Thomas County cat. [volume] (Colby, Kan.) 1885-1891, 1886-10-21

improvement, afflicted with evil ten
denotes aud bearing the marks of sin
and disobedience, subject to sorrow,
disappointment and trial, in period
of probation here. dependent upon
Gods providence and grace, and
doomed to exist when death has over
taken us, throughout the eternal years;
l say the things which we all have in
common are infinitely more than the
things which divide and distinguish US.
The points of agreement between men
are more real and radical and indie
structible than the points of disagree
ment The one are vital aud generic;
the other are superficial and nOnessen-
tial. All babes may not look alike. at
least to fond mothers, but between no
two children ever born into the human
family. though separated by centuries
and continents and civilizations, is
there any such difference as exists be-
tween kernel of corn and grain of
wheat. We are all simply individuals
of the same distinct species.
That there are differences numerous
and broad We are painfully aware
differences of birth. of social advantage
and position and external circum-
stance. which no fine-spun, socialistic
theories will ever be able to remove.
For if they could be made to disappear
to-day, they would reappear to-mov-
row. There are also differences which
lie deeper still, differences of tempera-
ment and disposition, of taste and
capacity. You see them in the same
family, owning the same parentage.
having the same home and educational
influences, and much more in the scat
tered members of the great human
family. Men may be born in the same
geographical zone, but in their intel
lectual and moral zones be as wide
apart as the tropics or the poles. Weak
wills and strong wills, refined tastes
and vulgar tastes. industry and indo-
lence, prudence and waste, moral as
well as physical beauty and deformity,
things which sometimes come by in
herited nature unbidden and unde-
sired, and things of which we are the
conscious or unconscious authors, all
these things create distinctions and
draw sharp lines between man and
man, and between human life and hui
man life. No two of us all, or of all
the race of man, are exactly alike in
characteristics or circumstances, in in
ner life or in outer lot.
And vet beneath all distinctions,
however numerous or broad, there lies
the indestructible tie of a common
brotherhood, taught by the. Divine
Teacher and Brother of us all, and
coming to be more widely felt and ac-
knowledged as the generations 60 by
"a Life that sprang from common
origin and flows on to a common des-
tiny, Gulf-Stream that flows through
all the zones of difference and unlike
ness. a Nature that links us all to-
gether in a family fellowship, the one
Roof of a common Providence which
extends its shelter over us all, points
of agreement and evidences of oneness
so marked and vital, so unchanging
and universal, that we must ali con-
fess that we have descended from
common stock and are members of
single race.
how strong is the family resemblance,
not simply in our physical structure,
but in our mental and moral constitu-
ton, in our inherited intuitions, jim the
sense of God, in the consciousness of
right and wrong, in the power of will
and choice, in the longing for
growth and progress, and in the
hope of a blessed Immortality, in those
things which are our common possess
sion, which are insepara5le from us.
which make us what we are and lie at
the basis of all moral and personal be-
ing.
And Christianity harmonizes with
these great essential facts of every soul;
it is the common religion of common
people, just such as lived in the time
of Christ, just such as we are, and just
such as we meet everywhere; it appeals
to the deep, universal needs which
grow out of sense of sin which rank
les and testers in every breast, a need
of pardon, Of peace. of comfort, of per-
sonal purity, of reconciliation with
God, in a word, of better, a COM
pleter, 8 diviner life. These arr the
needs of our common no man
ity: which bind us IN a fellowship that
we can never break, which cause our
to melt away and disappear
in the all-embracing tide of a common
brotherhood, and which Christ, our
elder Brother, came to meet and sat-
isfy in the fullness of His redeeming
and purifying grace. If it be true that
lone touch of nature makes the whole
world kim" here we have touch of a
nature at every essential
point, making us all kin, and the touch
Of the Divine nature in Christ with
power to exalt this. our common hui
manity, to Heavenly kinsh'r with all
that is holy and immortal. Henry |
~ King. tn Standard.