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THE COJI7ION RULE OF HAPPINESS
<1 abernacle Sermon by Keb, Len G. Broughton, D.D.
Stenographically reported for The Golden Age.—Copyright applied for.
Text, Gal. 6:2.—“Bear ye one another’s bur
dens, and thus fulfil the law of Christ.’’
T
HE inspiration of this sermon I ob
tained on a railroad train. The
train was at a standstill at a station
and I heard two men who sat just
back of me in conversation in rath
er low tones, but sufficiently audi
ble for me to hear what they were
saying without any effort to do so.
One said, “I have obtained nearly
everything I ever started after; everything but
one, and that one thing is the one of all others
that I wanted most. 1 have won in the race of
fortune; I have more than two million dollars,
but I have not won the one thing 1 intended to
get when I first started?'’ “The other man said,
“What is that?” Happiness.” “Why didn't
you get it?” “To tell you the plain truth, I do
not know. I thought the things I was pursuing
would bring it. Just then the train started off
and the rattle of the wheels prevented me from
keeping up with the trend of the conversation
and I began to think and ask myself some
questions. I like, sometimes, to talk to myself.
THE ONE THING DESIRED.
So I proceeded. Said I, “Happiness; that is
a common word. 1 wonder what it means; I
wonder what the ordinary rule is for obtaining
it. Certainly it is the one thing that the world
is after today, and it must be the thing that to a
great extent the world is failing to obtain.” And
the answer that came to my mind I am going to
give you today. To begin with, the whole world
desires it; it is the one thing that the world is
striving for, but the way in which the world is
striving to obtain it is the way that brings ev
erything else in the world but the thing desired.
For example, there is the man who is trying to
win happiness through the pursuit of wealth.
The thing that he desires originally in his pur
suit of wealth is happiness, but alas, when he
gets it, his experience is almost universally the
the experience of the man I overheard, not that
there is anything in wealth that would make a
man unhappy, but the way in which wealth is
obtained, and the rules that are essential for
the holding of wealth, are such as to preclude
the operation of the very law that brings hap
piness. I do not believe that there is a happy
rich man on earth. I doubt very seriously
whether it is possible for a man to hoard up
great gain and be happy, for happiness comes
as the result of the operation of a very fixed
principle and law, and the rules essential to the
gathering of wealth and the hoarding of wealth
are such as to preclude the operation of that
law.
And there are those trying to get happiness
through the pursuit of pleasure, and here again,
the thing started to obtain is happiness. That
is why pleasure is sought because it is suppos
ed that pleasure is synonimous with happiness,
but alas, in the pursuit of the pleasures of the
world there are things required of us that also
preclude the operation of the law of happiness.
There are those trying to find happiness by the
adornment of their persons, by dress and the
like, but the thing that they desire in the pur
suit of these things is happiness, but everybody
knows, especially those who try it that the
very things essential for dress and show are
the thing that operate against the law of hap
piness'. How can any woman have a happy
home and undergo the tortures incident to get
ting a dress made? Instead of becoming hap
py she becomes a fit subject for the lunatic
asylum, and the wonder is they have not all
landed there. 1 heard of a woman whose hus
band gave her a ten thousand dollar brooch
and she was the happiest woman, as she
thought, in all the land. But she had not had
it any time before .she found it was the great
est care she ever had in her life. She was
The Golden Age for February 9, 1911.
afraid to walk the streets for fear somebody
would rob her, afraid to leave it at home for
fear somebody would break in and steal it, and
in the end she said, “If you do not take this and
sell it 1 am going to give it away; if I don’t
get rid of it it is going to get rid of me.”
Then there are those who try to obtain hap
piness by advancement in popular favor; by
honors and position. I had a man tell me this
story of a friend who had been elected three
times governor of his state, and United States
senator from his state, one of the most popular
men in all this country. Only a few days be
fore that he was with this man and they got to
talking about old times, and he called him by
his first name, the name he used to be known
by in his boyhood days, and said, “Now tell
me, after all the honors you have received, are
you a happy man?” He said, “A happy man!
I would give this world if I could be as happy
as I was when I lived on the banks of the lit
tle stream there in the mountains where I used
to fish and wade; if I could just have the same
happy feeling that I had in those simple days
of my mountain life I believe I would be will
ing to go back there.” There should be noth
ing in such promotion that would make a man
unhappy, except that the rules that are laid
down for advancement in popular favor are
generally such as to make imperative the law
that underlies real happiness; the compromise
of conscience and of position and of purpose
does not make happiness. And so we might
go on to that the things that the world
today is seeking for happiness are the things
that make absolutely impossible the operation
of the laws that govern a happy and blessed
life.
WHAT IS HAPPINESS?
Happiness is the fulfillment of the law of
Christ —“Bear ye one another’s burdens, and
so fulfil the law of Christ.” Happiness is the
result of fixed laws, just as everything else in
the world is the result of the operation of cer
tain fixed laws. The reason why my voice is
being heard at the bed of every sick person in
the Infirmary is because we have learned how
to adjust law —the law of electricity makes it
possible for my voice to be caught by these re
ceivers and carried over the wires to the beds
in the Infirmary. Just as certain as our obe
dience to the laws of electricity makes that
possible, if we obey the laws of happiness we
shall have happiness.
How then is happiness the fulfilment of the
law of Christ? Our text tells us, “Bear ye one
another’s burdens and so fulfil the law of
Christ.” “Bear ye one another’s burdens”;
and beneath your fellowman’s burdens lies
your happiness. Happiness lies hid beneath
somebody else’s burden, not your own. Here I
am looking for happiness. There isn’t a man
who isn’t. We are striving to obtain it in all
sorts of ways. We are putting hard work
upon it, spending our time and thought trying
to obtain happiness, the one longed for goal. I
go in the direction of wealth and do not find it.
I find burden and care, I lose of my sympathy
and love and my fellow feeling for humanity.
It must be so in order that I may obtain wealth
and keep it, and this does not make me happy.
I start for a trip abroad and say, “I will find
it in travelling.” But I find I have carried the
same atmosphere with me, for no man can run
from his own shadow, whether he likes to car
ry it or not, and his spiritual shadow is simply
the reflection of his own heart upon his life. I
start in the direction of dress and God knows I
get into a whirlpool to which there is no end.
It is worse than the whirlpool of Niagara. I
start in the direction of fame, and to become
famous I have had to subscribe to things abso
lutely in opposition to the operation of the law
of Christ, which is the law of sincerity, sim
plicity, truth, the reign of righteousness over
wrong, and I do not find it. I have exhausted
myself until as I go I stumble against some
thing; it is a man low upon his face and he can
not get up. He would get up, but he can not.
If you have never been in such a place you
can not appreciate the situation. Here is a
man who can not get up. Physically and mor
ally and spiritually he is not strong enough.
What are you going to do? You have tried
everything else in the world; now is your op
portunity to obtain happiness. “Bear ye one
another’s burdens and so fulfil the law of
Christ.” That is always happiness. Get down
and take that fellow’s burden up and you will
find underneath it the thing you have been
hunting. It is happiness, and it isn’t anywhere
else, and you will never find it until you learn
that lesson. Where you lift your fellowman’s
burden, the unselfish burden, you find hid be
neath it the one supreme longing of your heart,
which is happiness.
WHERE IS HAPPINESS?
Happiness—where is it. It is beneath your
fellowman’s burden. I know somebody says,
“Yes, I have tried it, and had a. most ungrate
ful experience.” A friend once gave me this
story. He said, “I had a bit of experience that
I never shall forget. I came across a girl that
had just finished the High School. Her father
was a blacksmith, one of the poorest men in
the community, and they said of her that she
was the brightest child in the school, and it
was such a pity that her father was not able
to educate her. I went to him and said, “Will
you let me have this child for four years? I
will send her through college and give her the
education she wants.” The father consented.
So he took charge of the girl for four years
and graduated her and paid every dollar of the
expense. When she got out of school she be
came a veritable butterfly, light headed and
frivolous. She finally married, and never even
thought enough of the man who educated her
to invite him to her wedding; and has never
written him a line since the day she married,
nor sent him a message. And he said it hurt
him. “Actually,” he said, “I had become so
wrapped up in the child until she had become
one of my own family and I loved her almost
with a father’s affection, and for a long time
the thing burned in my soul, but after awhile I
began to feel, “Well, I got the blessing for I
never did ‘enjoy anything like 1 did sending
that money to pay her expenses. I got enough
for four years to last, never mind whether I
ever hear from her or not.” As I look back to
day I do not recall a single solitary step I ever
took to make somebody else have a better time
or to lift them up in the school of usefulness
and blessing but that I got during the process
more than the persons I was trying to help,
whether they are grateful or not does not
change the fact that it is a blessing.
In this matter, as in all others, Christ is an
example. He was the first to put into opera
tion His law. His invitation to the world is,
“Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy
laden and I will give you rest,” actually send
ing out the broadcast invitation to the world
to come and dump its burdens on His shoul
ders. The average man seeking happiness is
seeking it exactly the other way. We are run
ning from burdens. We see that there is some
body over there in trouble and we go the other
way.
I will give you two stories to illustrate this.
A friend gave me this story. He was on a rail
road train going to Waco, Texas. It was a
very cold day and on that train there was an
old woman going far out West. She was bend
ing on a staff and could hardly walk. Her face
was wrinkled. Her shoulders bent. As they
came into a certain town this friend of mine
saw a young woman, a girl of great refinement,
splendidly dressed; he noticed that she was
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