"A THROUGH TICKET TO HEAVEN."

Auckland Star, Volume XL, Issue 50, 27 February 1909, Page 15

"A THROUGH TICKET TO HEAVEN."

FATHER VAUGHAN'S WIT. Father Bernard Vaughan waxed facetious In a speech he delivered at St. George'e Hall, Bradford, on Sunday, 10th January, In connection with the Joint Hospital Fund. The Lord Mayor (Mr James UilU presided. Father Vaughan said at the outset he must emphasise the fact that life on this earth was but a probation. He knew that he came from God, he knew that he was going to God, and he knew that when he left this earth he would be with God. If anyone tried to put him off he would say, "You are ON THE DOWX LINE. Pass on." (Laughter.) His great effort would be to get a through ticket to Heaven without any change. If they gave him this planet with Socialism dominant In it, with everything in it absolutely satisfactory, he would kick the thing Into space and set off to Heaven. (Laughter.) They were all commercial travellers sent here with wares from the Master, and when they went back they must give an account of their doings. He knew that the politician was not a man, he was a vote; he knew that a society woman was so much entertainment; he knew that the commercial man was so much business, and that the mill man was only a hand. When he was travelling he knew he was nothing more than a ticket. (Laughter.) Some people asked him how it was he had not LOST HIS HEAD with so much applause. lie supposed it was because he was not such a fool as he looked. (Laughter.) A good many people thought they were going to Heaven in a saloon carriage, and thought they were made perfect and not fit to associate with their fellow-men. These people, instead of going by saloon carriag-es, were doing a little tobogganing. (Laughter.) If he could make certain that he could get to Heaven in a truck he woud just as well go that way as flrst-clase. "This is a hospital of Incurables," Father Vaughan continued. "Did you ever kuow anybody go out of it alive?" (Laughter.) Their duty was to school the character, and they must begin that in the first school—-the mother. Woman might have aspirations to standing on the tall of a cart shouting "VOTES FOR WOMEN." but she would be much better over a cot of the child. (Applause.) If a mother allowed her child to be under the care of the State or the corporation, she was a traitor. (Applause.) Any woman who put her child at a school which did not recognise the divinity of Christ, put her child in a school which could never lead that child aright. (Hear, hear.)