1.H 08. Health as a Sweetener of Work

Health as a Sweetener of Work.

I have seen a great deal of life, and on all of its sides. I have seen the depths of poverty, and I have seen competency. I have seen the extremity of solitariness and the crowds of a city, both at home and abroad. I have seen what art has done, and whatever is to be seen in the wilderness. I have had youth and middle age, and now I am an old man. I have seen it all, and I bear witness that, while there are single moments of joy in other matters that perhaps any a man up to the summit of feeling, yet, for steadfast and repetitious experience, there is no pleasure in this world comparable to that which a man has who habitually stands before an audience with an errand of truth, which he feels in every corner of his soul and in every fibre of his body, arid to whom the Lord has given liberty of utterance, so that he is pouring out the whole manhood in him upon his congregation.

Nothing in the world is comparable to that. It goes echoing on in you after you get through. Once in a while I preach sermons that leave me in such a delightful state of mind that I do not get over it for two days; and I wonder that I am not a better man. I feel it all day, Sunday and Monday, and there is not an organ in the world that makes music so grand to me as I feel in such supreme hours and moments. But I am conscious how largely the physical element of healthfulness enters into this experience. When I am depressed in body and heavy in mind, I do not get it. You cannot expect either these exceptional, higher consummations, or the strong, steady flow of a joyful relish for your work, unless you cultivate a robust and healthful manhood.