The Lake Charles echo. [volume] (Lake Charles, Parish of Calcasieu, La.) 1876-1898, 1879-04-05

to Niblo's, says one, go to Booths, go
to the opera. Take my advice and
throw yourself body and soul into chris
tian society. Report yourself to me five
years from now, and let me see how the
advice works. Bring with you that
young man who refuses the advice. At
the end of that time he will come up
d1ssipated, shabby in apparel, not dis
posed to look any one in the eyes, and
with moral character eighty-fVe per
cent. off. You will come with physical
health confirmed, countenance frank,
habits honorable, soul saved with all the
inhabitants of Heaven.
Again / find much sunshine in Christ,
and Divine explanation. To most people
life is an inexplieable tangle. Things
turn out just opposite to what you
might suppose. There is useless woman
perfectly well, and there is an inoustris
GUS and consecrated woman completely
invalided. There is a bad man with
$50, 900 income, and there is q good one
with 81 500. There is q man, nuisance
to society, seventy five years Of age,snd
there is Christian of thirty-fye taken
from his usefulness. There ia no
one sentence that you oftener hear utter
ed than e don't understand this." Our
religion comes in with our misfortunes.
The world goes the other way when
mans down. During the week before that
man lost his property there were fifteen
or twenty carriages at his door. The
week after his misfortune, you could
count all the carriages on one finger.
The week before his financial disaster,
men took their hats clear of, passing
him in the street. The days that he
was under severe financial discussion
people only tipped their hats, hardly
touching the rim. After the question
was decided adversely, people gave
slight ] bit of their heads without touch
ing their hats, and the week after toe
sheriff had sold him out people were
busy looking in store windows as he
passed them
But religion delights to come to man
when he is down. 1t assures him that
there is something more important than
money. 1t says your sickness is merely
publication; it says God wants to trans
plant your family to Heaven, and He
had to begin somewhere, and of course
He took the one best fitted to go. / do
not say religion makes everything plain,
down to the minuti@, but it has general
explanations very oonsolatory. You
know the principle of telegrsphy by
ciphers. Not wishing the public to get
the telegram, The merchant in Chicago
telegraphs to the merchant in New York
certain words, which are simply nonsense
TO Others, but at each end of the route
there is man who has the key, by which
these meaningless words become import
ant information on which business oper-
ations of tens of thousands of dollars are
builded. So the vicissitudes of our life
sometimes seem senseless rigmarole or
contradiction or mysterious cipher.
But God has key to it, and the Chris.
tan has key to it, and though we may
have some difficulty in spelling it out,
we shall get enough neaning out of it to
learn that God is doing everything for
the best. Is there no sunshine in that?
1t is pleasure far beyond laughter. 1t
ia nearer the fountain of tears than of
boisterous demonstrations. Have you
ever cried for joy? There are tears
which are eternal rapture in this relation.
There are thousands here who walk in
the full satisfaction and the perpetual de-
light that all is well. / do not know
how men without the explanations of
religion keep out of the insane asylum.
Your child dead, and that is the end of
it. Your property gone, and that is the
end of that. Your reputation persisted,
and that is the end of it. Tell me how
you can stand all this? Are your nerves
and muscles different from mine
Where did you get this supernatural
toughness9 No religion, and yet not
maniac In. Dewitt Talmage.
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A Seedless Lemon.