Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1888-08-29

only increases the embarrassment, since 20
nave her also to take care Of" You are a
migrate, for the woman as often support
the man as the man supports the woman
The man may bring all the dollars, but tn
woman generally brings the courage and tn
faith of God.
Well, this man of whom am speaking
looks around, and he finds his family is left
and he rallies, and the light comes to hi
eyes, and the smile to his face, and th,
courage to his heart. In two years he il
quite over it. He makes his financial ca
lamity the first chapter in new era o
prosperity. He met that one trouble-con
quered it. He sat down for little whil'
under the grim shadow of the rock Bozez
yet he soon rose and began, like Jonathan
10 climb. But how often it is that physica
ailment comes with financial embarrass
ment. When the fortuR> failed it broke
the mans spirit. His nerves were shatter
ed. His brain was stunned. can show
you hundreds of men in New York whose
fortune and health failed at the same time
ihey came prematurely to the staff. Theil
hand trembled with incipient paralysis
They never saw we'll day since the houl
when they called their creditors together fol
a compromise. If such men are inpatient
and pecu liar, aud irritable, excuse them
They had two troubles, either one of which
they could have met successfully. II, wher
the health went, the fortune had beeu re-
tanned, it would not have been 30 bad. The
man could have bought the very best medi
cal advice, and he could have had the very
best attendance, and long lines of carriages
| would have stopped at the front door 10 in.
quire as to his welfare. But poverty on the
one side, and sickness on the other. are
Bozez and Seneh, and they interlock theil
shadows, and drop them upon the pooI
mans way. God help him! "There is a
sharp rock on the one side, and a sharr
rock on the other side."
Now, what is such man to do? In the
name of Almighty God, l will tell him what
to do. Do as Jonathan did-climb: climb
up into the sunlight of Gods favor and
consolation. / can 60 through the church.
es, and show you men who lost fortune and
health at the same time, and yet who sing
all day and dream of heaven all night. II
you have any idea that sound digestion, and
steady nerves, and clear eyesight, and good
hearing, and plenty of friends, are neces-
sary to make man happy, you have mis-.
calculated. Issuppose that these overhang.
ing rocks only made Jonathan scramble the
harder and the faster to get up and out into
the sunlight; and this combined shadow ol
invalidism and financial embarrassment has
cften sent man up the quicker into the
sunlight of Gods favor and the MONDAY OF
His glorious promises. 1t is difficult thing
for man to feel his dependence upon God
when he has ten thousand dollars in the
bank, and fifty Thousand dollars in Govern.
ment securities, and block of stores ard
three ships.
"Well," the man says to himself, sit il
silly for me to pray, Give me this day my
daily bread, when my pantry is full, and
the canals from the West are crowded with
breadstuffs destined for my storehouse. -
Oh, my friends, if the combined misfortunes
and disasters of life have made you climb
up into the aims of a sympathetic and COM
passionate God, through all eternity you
will bless Him thatin this world "there was
| a sharp rock on the one side, and a sharp
rock on the other side."
Again, that man is in the crisis of the
text who has home troubles and outside
persecution at the same time. The world
treats man we'll Just as long as it pays best
to treat him well. AS long as it can man
ufacture success out of his bone, and brain,
and muscle, it favors him. The world fat
tens the horse it wants to drive But let a
man see it his duty to cross the track of the
world, then every bush is full of horns and
tusks thrust at him. They will belittle
him. They will caricature him. They will
call his generosity self-aggrandizemeDt, and
his piety sanctimoniousness. The very
worst persecution will sometime come upon
him from those who profess to be Christians.
John Milton-great and good John Mil
ton-so forgot himself as to pray, in so many
words, that his enemies might be eternally
| thrown down into the darkest and deepest
gulf of hell, and be the undermost and most
detected and the lowest down vassals OF
perdition! And Martin Luther so far for
got himself as to say, it regard to his theo
logical opponents, "Put them in whatever
sauce you please, roasted, or fried, or baked,
| or stewed, or boiled, or hashed, they are
nothing but assesp' All, my friends, il
John Milton or Martin Luther could come
down to such scurrility, what may you not
expect from less elevated opponents? Now,
the world sometimes takes after them; the
newspapers take after them; public opinion
takes after them; and the unfortunate man
| is lied about until all the dictionary of
Billingsgate is exhausted on him. You
often see man whom you know to be good,
and pure. and honest, set upon by the
world, and mauled by whole communities,
while vicious men take on supercilious
air in condemnation of him; as though Lord
Jeffreys ehould write an essay on gentle
ness, or Henry VIII. talk about purity, or
Herod take to blessing little children.
Now, certain amount of Ier;e,ution
rouses a mans defiance, stirs his blood for
magnificent battle, and makes him fifty
times more a man than he would have been
without the persecution. So it was with
the great reformer when he said: 81 will
not be put down: I will be heard" And
80 it was with Millard, the preacher, in the
time of Louis XI. When Louis XI. sent
word to him that unless he stopped preach
| ing in that style he would throw him into
the river, he replied; "Tell the king thai
I will reach heaven sooner by water than
he will reach it by fast horses" A certain
amount of persecution is tonic and inspi-
ration, but too much of il, and too long con.
tinued, becomes the rock Bozez, throwing
a dark shadow over mans life. What il
he to do then? Go home you say. Good
advice, that. That is just the place for a
man to go when the world abuses him. Go
home. Blessed be God for our quiet and
sympathetic homes. But there is many a
man who has the reputation of having a
QOu1e Wu6u u0 Ado hOhOs 4AAOuSA uA-
thinkingness or precipitation, there are
many matches made that ought never to
have been made. An officiating priest can.
not alone unite couple. The Lord AL
mighty must proclaim banns. There is
many homo in which there is no sym.
pathy, and no happiness, and no good
cheer. The clamor of the battle may mol
have been heard outside, but God knows,
notwithstanding all the playing of the
sWedding March," and all the odor of the
orange blossoms, and the benediction of the
officiating pastor, there has been no mar.
riage.
Sometimes men have awakened to find
on one side of them the rock of persecution.
and on the other side the rock of domestic
infelicity. What shall such an one do. Dc
as Jonathan did-climb. Get up the
heights of Gods consolation, from which
we may look down in triumph upon outside
persecution and home trouble. While good
and great John Wesley was being silenced
by the magistrates, and having his name
written on the board. fences of London in
doggered, at that very time his wife was
making him as miserable as she could-act
ing as though she were possessed with the
devil, as suppose she was; never doing
him kindness until the day she ran away,
so that he wrote in his diary these words:
81 did not forsake her; l have not dismissed
Il