DANGEROUS AGE.
DR. INGE ON MIDDLE LIFE
“To be content, and to compromise with life as it is, is a danger that threatens most of us in middle life,” said Dean Inge, preaching at St. Paul’s recently. He discussed in his sermon on the first Sunday in Advent the tragedies that occur in middle life. His text was Psalm xci., 5 and 6: “Thou shalt not be afraid for the terror by night; nor the arrow that flieth by day; nor the pestilence that walketli in the darkness nor for the destruction that watcheth at noonday.” “As a recent writer had observed, he said, few things were more tragic than the depreciation of character which often set in about the age of 50. There was less inclination to fight against weakness. People became more opportunist—rather clever at taking the line of least resistance —and had less capacity for the heroic. Some escaped the danger and gained strength of soul from the weakness of the body, and were full of generous sympathy and happily blended .temperament. Such characters, he thought, were rarely found among those who had been greatly and uniformly successful in world affairs, but rather those who .had fully experienced life’s trials, “I believe that the habit of private prayer will do more than anything else to keep at bay that.fatty degeneration of character. - “We all assume that, youth is the happiest period of life. I doubt very much whether that is so. The young are secretive about their ambitions, hopes, and fears —are fearful of being laughed at, and often suffer acutely. In my experience as a college tutor the most distressful thing was to observe so many young pien with talents prepared to wrap them up in a napkin.” Habits of life became second nature, and the successful man often became a pitiable object, with the habit of attending to nothing except the things which helped him on or held him back. He was one for whom the finer values of life did not exist. He did not mean to break with religion and give up higher things altogether, but he kept an account open with the world, the flesh, and the devil, so that they should not interfere with his business. Thus now and then, came humiliating exposures which surprised his friends. “Possibly we can benefit by living all we can with the young, trying to, sympathise with their ingenuous and sometimes absurd ideas. There are two sides of the question whether we ought to grow old continually or to remain young while we can.' So I have tried to suggest to those of my hearers who are no longer very young a few suitable topics for self examination in Advent.”
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Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 3757, 21 February 1928, Page 3
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455DANGEROUS AGE. Manawatu Herald, Volume XLIX, Issue 3757, 21 February 1928, Page 3
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