The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1885-11-18
DR.. ThLMAGE'S SERMON

LII, lQuMuuu UullMUlI'
THE BLOOD.
Text: Hebrews tx, 22-"Without shedding
Of blood is no remission"
John G.. Whittier, the last of the great
school Of American poets that made the last
quarter of a century brilliant, asked me in
the White mountains one morning, after
prayers in which I had given out Cowper's
famous hymn about THE Fountain Filled
with Blood:' 'Do you really believe that
there is a literal application of the blood OF
Christ to the soul?" My negative reply then
is my negative reply The Bible statement
agrees with all physicians and all physiolo-
blood is the life, and in the Christian religion
it means simply that Christ's life was given
for our life. Hence all this talk of men who
say the Bible story of blood is disgusting, and
that they don't want what they call a
slaughter house religion only shows their
incapacity or unwillingness to look through
the figure of speech toward the thing signi-
fed. The blood that on the darkest Friday
the world ever saw oozed or trickled or
poured lFOm Uu9 DrO" uuu Gu6 SlQo duu GLlo
hands and the feet Of the illustrious sufferer,
back of Jerusalem, in a few hours coagu-
lated and dried up and forever disappeared.
and if men had depended on the application
of the literal blood of Christ there would not
have been a soul saved for the last eighteen
| centuries. In order to understand this red
word Of my text we only have 70 exercise as
much common sense in religion as we DO IN
everything else. Pang for pang, hunger for
hunger, fatigue for fatigue, tear for tear,
blood for blood, life for life we see every day
illustrated. The act of substitution is no
novelty, although Ihear men talk es though
tho idea Of Christ's suffering substituted for
our suffering were something abnormal,
something distressingly odd, something wild
ly eccentric, q solitary episode in the worlds
history when I could take you out into this
city and before shutdown point you to five
hundred cases of subtitution and voluntary
suffering one in behalf OF another.
At 2 o'clock tomorrow afternoon 60 among
the places of business or toll. 1t will be no
their looks show you that they are over
worked. They are prematurely old. They
are fastening rapidly toward their decease.
They have gone through crises in business
that shattered their nervous system and
pulled on the brain. They have a shortness
Of breath and a pain in the back of the head,
and at nights an insomnia that alarms them.
Why are they drudging at business early
and late? For fun? No, it would be difficult
to extract any amusement out Of that e1.
haustion. Because they are avaricious? In
many cases, no. Because their W personal
expenses are lavish? No, a few hundred dol
lars would meet all their wants. The simple
fact is the man is enduring oil that fatigue
and evaporation and wear and tear to keep
his home prosperous. There is all invisible
line reaching from that store, from that
bank, from that shop, from that scaffolding
to a quiet scene a few blocks, q few miles
away, and there is the secret Of that business
endurance. He is simply the champion of a
homestead, for which he wins bread and
wardrobe and education and prosperity, and
in such battle ten thousand mon fail. Of
ton business men whom I bury nine die Of
overwork for others. Some sudden disease
finds them with no power of resistance and
they are gone. Life for life. Blood for
blood. Substitution.
At l o'clock to morrow morning, the hour
when slumber is most uninterrupted and
most profound, walk amid the dwelling
houses Of the city. Here and there you will
find a dim light, because it is the lou: ehold
custom to keep q subdued light burning, but
most of the houses from base to top are as
dark as though uninhabited. A merciful
God has sent forth the archangel of sleep and
he puts his wings over the city. But yonder
is a clear light burning and outside on the
window easement a glass or pitcher con-
tanning food for a sick child, tho food
set in the fresh air. This is the sixth night
that mother has sat up with that sufferer.
clans prescription, not giving a drop too
much or too little or a moment too soon or too
late. She is very anxious, for she has buried
three children with the same disease and she
prays and weeps, each prayer and sob ending
with q kiss of the pale cheek. By dint Of
kindness she gets the little one through the
ordeal. After it is all over the mother is
taken down. Brain or nervous fever sets in
and one day she leaves the convalescent
join the three in the kingdom Of heaven.
Life for life. Substitution. The fact is that
there are an uncounted number of mothers
who after they nave navigated a large fam
ily of children through all the diseases of in
fancy and got them fairly started up the
Towering slope of boyhood and girlhood have
only strength enough left to die. They fade
away. Some call it consumption, SOME call
it nervous prostration, some call it intermit-
tent or malarial disposition, but call it
myrtyrdom of the domestic circle. Life for
life. Blood for blood. Substitution. Or
perhaps she fingers long enough TO see a son
get on the wrong road, and his former kind
ness becomes Ugh reply when she expresses
anxiety about him. But she goes right on
looking carefully after his apparel, remem-
bering his every birthday with some me.
mento, and when he is brought home worn
out with dissipation, nurses him till he gets
we'll and starts him again, and hopes, and
expects, and prays, and ~counsels, and suffers
until her strength gives out and she fails.
She is going, and attendants bending ever
her pillow ask her if she has any message to
leave, and she makes great effort to say
something, but out of three or four minutes
of indistinct utterances they can catch but
three words: My poor boy!" The simple
fact is, she died for him. Life for life. Sub
stitutlon. ,
About twenty-four years ago there went
forth from our homes hundreds OF thousands
If men to do battle for their country. All the
poetry of war soon vanished and left them
nothing but the terrible prose. They waded
knee deep in mud. They sleptin snow-banks.
They marched till their cut feet tracked the
earth. They were swindled out of their hon.
,st rations and lived on meat not lit for q
log. They had jaws fractured and eyes OK
;inguished and limbs shot away. Thousands
If them cried for water as they lay dying on
the field the night after the battle, and got 1t
aot. They were homesick, and received no
message from their loved ones. They died in
barns, in bushes, in bitches, the buzzards OF
The summer heat the only attendants on their
,bseuuies. No Ole but tine infinite God VINO
Knows everything knows TIE ten-thousancth
part of the length and breadth ana depsn
ind height of anguish of Northern and South
rn battlefields. Why did these fathers leave
heir children and 60 to the front, and why
lid these young men, p%ostponing the marriage
Law, start out into the probabilities OF never
coming back! For the country they died.