Page:Cyclopedia of illustrations for public speakers, containing facts, incidents, stories, experiences, anecdotes, selections, etc., for illustrative purposes, with cross-references; (IA cyclopediaofillu00scotrich).pdf/433



water, sweet to the taste and unaltered in quality. It had lost none of its pristine excellence after centuries of time.

Jesus described Himself as living water, and after two thousand years this has lost none of its purity or strength.

(1824)

LIFE WHAT WE MAKE IT

Life is what we make it. It varies in its prospect with the sort of eyes that see it. A writer remarks on this, as he takes his walk over the fields:

The laborer is coming along the road with his lumbering wagon; or the shepherd is standing by the gate of the field; or the game-keeper is out to see to his snares; and you say to the countryman, whichever you meet, how beautiful the country is when the red berries so thickly stud the hedge.

"Beautiful enough," he replies, "but it's no pleasant sight for us poor folk; it means we shall have a hard winter."

Because of this relation of the individual to the coloring of life, it behooves each one to make his own world beautiful and he will do so when his own life is in accord with truth. (Text.)

(1825)

LIFE WORK, CHOOSING A

In a current book a college president tells this story:

A traveler in Japan says that one day as he stood on the quay in Tokyo waiting for a steamer, he excited the attention of a coolie doing the work of a stevedore, who knew he was an American. As the coolie went by with his load, in his pigeon English he said, "Come buy cargo?" By which he meant, "Are you in Japan on business?" The man shook his head. The second time the coolie passed, he again asked, "Come look and see?" By which he meant to ask if the American were a tourist seeing the country. Receiving a negative reply, the next time he passed he tried one more question. "Spec' die soon?" By which he meant to ask if the man was there for his health.

This the writer used to describe three different classes of people in the world. There is the young man who seems to be in the world for his health. They want to be coddled. There is the young man who seems to be in the world as a traveler. He wants to be amused. There are the young men who are in the world for business. They mean to do something and be somebody.—

(1826)

Life Yet to Be—See.

Life's Furrow—See.

LIFE'S MELODY

A great pipe-organ has one or two thousand pipes. Some are twenty feet long, and large enough for a man to stand in, others are no bigger or longer than a common lead-pencil; some are made of wood, some of zinc, some of lead; and every one is set to make its own peculiar note. No pipe ever makes any other note than its own. But the organist is not limited to one tune. He can play any tune he may wish simply by changing the order of the notes which he sounds.

The laws of God's world are fixt; but on that great organ He is master, and it obeys His will; and rest assured that He it is that is playing the melody of your life.—, "The Fighting Saint."

(1827)

LIFE'S TURNING TIDE

Does the tide ever turn in the land of the dead? Shall we stir at the kiss of the wave rolling back, And lift, like the sea-weed, the death-draggled head, And toss with life's flood, like the tangles of wrack?

We trust it is so; for the sea that God turns, And sends flooding back into river and bay— Is the sea more divine than the spirit that yearns? And we will not believe that life's tide ebbs for aye.

—, Frank Leslie's.

(1828)

LIFTERS AND LEANERS

A prosperous member of a church in Scotland had been besought often by his pastor to give to the work of evangelizing the poor in Glasgow, but would always reply: "Na, I need it for mysel'." One night he dreamed that he was at the gate of heaven, which was only a few inches ajar. He tried to get in, but could not, and was in agony at his poor prospect. Just then the face of