathers business will have to be sacri- feed, don't you do 1t. You cannot afford to sacrifice your brains and" your rail- road genius and your life. Be what God wants you to be. Be 1t at any cost and at any sacrifice. By the lesson of the deserted California farm lands learn that there is time to let go.
 But the theme has a powerful applica- tion to the semi-invalid as well as to the young man stout of limb and clear of eye. Ii has an application for the human tree which has spread its roots and Is firmly anchored and is matured but which Is being blasted by the east wind as well as for tho young sapling just planted and able to defy almost any storm. I ride down town in the electric cars of one of our eastern cities. l alight at the open door of your store. I find n- telllgent and courteous clerks at the counters. The store is crowded with cus-
 
 there is no confusion anywhere. I enter your glass office You are an old boy hood friend. l say: "Hello. Joel Bus mess is booming Your store is growing by leaps and bounds. Why, man. you will be a millionaire within a few years But, old fellow. what is the matter with you? You are sick. Why, Joe have you seen the doctor lately?" "Yes," you an swer, "I have seen the doctor. He has prescribed enough medicine for me to float battleship. But medicine does no good. He says I cannot live in this clim- ate. I should go to Texas or, Arizona or | California There I would be well man. But how can I go? This awful cough is i draining my life away but I cannot pull out and sacrifice my life's work. I can not sell the business for what it Is worth. cannot sacrifice the labor of twenty | years' "Yes, you can, Joe You must sacrifice 1t now or give it up altogether within couple of years. If you pull out I. now you can go to a warm climate and 1 start anew and have a long life with | your family. If you do not pull out now they will take you south winter after next when your two lungs, are nearly gone, and then the sacrifice will be too late.' Let go" Is the command. Let 1 go.". No matter whether you have spent | three long months in digging the reser- | voirs on the drought accursed California l mesa, let go. As man whose life is l doomed read you not Gods handwriting | upon the wall as Beshazzar read 1t In l the Babylonish capital7
 1 Spiritual Application.
 | But we must not stop here. Our ser mons theme has an application in spir-