Evening Republican, Volume 14, Number 50, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 28 February 1910 — RELIGIOUS [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

RELIGIOUS

Work and Rest. O Father, while I live, I pray That I may work from day to day— Work with strong hand and willing mind At little tasks that help mankind.

And Father, when I die, I pray That, as I rise to greet the day, I be not cursed with idle rest, _ But with some heavenly work be blest. —John Haynes Holmes.

A Gift for Mluloni, In the year 1877 Col. Robert G. Ingersoll made an extended tour of the Pacific coast. He spoke in several of the larger cities, and at length arrived at Portland. There - was in the city a certain missionary to the Chinooks. He could not afford a ticket to the lecture, and was greatly disturbed at what he read concerning it. Yet he felt a strong desire to meet Colonel Ingersoll, and a common friend procured a meeting between them.

There was a moment of constraint, relieved by the greater ease of Colonel Ingersoll, who began the conversation by Inquiring concern ing .the work of the missionary. A little mirthfully he questioned him about the advisability of exporting religion, of which there might not be any surplus at home, and inquired, somewhat doubtfully, about the wisdom of a man’s giving his life to a hopeless task in attempting to taach a small and vanishing tribe things of which we ourselves have perhaps less knowledge than we suppose.

The answers of the missionary, however, interested Colonel Ingersoll. He inquired about the “Chinook jargon,” that mongrel speech, made of English, Canadian, French, Chinook and other Indian words, picked up from several tribes, and all softened and modified to suit deficiencies of pronunciation; the r changed into I, after the Chinese manner, and the grammar “made by chopping up words with a tomahawk.”

How could a man preach in a language where one word had to serve as noun, verb and adjective? How could a man of education make himself understood In a language with only four parts of speech and some fragments? How could he tell the story of Peter’s denial in a language which, having only one word for all manner of feathered things, and no verb for the act of crowing, made it necessary for the speaker to imitate the act and sound? How could he tell that Peter swore, in a language that had no verb “to curse,” but had plenty of oaths inherited from traders in various tongues? How could he impart any idea of sacred things in a polyglot of slang? The missionary told him the story of his work —how he preached as best he could in the poor, meager speech of- the people, meantime teaching the children English, encouraging them in useful arts, fighting the vices of civilization as they made inroads among the people, and doing what he could for them as adviser and friend. IT was hard work, and not very encouraging, but it was worth doing, and he was happy in it.

In telling his story thus, encouraged and led on by a man trained and skillful in cross-examination, the missionary unconsciously disclosed many of the hardship and privations which his work entailed upon him. Possibly, and Indeed probably, he had not thought of them seriously as hardships, and therefore he related with telling simplicity the stories of long journeys by canoe and on horseback, of nights in the open, of poor and sometimes revolting food eaten in savage company. There was no word of complaint, nor even the least expression of regret, except for books and papers and magazines missed.

When the -missionary rose to go, Col. Ingersoll took his hand warmly, and said, “I thank you for coming to see me. This interests me very much. It’s good work you are doing; it’s good work. And here, take this. I am not a frequent contributor to missionary work, but I like this.”

Into the missionary’s hand he dropped a bright twenty-dollar gold piece. —Youth’s Companion.

The Purpose of Life. Slowly, through all the universe, the temple of God is being built. Wherever, in any world, a soul, by freewilled disobedience, catches the fire of God’s likeness, it is set into the growing walls, a living stone. When, in your hard fight, in your tiresome drudgery, or in your terrible temptation, ypu catch the purpose of your being, and give yourself to God, and so give Him the chance to give Himself to you, your life, a living stone, is taken up and set into that growing wall. Wherever souls are being tried and ripened, in whatever commonplace and homely ways—there God is hewing out the pillars for His temple. Or, if the stone can only have some vision of the temple of which it is to be a part forever, what patience must fill ft as it feels the blows of the hammer and knows that success for it is simply to let itself be wrought into what shape the Master wills.—Rev. Phillips Brooks, D. D.'

Loving Thy Neighbor. * To love my neighbor as myself is not to rejoice in his companionship, to find In him a congenial comrade, to share with him the same pleasures and the same sorrows, to enjoy the same

pictures or books -or music, to hold the same opinions, to live on the same intellectual t and moral plane. It is to regard his welfare as of equal importance to me with my own. To love my enemy is not to be moved by a passionate devotion toward him; it is not even moderately to like him. It is to be moved by his enmity to wish him not evil but good. Paul has defined what is meant by loving one’s enejpy; “If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give him drink.” Christ has defined what He means by loving one's enemy: “But I say unto you, Love your enemies, bless them that curse you, do good to them that hate you, and pray for them which despitefully use you, and persecute you.”—Dr. Lyman Abbott. .

Heaven-Sent Opport unit tea. “My Father worketh hitherto and I work.” Our tasks are divine, however insignificant they may seem. The vast majority of human toilers are doingnothlngbrilllant. Thedaylaborer, the overtaxed accountant, the housewife worried with a thousand petty cares and duties, the inte3lestual genius cramped to drudgery that seems comparatively menial, may be tempted to undervalue the dignity of the humble work whereby others are served. But work as work is stamped by Christ with dignity divine. No toil was too menial for Christ. He girded himself with a towel and washed the travel-stained feet of His disciples. The allotment of labor is divinely made: “To every man his work.” "He that is faithful in that which is least, is faithful also in much.” The lowliest tasks come before us as sublime responsibilities, heaven-sent opportunities. "