The Ouachita telegraph. [volume] (Monroe, La.) 1865-1889, 1882-05-20

Mount Horeb, come to worship God in
festive attire; to renew, as 1t weres
that memorable covenant, and exclainl
again: awe will do: we will heark-
eng" Iu most Of our American tenn
pies this is also confirmation day.
Youth. after due instruction, APP.
proaches the sacred shrine to announce
their conscientious faith in God and His
law, and be blessed. And with the
children, their fathers and mothers are
frequently re.confirmed and treasured
in their faith. 1t is a day of gladness
and reunion Of Israel with his God,
which awakens in many hearts the
echoes of a higher life and nobler aim.
In vain has fantasy labored and
brought forth the productions of genius
in all forms and languages; in the
worlds literature and works of art,
there is positively nothing which COM
pares in grandeur, sublimity and ma
jestic fullness with the revelation on
Mount Sinai, although it is described
in Scriptures in the simplest and most
artless terms. All the elements of the
aw full and the sublime combine in that
Sinaic picture. There is the soundless
and lifeless desert, vast and calm,
bounded in the north, to the very
clouds, by the steep mountain range OF
Horeb, like huge red stones piled, one
above the other, by giant race. On
the highest peak of that mountain
range, you must imagine that scene of
revelation, as described in the Bible,
and behold a nation standing in breath.
less awe at the foot thereof, the thun-
ders and the sounds of the comets re-
echoed by the numerous clefts rolling,
roaring over the plain, and you APP
proach the picture drawn for you in
the brief words of Scripture. There Is
nothing like or similar to it, nothing
approaching it in the history or poetry
of any nation.
Come here, all ye infidels and skep-
tics, and answer this question: How
is it that genius but once, if poetry it
is, but once and never again rose to
that awful height of the sublime? Did
man at that time, for once, excel HIM
self? Art can not exceed the grandeur
of nature; the fictions of fantasy are
mere shadows of the rock of truth. No
human genius was ever able to invent
the Sinaic revelation. In order to es-
tablish this as fact, no better proof is
necessary than its description as it is.
The psalmist-Psalm xviii, $40
did make tho attempt to describe the
Sinaic revelation, and his description
is very poetical. 1t falls short, howev-
err, by far short, of the original nara
tive in Exodus. The author of the
Acts of the Apostles also-Acts ii
made an attempt to initiate the Sinaic
scene in the upper chamber of house
in Jerusalem, as the Evangelists tried
to surround Calvary with Sinaic gran
deur. But how faint a shadow of the
original are those imitations-manh has
not invented it, man can not initiate it.
We Israelites celebrate this feast in
memory of the great event when God
gave law and doctrine to all his chill
dren, such as to serve them as their
protectors from bondage and corrup-
ton; the day when heaven and earth
were reunited by Gods proclamation
of His care and providence for the
children of this earth; the great event
which taught our sires: "This day we
have that the Almighty will speak to
man and he will live" and will never
disappear from the memory of Israel.
We Israelites are proud to maintain
our belief, not because our ancestors
were heroes, statesmen, princes and
mighty men; not because they were
musicians, poets, reasoners and legisla-
tors Of the highest rank; not even be-
cause they were divine bards, prophets
and teachers of righteousness; because
God, the only One Great Jehovah, has
revealed His will to us, for the redemp-
ton of humanity, and therefore calls
US, among all the nations, His first
born son. 1t is with particular pride
that we look upon this feast, which
annually places US again before Mount
Sinai, and causes ms to hear anew the
lesson from on high, il" Jehovah, am
thy Cod and 10 We a ire nv witnesses