THE KING’S BUSINESS
3Ö5
Seated on a village porch behind gome vines one day last summer, I heard the thumping of a cane on the sidewalk. Peep ing out, I saw an old man, with white head and bowed shoulders, approaching. A young man was coming in the opposite direction, and the two met and stopped in front of the gate. After the usual greet ings, the old man said, in a high key: “Well, Jim, how are you getting along? Are you on the road to heaven ?” The young man mumbled something about be ing afraid not. “Well, Jim,” said the gray haired father, “always remembers one thing. If you don’t git thar, it’s your own fault, for you know the way.” Then, thumping along with his cane, he passed out of sight. The Rev. William J. Hart has told this in the columns of The Christian Endeavor WorId : “Seven men were buried be neath thousands of tons of rock which fell in a Cornish tin mine. The rescuers, after two days, called aloud. One man answered. He was an active Christian and a Sunday school superintendent. ‘Are you alone?’ asked some one. ‘No; Christ is with me,’ was the answer. Then, in a feeble voice, he sang: ‘Abide w ith me! F a st falls the eventide: The darkness deepens; Lord, w ith me abide! When other helpers fail and com forts flee, Help of the helpless, oh, abide w ith me.’ They heard no more from him. Two days later they found him with his legs crushed by a huge rock which rested on them; but it was known from his life and his words that he was gone to be ‘forever with the Lord.” ’ A certain nobleman had a spacious gar den which he left to the care of a faith ful servant, whose delight it was to trail the creepers along the trellis, to water the seeds in time of drought, to support the stalks of the tender plants, and to do every work which could render the garden a paradise of flowers. One morning the servant rose with joy, expecting to tend his beloved flowers, and hoping to find his
favorites increased in beauty. To his sur prise, he found one of the choicest beauties rent from the stem. Full of grief and anger, he hurried to his fellow servants and demanded who had robbed him of his treasure. They had not done it, and he did not charge them with it, but he found no solace 'for his grief till one of them remarked, “My lord was walking in the garden this morning, and I saw him pluck the flower and carry it away.” Then, truly, the gardener found he had no cause for his trouble. He felt that it was well his master had been pleased to take his own, and he went* away smiling at his loss, because his lord had taken delight in the flowers. Would any one take serious exception to the following as a truthful list of the great “interests” which make up our American life? 1, The ticker; 2, Female apparel; 3, Baseball bulletin; 4, The “movies” ; 5, Bridge whist; 6, Turkey trotting; 7, Yel low journal headlines and “funny” pages; 8, The prize fight. How many of our readers, after due re flection, would dispute the proposition that 100,000 Americans are genuinely interested in the foregoing matters, and day by day excited over them, to every 10,000 that are interested in religion beyond a perfunctory church attendance, to every 5000 that are interested in politics beyond a little parti san campaign excitement, to every 1000 that are interested in schools and education, to every 100 that ,are interested in reasonably good music or good operq, to every solitary individual who is interested in literature or science? Men and women, and children, too, in multitudes, in droves, are “gone” on them, and this slang word, so accurately descrip tive, is the multitude’s own indictment of itself. Culture and beauty are scored, knowledge is sniffed at, obligation is for gotten, work is neglected in the feverish following of the “quotation” or the “score” in the senseless slavery to “mode,” in the surrender to sensual pleasure .—The Inde pendent.
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