The Birmingham age-herald., 1913-12-01
Influence of Habit on Life
and Character
''RUT IN BRAIN STUFF
Commends Thanksgiving Habit as One
of Best Because 1t Meant Close
Relations With GOd-Fail-
ure and Success

strong sermon before a large congrega-
ton. He took for his theme Habits"
He told his hearers that the little SEEM
ingly unharmfu1 habits exercised a strong
and sometimes baneful influence upon
life. One habit which he strongly COM
mended was that of thanksgiving. He
said it was most gracious habit; that it
related to God. That his hearers were i'm
pressed was evidenced by the thoughtful
and grave manner in which they gave
attention
Dr. Edmonds spoke in part as follows:
Habit a Rut
Habit is the rut that constant doing
cuts in brain stuff. 1t may make no
change in the actual fibre of the brain
but does in the immaterial cloud that
floats about and above the brain and is
the brain, the nervous system, the char
acter, the life Some people go SO far as
to say that all morality is nothing more
than habit extended through thousands of
years and followed because experience has
approved 1t. Such thinkers neglect a
number of things, among them the phe-
nomena of conversion and of growth in
grace. In the case Of Saul of Tarsas,
Tolstoi, Billy Sunday and millions of
others, old habit molds were suddenly,
or at least completely broken, and new
ones set forming; and 1t was not a change
of mind merely, but a churning up of the
whole nature. So also in the hearts of a
great multitude of the followers of Christ
there is not slow, passionless evolution
of habit, but fervid yearning for hon-
ness that cries unto God day and night
and will not be denied
Some things are stronger than habit.
Will is. God is. But habit is strong as
brass.
"A man told me that he had not changed
his route to his office in 20 years. If we
should have our conversation reproduced
on talking machine we should find our
tongues resounding in certain ruts of
speech that would surprise us. We preach
ers are constantly in the way of getting
into ridiculous habits OF speech and ac-
tom of twisting a button on his coat. His
tom of twisting a button on his coat. His
wife cut it off but had to put it back.
He couldn't preach without it.
Habits That Count
Nov there are certain habits of SEEM
lngly no consequence which yet tell tre-
mendously OH life. Some of these are
habits of body, If they may be loosely
so called-habits of diet, of exercise, of
vicious or of godly practice and the like.
constitute soul viewpoints from which to
look at life and things.
They frequently would seem to be not
worth accounting, and at first may be
insignificant, but little by little they come
to flavor all of life and to shape with
iron hands even its major issues. Some
times it is difficult to fasten the eye of
discernment on the exact thing that has
meant the failure of one man and the
success of another. The two seem to be
of like equipment, of like power: yet the
one has fallen, the other climbed or the
climber may even have suffered heavy
disadvantage in endowment and training.
What is the secret? Perhaps some mere
unsubstantial nicely of mental frame has
in the one case by slow but sure degrees
nodded even ugliness into beauty; some
subtle chemical in the minds alembic has
sufficed to turn the dross to gold. There
is much of truth in the old Stole preach
ment that the mind is the measure and
standard of its own experiences. that
things become food or poisons according
as our spiritual stomachs handle them.
We all have about the same material to
work on-labor, play love. difficulties.
privileges: yet one starves to Death and
abuses fate, another fattens and thanks
God. A mental attitude a habit of mind,
may explain the abysmal difference.
A Gracious Habit
zone of the most gracious of these lit
tie life makers is the habit of thanks
giving. 1t relates to God. 1t has its
fingers on experience but its eyes on Him.
1t stands in the midst OF the things of
life but looks to God as the giver of those
things and finds it in its heart to say
Praise God from whom all blessings
flow.
"And it is the antidote for many
no for hoe lirU
balm. 1t peoples deserts with oases and
makes the barren places to rejoice. Just
a way of looking at things. only a little
system of Interpretation, but what mir
acles it works. what puddles 1t makes to
glisten, what novels 1t converts into
castles. Rostand says to the sun, With
out thee things would be no more than
what they are But without thanksgiving
things are vastly less than what they are.
Gratitude is a multiplier and refiner of
gifts and thereby priceless benefactor;
but ingratitude is a liar and thief deny
ing the charm of what you have, thereby
stealing away its blessing and its bloom.
Cultivate Thanksgiving
"a gentle, strong healing habit is this
of thanksgiving, my friends. Cultivate it.
Teach it to your children. 1t is better
than gold, yea, than much fine gold. 1t
will send its strains of light music up
and down the halls of life, it will perfume
the portcoes like jasmine at night.
There is enough in each life for despair
or for joyous thanksgiving. 1t depends
on where we put the emphasis. As mat
ter of experience we ought to put 1t on
the thing for which we can be thankful,
for that way lies hope and life. As mat
ter of honesty we must put it there, for
the good far outweighs the bad with every
one of us, We are guilty of a crime
against proportion If we do otherwise
There Is score on you that covers an
inch. Study it with the microscope long
enough and you will come TO the conclu-
sion that you are rotten. Study the rest
of your body where rosy health abounds
and you will come to the conclusion that
you are able to take care of hundred
sores.
Count your blessings. name them one
by one. Sit right down and open a set
of books. Put on the one side the items
for which YOU owe Thanksgiving; on the
other side the difficulties, the sorrows the
disappointments, the limitations, the items
for which God owes you a balance, some
sort of recompense. Every honest man
of us will have to say that where burdens
did abound blessings did much more
abound.
"Some of us have jaundiced our lives
and the lives of others by moping over
ineonsequental mishaps instead of setting
the skies aglow by remembering to do
Him praise for the multitude of His
merces. And some of us have suffered
shipwreck and loss of argosy by not lay
ing hold of the one little plank that was
.,ff Aad nd mol Id th.. 80