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ONLY ONE BEAT!

MOST loyally that remarkable little organ, your heart, weighing only about ten ounces, and but the size of your closed fist, serves at its daily task. It is a wonderful mechanism, and so seldom fails that one takes it entirely for granted and seldom gives it a thought. But at this moment, reader, there is BUT ONE BEAT of that heart between you and "the great beyond."

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Like multitudes, you perhaps fail to realize how very little it would take to close your history here and usher you into eternity. An unexpected accident, a very simple infection, a sudden and quite unlooked-for disease-and you are gone! A disturbance of one of the many processes upon which life depends-and at once death ensues. And how very readily some of these processes are disturbed! How sudden, frequently, is the transition from radiant life to the gloom of death! And are you one of those who foolishly trifle with these stern realities? Have you forgotten that, when your heart has beat its last, eternal bliss or eternal woe must be your portion? Listen, for eternity is at stake.

Which of these two destinies, should the present beat of your heart be its last, would be yours? If you have not given this question the thought that it deserves, can there be any better time than now to face the issue? If but a short journey lay before you, how carefully you would prepare for it!