St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1886-03-20

Out and out and out, and on and on and on,
and down and down and down he sped
until one night, with only one to greet him,
he arrived His Decentralization so UNI
pretending, so quiet, that it was not
known on earth until the excitement in the
cloud gave intimation that something
grand and glorious had happened Who
q comes there? From what port did he sail9
why was this the place of his destination?
L question the shepherds, J. question the
camel drivers, l question the angels.
have found out. He was an exile. But the
world has had plenty of exiles. Abraham
an exile of Ur of the Chaldees; John en
exile from Ephesus; KOsciusko an exile
from Poland: Mazzin an exile from Rome !;
Emmetan exile from Ireland; Victor Hugo
an exile from France; Kossuth an exile
from Hungary. But this one of whom
speak to-day had such resembling farewell
and came into such chilling reception-for
not even hostler went out with his lam
! tern to help him in-that he is more to be
| celebrated than any other expatriated one
of earth or Heaven.
| 1t is ninetyive million miles from here
to the sun. and all astronomers agree in
saying that our solar system is only one Of
! the small wheels Of the great machinery o
| the universe, turning round some one great
center, the center so far distant it is be-
yOnd all imagination and calculation; and
if, as some think, that great center in the
distance is Heaven, Christ came far from
home when ne came here. Have you ever
thought of the inconsistencies of Christ?
Some of you know what inconsistencies is,
when you have been only few weeks alb
sent from the domestic circle. Christ was
thirty three years away from home. Some
of you feel Inconsistencies when you are a
hundred or thousand miles from the do
mestic circle. Christ was more millions of
miles away from home than YOU could
calculate if all your life you did nothing
but calculate. You know what it is to be
homesick even amid pleasurable surround.
ings; but Christ slept in huts. and he was
athirst, and he was ahungered, and he was
on the way from being born in another
mans barn to being buried in another
mans grave.
AT our best estate we are only pilgrims
and strangers here. Heaven is our
home" Death will never knock at the
door of that mansion, and in all that coun-
y tISle Is lOb SllS grave. no" glau
parents are in holiday times to gather
their children home again. But I have
noticed that there is almost always son
or daughter absent-absent from home,
perhaps absent from the country, per-
haps absent from the world. Oh, how glad
our Heavenly Father will be when he gets
all his children home with him in Heaven!
And how delightful it will be for brothers
and sisters to meet after long separation!
Once they parted at the door of the tomb;
now they meet at the door of Immortality.
Once they saw only through glass dark
ly. now it is face to face: corruption, in-
corruption; mortality, Immortality. Where
are now all their sins and sorrows and
troubles? Overwhelmed in the Red Sea Of
Death while they passed through dry shod. |
One night lying on my lounge, when
very tired, my children all around about
me in full romp and hilarity and laughter
on the lounge, half awake and half !,
asleep, dreamed this dream: l was in a |
far country. 1t was not Persia, although |
more than oriental luxuriance crowned |
the cities. It was not the ,
tropics, although more than trop-
zeal fruitfulness filled the gardens. 1t |
was not Italy, although more than Italian
softness filed the air. And l wandered
around looking for thorns and nettles, but
found that none of them grew there. and
l saw the sun rise, and | watched to see it
set, but it sunk not. And | saw the people
in holiday attire, and said: "When will
they put off this and put ON worI1men's
garb and again delve in the mine OF swell.
ter at the forge:" but they never put OF
the holiday attire. And [ wandered in
the suburbs of the city to find the place
where the dead sleep, and l looked all
along the line of the beautiful hills, the
place where the dead might most blissful-
ly sleep, and Isaw towers and castles. but
not mausoleum or monument or
a white slab could l see. And
went into the chapel .of the
great town and | said: "Where do the
poor worship and where are the hard
benches on which they sit?" And the an.
swer was made me: "We have no poor in
this country" And then l wandered out
to find the novels of the destitute, and !
found mansions of amber and ivory and
gold but not tear could / see, not a sigh
could hear, and was bewildered and I
sat down under the branches of great
tree and | said: "Where am I? and
whence comes all this sceneN' Aud then
out from among the leaves, and up thu
iowery paths and across the bright
streams there came a beautiful group,
thronging all about me, and as I saw them
come l thought I knew their step, and
rs they shouted thought knew their
voices; but then they were so glori-
ously arrayed in apparel such as l
lad never before witnessed, that bowed
rs stranger to stranger. But when again
hey clapped their hands and shouted:
Welcome, welcomen' the mystery all