The Evansville daily journal. [volume] (Evansville, Ia. [i.e. Ind.]) 1848-1862, 1856-10-10
Cant,

We know not more certain symptom to
hypocrisy in religion than in minds, them
selves obviously worldly in the extreme, an
exaggerated condemnation Of all little world
illness in all other honest people, gravely
jogging, or gaily skipping along their path OF
life. Those people are often the least worldly.
on whom they who make the loudest boast Of
their unworldliness, seek lasely to afix that
Iopprobrlous eplthet. For they walk the world
with heart pure as it is cheerful; they are,
by that unpretendlng purity, saved from in-
ffection, and as there are as many fair and
healthy faces to be seen in the smoke and stir
of cities, as in the rural wild, so also are there
as many fair and healthy spirits. The world
the wicked world-has not the power over
us Christians that the canters; as for the
mere amusements of the world-frivolous as
they may too often be-lttle or no power
have they over that which is $50 majestcal." :"
Yet to listen to some folks, you would think
that all the boys and girls one sees, ''like gay
creatures of the element" dancing under a
chandelier pendant from the ROOT, like some
starry constellation, were quadrilling away to
the sound of music, into the bottomless pit.
Is it not. for example, most disgusting and
loathsome, to hear some brOadbacked thick
calved, greasy-faced, well-fed, and not badly
drunk caitif, of some canting caste, distn-
guished in private and public life for the gross
greedlness with which they gobble up every
thing eatable within the reach of their hairy
l6sts-preaching and praying, and exhortlng
Young people, full of flesh and blood, of the
purest and clearest quality, to forsake and for
swear the world-to quell within them all
mortal vanities, and appetities and lusts?
To whom is the hound haranguing? What
means he by lusts, while the sweet face is be-
fore him of that innocent girl of fifteen or
twenty? For what are years to her, into
whose eyes God and the Saviour have put
their light angelical--that ineffable loveliness,
as pure from taint as the beauty of the rose
bushing on her lily breast, which she gathered
in the dewy garden a few hours ago, among
the earliest songs of Birds while yet the pen
countenance, still lingering there from the
piety of her soul breathed prayers? Shock
ing to hear the ugly monster coarsely canting
to such creature of her--corruptioni She
knows that she belongs to fallen nature
Often times her tears have flowed to think
how undeserving she was of all the goodness
showered on her head from heaven. Often
hath she looked upon the lilies of the field,
and envied their innocence. Meek and hum
bic is she even in her most joyful happiness;
contrite and repentant, even over the shadows
of sin that may have crossed her spirit as the
shadows of the clouds suddenly over "a sta
tionary spot of sunshine" Even for her sake,
she knows that "Jesus wept." With what a
revered touch do these delicate hands of hers
turn over the leaves of the New Testament
Her father and her mother intensely feel them
selves to be Christians, while she reads to
them of the crucifxion. She remembers not
the time when she knew not Him who died
to save sinners.-[ Prot. Wilson'S Essays