God’s handiwork and its beauty is manifest wherever the eye rests. The towering mountain peaks, the great boulders, the babbling brooks, the peaceful valleys, the green grass, the beautiful flowers, the shady dells, all speak of his master hand. The moon-beams playing on the still waters, the sunshine streaming through the golden clouds, the perfect poise and artistic shape of the trees growing on the mountain side among the jagged rocks where the hand of man never trained or cultivated them. There they stand as sentinels waving to and fro by the gentle breezes and tell of His wonderful works. The wild flowers growing side by side in the shady dell, each a different color, whisper His wonderful plan. The little brook dancing and playing in and out among the deep chasms chiseling its narrow passage among the granite, jumping over big rocks, rolling little pebbles, it steals here and there until it spreads out on the great plains and fertile prairies into a rushing river hurrying on its way to the ocean. The beautiful sun-set casting its long stream of golden beauty over the western sky mocks at the skillful artist when he tries to imitate its marvelous shades and tints. The moon breaking through the silvery clouds and showering the heavens with beauty and grandeur rests its glory on the evening dew, and the millions of diamonds glitter and glisten in a splendor and elegance far beyond the hand of man. The many stars hanging like precious gems upon a great pedestal twinkling and sparkling tell the same story of His wonderful handiwork.

God was not satisfied with all these marvelous things and, though they are perfect, good and beautiful He must surpass them. He must have a crowning effort to all their glory. So to defy imitation He brought forth His masterpiece and called it man. The incomparable and unsurpassable, the grandest achievement of his architecture. In his wisdom He provided everything for his needs and comfort. Sunshine to warm him, darkness to rest him, trees to shade him, give him fuel and shelter, birds of song to cheer when weary with labor, flowers to beautify, soil to produce whatever he sowed, rain and sunshine to mature it, meats of all kind to nourish him, fruits, fishes, grains, honey, milk and everything necessary for his growth and sustenance, He made him pure, clean, strong, and beautiful, just a little bit lower than the angels. He furnished man everything to start with. It was no disgrace if his hands were blistered and dirty if they were stained by honest toil, he fought hardships and privations, he was the hardy pioneer blazing his way for home and country, raising his children near to nature’s heart and cleanliness. He gave to posterity strong, hearty, rugged men and women, he lived honorably, his labor was rewarded and he died ripe in years as a fitting tribute to his great achievements.

Time rolled on! Years became centuries! Methods changed and the great plan of God was lost.

Greed, avarice and monopoly commenced to steal the bread from the infant’s mouth; the keen and bitter struggle for existence is in full sway; the great land of liberty and opportunity no longer can put forth her boast and call and call for him to come, build homes, prosper, live well and accumulate.

What changeful conditions today from then! We boast of our great enlightenment and yet we are like the drowsy cat under centuries of domestication. As soon as the raw meat is put before us all the centuries’ training is cast aside and we are ready to do acts of barbarians. Instead of being able to arbitrate and handle all questions of war through peace tribunals we cast aside the brotherly teachings of the great book, increase the standing army, build more warships, enlarge the navy, and be ready for war, ready to shoot our brother, ready to destroy his home, leave his children penniless and fatherless, a widow to struggle and mourn, posterity to be enfeebled, a gigantic debt to stagger many generations unborn, a country bankrupt and all teachings of love and better citizenship disgraced.

No wonder our people are discouraged and feel we are slipping away from the preamble of our great Constitution! If this age and this country can not handle all questions, national and international, and extend the fullest measure of brotherly love where peace is needed; what age or country can?

I think it may be America that will be called upon to lead other nations and have them cast aside their war preparations and prepare for peace. In every crisis through which this country has passed we have been fortunate, thank God, that the right man has always been found. We have had our Washingtons, Lincolns, Websters, McKinleys, Wilsons, and hundreds of others and in every instance when some great problem has had to be solved, either in this country or abroad, in either science, statesmanship, literature or art, no matter how perplexing, difficult or intricate, American brains and ingenuity, in the vernacular of the day, has brought home the bacon, Swift’s premium, if you please!

I have always felt deeply sorrowful for the man who studies long and ardently with a bowed head resting upon his hands. His whole soul seems to be calling for the fine sympathies that can only be rendered from the loving teachings of the Nazarene. He is calling for the tender affection that is keenly necessary to right him just before that sullen burning wave of despondency casts him into utter gloom and sorrow. O Christianity! Christianity! amid wealth, society, culture, influence, peace, advancement, laws, legislators, and boasted liberty where art thou?

Visit the parks of any cities, towns or small villages and you can find sitting on the benches man after man who is unable to solve the problem of an honest existence. There he is, honest, clean, and worthy of good citizenship, unable to find labor that will keep him an honor to society. What will become of him in this land of boasted opportunity and liberty? Plenty for all; but monopolized and organized until the laboring man is almost ostracized. Look at his countenance, clear cut, manly and open, haggard, yes, but from what? From worry, loss of sleep, lack of food, responsibility of a family without funds, etc. But withal you find no look of dissipation, no odor of liquor, no foul language, and still with all these excellent qualities of meritorious citizenship he is sinking. How long will he stand it?

Were you ever in a condition of this kind when any way you turned you were outfigured. How long can a man have a thorn like this continually getting deeper and deeper into his flesh before he will make a grasp for it, and endeavor to release the pain? Where is the cause? What is wrong with our wide heralded economic system? This condition being true of the man with a family how alarming to the young man of today without a family? Show me any incentive or inducement for the common ordinary man of today without funds to cause him to establish a home and rear a family under the grand old Stars and Stripes, and I’ll show you a man that loses worse than a bankrupt in the finer sense of the word.

Without the establishment of homes this nation can not stand. No matter how frugal a man is, no matter how economical his habits you can give him the most promising part and he can not marry and rear a family because at every angle he is beaten. What is he going to do? Free land is almost gone, food stuffs are high, all his needs are expensive; how can he make it? Every line he wishes to enter is crowded! Reason for yourself and see if this is not true.

When you talk of large families, who raises them but the poor people and this will soon be eliminated. If the poor man raises one child he is doing more than his duty to society than the rich man. The expense is such a night-mare and horror to a common, ordinary and honest man to provide the necessaries of life for his family that I sometimes shudder and feel sorry that I caused children to be born, fought for a home, paid my debts, and lived clean. I wouldn’t want to do it again for my country, and I love her as I do the man of Galilee.

I fear America is no longer another word for opportunity as was said by the beloved Emerson, unless she helps him to establish homes on the public domain by loaning him money at a low rate on long time periods and keep him at work and help him along and not foreclose when he is doing his best to win. He’ll win, give him a chance.

What Emerson said may have been true at an earlier period it was so intended, but the plan was lost sight of and the great greed for wealth was accomplished to the detriment of the majority who have been obliged to make their living with their hands. It is a sad fact but true that there is a revolution slowly kindling in the breasts of the laboring class of people against capital; God grant that in some way the fire can be put out.

I have sometimes thought what’s the use of living. The sorrows and pains outnumber the joys by a large margin. You slip down the hill of pleasure without any exertion, but to climb the mountain of morality is a gigantic task, for every step is a struggle, and after you have fought and won nine-tenths of the journey one misstep and you slip to the bottom and the whole climb is before you again. It’s fight, fight all the time, continually and forever! It robs you of nature’s rest, steals away your ambition, stirs up hatred towards those in easy circumstances and causes conditions of unrest and strife.

Is life worth the gigantic struggle to overcome the perplexing difficulties and endeavor to live honest and clean and not slip down the path of despair where the great majority seem to be going. I say it is! “For, what do you profit if you gain the whole world and lose your own soul.”

Let your mind ponder over the story of Lazarus picking up the crumbs from the rich man’s table and you must conclude the starving beggar gained uncomparable joy and satisfaction to the rich man’s torment when the two men’s lives were carefully weighed on the scales where God predominates and not the sugar trust. It pays! It pays in a thousand different ways!

There is something to a man that lives an upright life in the church and in the world. He is a valued asset to any community, he may be poor but he has character, and this is something money can not buy. It takes a good life to make a man. A fellow that is rich and lives solely for the pleasure of his money is not a man.

One time I mused thus: If it could be so, just for the shortest duration of time, while temptation was the strongest and the fierce conflict was raging, if I could be blind, absolutely blind till the strong temptation had passed and then let me see again and have my first sight catch the last glimpse of the golden sun as it dipped behind the western horizon, leaving behind a long stream of golden beauty stretching out in its grandeur to kiss the evening sky; even if a scene like this could erase the temptation and the blindness prevail during the surging of the conflict, how could my faith be increased by not having the moral courage and strength of character to withstand the evil? It’s the casting aside of temptation by the sheer strength of the will power that makes the struggle easier, the way grow brighter, and the victories grander. If God would allow such a condition once, we, in our weakness, might ask again and again and instead of growing stronger we would grow weaker. It is the heroic fighter who has won his laurels when the bullets of evil whizzed all around him that you like to go up to and pin the medal on.