Clearfield Republican. [volume] (Clearfield, Pa.) 1851-1937, 1869-09-15
LONELINESS OF THE OCEAN.

N@'@e@ee&s %fHftf VI AAh tV&ahANt
One who has never Travelled upon
tho ocean expects to find II somewhat
thickly populated. lie thinks of the
vast traffic and travel that goes over
the waters, aud he Is ready to imagine
that the great deep is alive with this
great hurrying to and fro of the
tions. He reads Of lands "whosc
commerce whitcns every sea" and he
is ready to think that the ocean itself
is as full of sails as the harbor Of some
mighty metropolis. But hc finds his
mistake. As he leaves the land, the
ships begin to disappear As he goes
on his way they soon all vanish, and
there is nothing about him but the
blue sea and the Bonded sky. Some
times no may meet or overiake q
solitary ship during the day but then,
again, there will be many days when
not a single sail will cross the horizon.
There are spaces measured by thou
sands of miles, over which no ship has
ever passed. The idea of nations
commerce whitening every sea" is the
widest fancy. If all the ships that
have ever been built were brought
together INTO a single fleet, they would
fill but q handsbreadth of the ocean.
The space, therefore, that man and
his works occupy on the sea, is as
small in extent us the hold on il by bis
power is slight and superficial Both
together are as nothing Both to.
gethcr must al ways be as nothing.
The ocean covers three. fourths Of the
surface Of the globe, and by far the
greatest part Of this vast expansc is
and ever has been entirely free from
his presence and visitation.
And it is this vastness, this loneli.
ness, and this impossiblity of subiuga
tion by man, that sets it apar. from
the secular aspect that belongs to the
rest of the world, and consccrates it as
the peculiar possession and dwelling
place of the Most High. Like some
vast builded temple, it perpetually
speaks Of him and for him. 1t bodies
forth his immensely. 1t represents
eternity. Girded round all the lands,
as death is girded round all life, it |
seems 10 bring the unseen world to
our vision, and to sound and shine with |
the glory and the awfulness of that
state which. is beyond the grave. |
Travelling out into its vastness, we
seem to be moving beyond the boun-
daries Of space and time. Sailing on,
day after day, without any apparent
progress, never reaching the horizon
that is before, never leaving the hori-
zon that is behind, it is as if we had
lost all connections with the earth
which we inhaDit, and were voyaging
upon the infinite expanse of the skies,
travelling to some world that lies be.
yond the stars of heaven. The
strangeness of this sensation becomes
painful and oppressive. 1t is almost
as if we had quilted life itself, and the
winds of eternity had taken our sails
and were blowing us over the sea of
death towards the throne of God and
the bar of judgment. A feeling of the
supernatural begins to steal upon Us.
Familiar sights and sounds take on
wierd and mystical significance. We
look at one another, and in our revcrie
wonder II we arc not already disem.
bodied spirits. We look at The ship,
and wonder if some unseen hands are
not grasping its keel, and holding il to
its course, and lifting it from its billow.
We look at the engines aud wonder If
they are not q kind of archangels of
the deeps prisoned TO their task, and
bowing to. one another with some
secret intelligence as they lay their
mighty shoulders to the wheels and
push the trembling vessel along its
path. We look at the sun, and il
seems to shake its beams upon us
with new and strange significance.
We look at the stars by night, and
they seem to be nearer to us, and
to be gazing upon us with longing
eyes, and with a moro fixed and sol.
omn earnestness. We look at the
track Of tho ship, and it is a wake of
sparkling fires, as if our bark had left
at length the seas OF earth behind il.
and were sailing over the ocean of the
armament. We have forgotten time;
weare thinking Of eternity. We have
forgotten the world; we are thinking
OF God. The bondage of the senses
is dissolved, and the things that are
beyond them come breaking into our
being. The earth which we have left
behind us seems as far away us il il
were another planet, and the themes
that used to lie beyond the planets
lind easy entrance to our thoughts,
and rule us with a strange aud sudden
dominion. The pretty interests that
engrosscd us a while ago are shrunk
10 nothingness. The cagerness of an.
ticipation, the excitement of depart.
ure are all forgotten, as the departed
soul forgets the pain, the resllessness,
and the fear Of the dying bed, when
the shores of receding world fade
out of its sight, and the strange calm
OF that vast new ocean of life over
which Il is sailing, take possession of
ITS consciousness. We are alone 10Th
God We are walking in his temple,
and i would scarcely surprise us If
we should see him riding upon the !
clouds, or descending upon the deep,
and moving towards us in his chariot
OF the waters.-ISouhern Opinion. d
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