regard to these limitations, altho we all
know of them or should. The ministers tell us about these things
Sunday after Sunday, or should, and yet we find men chasing the
almighty dollar until they fall exhausted into the grave. A few
years ago I read a sermon by Dr. Talmage on this subject; he said a
man who wore himself out getting money that he did not need would
finally drop dead, and that his pastor would tell a group of
sorrowing friends that, by a mysterious dispensation of Providence,
the good man had been cut off in his prime. Dr. Talmage said that
Providence had nothing to do with it, and that the minister ought to
tell the truth about it and say that the man had been kicked to death
by the golden calf.

A few weeks ago I read a story by Tolstoy, and I did not notice until
I had completed it that the title of the story was, "What shall it
profit?" The great Russian graphically presented the very thought
that I have been trying to impress upon your minds. He told of a
Russian peasant who had land hunger--who added farm to farm and land
to land, but could never get enough. After a while he heard of a
place where land was cheaper and he sold his land and went and bought
more land. But he had no more than settled there until he heard of
another place among a half civilized people where land was cheaper
still. He took a servant and went into this distant country and
hunted up the head man of the tribe, who offered him all the land he
could walk around in a day for a thousand rubles--told him he could
put the money down on any spot and walk in any direction as far and
as fast as he would, and that if he was back by sunset he could have
all the land he could encompass during the day. He put the money down
upon the ground and started at sunrise to get, at last, enough land.
He started leisurely, but as he looked upon the land it looked so
good that he hurried a little--and then he hurried more, and then he
went faster still. Before he turned he had gone further in that
direction than he had intended, but he spurred himself on and started
on the second side. Before he turned again the sun had crossed the
meridian and he had two sides yet to cover. As the sun was slowly
sinking in the west he constantly accelerated his pace, alarmed at
last for fear he might have undertaken too much and might lose it
all. He reached the starting point, however, just as the sun went
down, but he had overtaxed his strength and fell dead