The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1886-02-10

cate blankdest it be enormously filled up. In
the State of New York let us have law
passed which will make it here as necessary
es in other States that license be issued be-
fore couple can be united in holy marriage,
and then let the announcement be made be-
forehand in the newspapers, just as IN Ne"
England it used to be announced berore-
hand, and is now in some parts OF the
country, in the churches, SC. if there be
INV lawful protest it may be presented
in time, and we not be swinging buoy,s
over rocks after the ship has struck
and gone down. And here I might as well
break the romance Of escapade by quoting
dozen lines from Robert Pollock, the great
Scotch poet, in which he describes the crazed
victim of an escapade:
"Yet had she many days of sorrow iii the
world,
But never wept. She lived as always and
carried in her hand some withered
stalks
She gathered in the spring;
When any asked the cause she smiled anu
said they were her sisters,
And would come and watch her grave wher
she was dead.
She never spoke of her deceiver-father
mother, home or child,
Or heaven or hell or God.
But still in lonely places walked and gazec
upon the withered stalks and talked tt
them,
Until wasted and the shadow Of her YOUTH
with woe too wide to see beyond, she
died"
But turn an intenser light on this whole
subject. We have one thousand five
hundred lights in this building, and when
in the evening services, by electric touch
they are kindled, it is almost startling.
But put this whole subject Of clandestine
marriage and escapade under an intenser
light. The headlight of locomotive is ter
rible if you stand near enough to the tracks
to catch the glare as it passes, as it sweeps
ghanies, or along the sides Of the Sierra
Nevadas How far ahead, how steep down,
how high up it flashes, making instantaneous
revelation Of mountain peak, and wild beasts
hieing to their caverns and cascade
thousand feet tall in white terror, cling
ing to the precipice. But under
an intenser light, swifter and more tremen-
dous, and more sudden, even under the head,
light of On advancing judgment day when all
subject. I quote an overwhelming passage
of Scripture and put all the emphasis on the
word SECRET" ''God shall bring every work
into Judgment with every secret thing,
whether it be good or whether it be evil: i"
Oh, what a time it will be WI en- the cover is
lifted off Of every home and of OF every
heart. Iniquities that were so slight they es-
capped all human detection will on that day be
as well known as the sins of Sodom and
Gomorrah unless the sins have been for
Christs sake forgiven. All the fingers of
condemnation will point to it, The archangel
of wrath with uplifted thunderbolt stand
there ready to strike out. All the squeanish-
ness and prudery Of society which forbid al
most the mention of certain themes will be
past, and the man who was unclean and the
woman who was impure will stand under
light brighter than thousand MONDAY suns
the whole story written on scalp and
forehead and cheek and hands and
feet, the resurrection body all aflame
and dripping with fiery disclosure,
and voices sepulchral and voices in
fernal and voices celestial will cry: "Un-
clean, unclean, unclean" All marital in
trigues, all secret thoughts and all secret
action as plain as if all the trumpets spoke
it, and all the lightnings capitalized it and
all the earthquakes rumbled it. Obi man.
recreant thy marriage vow; Oh! woman, in
sinful collision, what then will become or
thy poor soul! Better repent and give up
your sin and turn to God. Pardon for the
chief Of sinners if you ask in time-I say, if
you ask in time. Oh, leave you to guess
what will be the chance of that man, who, on
earth lived in clandestine relations, on the
day when the very Christ who thought so
much of the marriage relation, that He COM
pared it to His own relation with the church,
Shall appear at. the door Of the great hall Of
the last assize, and all the multitudes OF
earth and heaven, and hell shall rise up and
cry out from the three galleries; behold,
tho bridegroom cometh!"