The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1882-04-06
BRAVE IN RELIGION.
Continued from Page ?.

| that all the members Of those families
were sGyed-mysef, the youngest and
the last. There We're twelve Of Us chill
dTen. Seven of them are in Hrayeu,
five of us ia various ways was trying
to serve God. | trace the whole lin %
mercy hack to that hour when my
Christian grandmother sat in her room
impiUTiHg the blessing of God upon uei
| children. Elpe of her defendants be-
came preachers OF the Go. pei. Many of
her descendants are in heaven, many of
them still in the Christian conflict
Did it pay for her to spend the whole
evening in prayer for her household?
Ask her before the throne of God, sur
rounded by her children. In the pres
ence of the Christian Church to-day |
make this record of ancestral piety.
Oh, there is beauty, and tenderness,
and a sublimity in family religiOnl
In my house have book of strange
| fascination. 1t is my fathers and
| mothers family Bible. If you exam
ined it you would hardly find leaf
that is not discOlOred with time or tears.
AS long as l can remember out of that
book my father read every morning and
night. When my brother Van Nest
| died in the West Indies, where he had
| gone for his health, the night the news
came, out of that book my father read
the eternal consultations. When my
city, died, that was the book that com
| fOrted the old people. There came fif-
teen years of sickness to my father, and
mighty struggle for bread as a cOnse
| quence; out of that book he read of the
ravens that fed Elijah. My mother
went through the dark valley of death;
| that was the lamp that shOne on her
pathway. In the hours of loneliness
that followed, my father cOnsOled him
self with that book, reading of the re-
| union which took place two years af-
| terward in heaven. There are but four
| or five pictures in the book, but DOTe
never illustrated Bible as that Book is
| illustrated to my eyes. Through it L
can see into marriages and burials,
| joys and sorrows, meetings and part
| ingS, thanksgiving days and Christmas
festivals, cradles and death-beds. Old,
| old bOOkl speak out and tell of the sOr-
rows cOmfOTted and of the dying hours
| iTTadiated. Old, old book! The hands
| that held thee are ashes, the eyes that
! peTused thee are closed. What pillow
| thou wOuldst make for dying headl l
salute all the memories of the past when
l press it to my heart and when press
it to my lips. Oh, for family Bible!
| The New Testament in small type is not
worthy of being called by that name.
| Have a worthy Bible in large type, with
| the family record of marriages and
births and deaths. What if the curious
should turn over the leaves to see how
old you areP You are younger now
than you will ever be again. The Gu
TiOus will find out from those with
| whom you played in childhood how old
you are. Have family Bible. 1t will
go down from generation to generation
| full of holy memories. A hundred years
after you are dead it will be a benedic-
tiOn to those who come after you. Other
books, worn out or fallen apart, will be
| flung to the garret or cellar; but this
will be inViOlate, and it Will be your
protest for centuries against lnlqulty
ana IN behalf of righteousness. Oh,
when we see what family religion did
for our fathers household, do we not
want it to come into the dining-rOOm
to break the bread, into the nursery to
bless the young, into the parlOr to pu-
rify the sOcialities, into the library to
control the reading, into the bedroom
to hallOw the slumbeT, into the hail to
watch our going out and coming in?
Aye, there are hundreds of voices in
this house this morning ready to cry
out: eyes! Yes As for me and my
house, we will serve the Lord"
There are two arms to this subject.
The one arm puts it's hand OIL all par
pnts. 1t says to them: Don't inter
feTe with your childTen's welfare. Don't
interfere with their eternal happiness.
Don't you, by anything you do, put out
your foot and trip them into ruin.
Start them under the shelter, the in
surance, the everlasting help, Of Chris
tian parentage. CatechismS will not
save then, though Catechisms are good.
The rod will not save them, though the
rod may be necessary. Lessons of vlr-
tue will not save them, though they are
very important. Becoming a thorough
n oh nd Il n IL
out Christian yourself will make them
Christians" The other arm of this sub
ject puts its hand upon those who had
a piOus bringing up, but who, as yet
have disappointed the expectations in
regard to them. | said that children
brought up in Christian households,
though they might make wide curve,
were very apt to come back to the
straight path. Have you not been
curving out long enough? and is it not
most time for you to begin to curve in?
"Oh," you say, they were too rigid"
Wen, now, my brother, | think you
have pretty good character consider
ing what you say your parents were.
Do not boast too much about the style In
which your parents brought you up.
Might it not be possible that you would
be an exception to the general rule
laid down, and that you might spend
your eternity in different world from
that in which your parents are spend
ing theirs?
/ feel anxious about you; you feel
anxious about yourself. Oh, cross over
into the right path this morning. What
an awful thing it would be for you to
perish after all the prayers offered by
parental lips! If your parents prayed
for twice a day, each of them twice a
day for twenty years, that would make
29,2O0 prayers. Those 29,2O0 prayers
for you will either be the mountain OveI
which you will climb into heaven OF
they will be the avalanche that will
slide back to crush your soul forever
By the memory of the cradle in which
your childhood was rocked with thI
foot that long ago ceased to move, b!
the crib in which your own children
slumber night by night under God
protecting care, by the two graves il
which sleep those two old hearts tina
beat with love so long for your welfare
and by the two graves in which yOl
now, the living father and mother, will
4 find your last repOse, l urge you to tn
discharge of your duty.
Though parents may In covenant be-