The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1882-04-13

are looking TO see whether OtnerS are
getting into the life-bOat while we sink
into the wave. We cry hre because our
neighbOr's house is kindling, but let our
own go up in the blaze. Turn back, o
wandering and scattered thoughts of
men, to your own heart to-day. L ask
not what are the heavenly prospects or
your father, your companion, your child,
your neighbOT, your friend, but what
are yours. Blot out this audience and
sit by yourself alone. Each man now
for himself. Each woman for herself.
Your sins, are they forgiven Your death
hour, is it provided fOrp Your heaven,
is it secured? EglOn was i'll the palace
and Ehqd came with a private message,
and EgtOn waved out all his attendants.
l knock at the door of your heart. Let
me as Christ's messenger come in alone.
Wave out all your anXieties about others.
Here | stand with question about you.
Have you repented? Have you believed?
Have you prayed? Have you been saved?
ask nothing about anybody else in all
the universe. All my thoughts We're
toward you. The lane travel up ends
at your heart. The doOr-bell l ring is
that of your soul. 1t is your life, your
death, your enthrOnement or exile, your
unending existence. A mightier earth
quake than that which demolished the
Philiphian prison will after while rum
BILE about your ears. The foundations of
the world will give way, and by one
tremOr all Aperican cities Will be
thrown fat into the dust. Lisbon and
Caracas went not down more completely.
Cathedrals and palaces and prisons that
have been standing thousand years
will tOpple like child's blOck-hOuse.
Seas in one surge will submerge the
land, and the Atlantic and Pacific oceans
join hands above the Alleghenies, the
Alps and the Himalayas. What then
shall do? What then will you do? |
wonder not at the jail-keeper's personal
anxiety, for he was guarding not only
against the falling.Of that prison, but
the falling of world.
Again, the question of the jail-keeper
was one of Incompatible Importance.
Perhaps he may have been anxious to
have his salary raised by the Govern
ment. Perhaps he may have thought a
supervisor like him ought to have larger |
accommodation. Perhaps he may have |
been about to institute a prison reform |
on the subject Of light and warmth or
cleanliness, or medical treatment or dis |
cipline. Men are wonderfully alike, |
and l suppose, like ourselves, he had |
many subjects under discussion; and yet |
all the questions of his life are hushed |
up, submerged, forgotten, annlhilated, |
in the Outcry, "What must | do to be |
5ayed?" My hearer, what question have |
you comparable in Importance with this? |
Is 1t business question? But all your |
earthly business will shortly come to an |
end. You will go out of the partnership. |
Beyond certain point, of all the mil |
lions of goods that are sold in New York |
or Brooklyn, you will not handle a yard |
of cloth or a pound of sugar or penny's |
worth. A fire might start at Central |
Park and burn down to the Battery; it |
would not do you any damage. Every |
cashier might abScOnd, and every bank |
suspend payment, and every insurance |
company fail, and you would not be |
affected by it. What is any business
that stops this side the grave to be COM
pared in Importance with that which
reaches beyond it? What purchases
have you made for eternity? What
losses will you incur that are everlast-
ing? What is beyond the store and the
shop? What are your unfailing securi-
ties? Are you jObbing for time when
you might be WhOlesaling for eternity?
Is there in your store any question of
business so broad at the base, so altitu-
dinOus, so OvershadOwing, as the jailer's
questiOn-as Mr.. IngersOlPs question,
What shall l do to be saved?" In your
domestic affairs is there any questions
comparable with tn g? Is it something
about father, or mother, or husband, or
wife, son or daughter? But in a short
while this earthly relation by inevitable
and universal law must be broken I'D.
Father will be gone; mother will be
gone, you will be gone. But the super
natural question of the text will then
just begin harvesting its gains or de-
ploring its losses, rolling up its magni-
tudes and sweeping its circles-ques-
tiOn that decides whether you will live
a cd ha IA
demons lost; whether you will take |
wing and fly, or chain and drop; whether !
you shall forever be built up or pulled |
down; whether God shall be your father |
Or your foe; whether your future shall |
be spent praising OF blaspheming, chant |
ing or grOaning, living the life that al |
ways lives or dying the death that al |
ways dies. What difference now to Ma |
pOleOn III. whether he triumphed or |
at Sedan, lived at the Tuil- |
cries or at Chiselhurst, was an Emperor |
or an exile? Laid out in his coffin in |
the dress of a Field Marshal, did that in |
the future world give him any better |
chance than if he had slept in the plain |
est shrOudp What to you in few days |
will be the difference whether on earth |
you rode or walked, were bowed to OF |
maltTeated, applauded or hissed, well |
coined in or kicked out, while laying |
lOlu OF every moment OF Gne great 1utufe, |
)verarching and undergirding all time |
and eternity is the plain, living, infinite, |
startling, stupendOUs, overwhelming |
question of the text, "What must do to |
be saved?"
Further, it was question pressed out |
by a crushing misfortune. The peni- |
5entiary down, the keeper lost his posi- |
ton. But more than that, the flight of |
The prisoner was ordinarily the death of
the jailer. Had the wall stood quiet
and the incareerated lay still in their
stocks, and the morning sunlight drop
ped calmly on the pillow of the super
visor, suppose you he would have flung
the agitated words of my text into Pauls
ear? No; it was the earthquake that
reused up his anxieties. My hearer, do
not your troubles start in your soul the
same question: The color of your dress
is not as bright as it was once. Why
have you chosen a more subdued garb?
Do you not like saffron or orange or sol
feTinO as well as once? Yes; but that
which was in harmony with your feel
ings when you were young and gay and
prosperous would be a discOrd now, and
so you have plated up the shadows into
your apparel. There have been dark
days in your dwelling. 1t does not seem
any more like home. Once you thought