Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1888-07-18

pathway, and wonder when the exhaus.
tion will end. My friends, the brightest
crowns in heaven will not be given to those
who, in stirrups, dashed to the cavalry
charge, while the general applauded, and
the sound of clashing sabres rang through
the land; but the brightest crowns in heav-
en-, I believe, will be given to those who
trudged on amid chronic ailments which
unnerved their strength, yet all the time
maintaining their faith in God. 1t is COM
paratively easy to fight in q regiment OF
thousand men, charging up the parapets to
the sound of martial music; but it is not SO
easy to endure when no one but the nurse
and the doctor are the witnesses of the
Christian fortitude. Besides that you never
had any pains worse than Christ's. The
sharpnesses that stung through His brain,
through His hands, through His feet,
through His heart, were as great as yours
certainly. He was as sick and as weary.
Not nerve, or muscle, or ligament escaped.
All the pangs of all the nations of all the
ages compressed into one sour cup. He
took the vinegar!
| There is also the sourness of poverty.
Your income does not meet your outgoings,
and that always gives an honest man anx-
iety. There is no sign of destitation about
you-pleasant appearance, and d cheerful
home for you; but God only knows what a
| time you have had to manage your private
finances. Just as the bills ruu up the wages
seem to run down. But you are the only
one who has not been paid for hard work.
The great Wilkie sold his celebrated piece,
'sThe Blind Fiddler" for fifty guineas, al
though afterwards it brought its thousands.
The world hangs in admiration over the
sketch of Gainsborough, yet that very
sketch hung for years in the shop-window
because there was not any purchaser
Oliver Goldsmith sold his 'Vicar of Wake
feld'' for few pounds, in order to keep
the balliff out of the door; and the vast ma
iority of men in all occupations and profess
sions are not fully paid for their work.
You may say nothing, but life to you is a
hard push; and when you sit down with
your wife and talk over the expenses, you
both rise up discouraged. You abridge here,
and you abridge there, and you get things
snug for smooth sailings, and 10! suddenly
there is large doctors bill to pay, or you
have lost your pocketbook, or some creditor
has failed, and you are thrown a-beam end.
Well, brother, you are in glorious company.
| Christ owned not the house in which He
stopped, or the colt on which He rode, or
| the boat in which He sailed. He lived in a
borrowed house; He was buried in borrow
ed, grave. Exposed to all kind of weather,
vet He had only one suit of clothes. He
| breakfasted in the morning, and no one
could possibly tell where He could get any,
thing to eat before night. He would have
been pronounced financial failure. He
had to perform miracle to get money to
pay a tax-bill. Not dollar did He own.
Privation of domesticity; privation of nutri-
clous food; privation of a comfortable couch
on which to sleep; privation of all worldly
resources. The kings of the oarth had
chased chalices out of which to drink: but
Christ had nothing but plain cup set be-
fore Him, and it was very sharp, and it was
very sour. He took the vinegar!
There. also, is the sourness of bereave.
ment. There we're years that passed along
before your family circle was invaded by
death; but the moment the charmed circle
was broken everything seemed to dissolve.
Hardly have you put the black apparel in
the wardrobe before you have again to take
it out. Great and rapid changes in your
family record. You got the house and re-
joiced in it, but the charm was gone as soon
as the Grape hung on the door-bell. The
one upon whom you most depended was
taken away from you. A cold marble slab
lies on your heart to.day. Once, as the
put your hand over your aching head and
said: s'Ob, if could only have it stillV'
Oh, it is too still now. You lost your pa
tience when the tops and the strings and
the shells were left amid floor; but oh, you
would be willing to have the trinkets scat
tered all over the floor again, if they were
scattered by the same hands. With what
ruthless ploughshare bereavement rips up
the heart. But Jesus knows all about that.
You cannot tell him anything new in re-
gard to bereavement. He had only few
friends, and when he lost one it brought
tears to his eyes. Lazarus had often enter
tanned Him at his house. Now Lazarus is
dead and buried, and Christ breaks down
with emotion-the conyulsion of grief shud-
dering through all the ages of bereavement.
Christ knows what it is to go through the
house missing familiar inmate. Christ
knows what it is to see an unoccupied place
at the table. Were there not four Of them
Mary, and Martha, and Christ, and
Lazarus2 Four of them. But where is
Lazarus? Lonely and afflicted Christ, His
great loving eyes filed with tears, which
drop from eye to check, and from cheek to
beard, and from beard to robe, and from
robe to floor. Oh, yes, yes. He knows all
about the loneliness and the heartbreak.
He took the vinegar!
Then there is the sourness Of the dsath-
hour. Whatever else we may escape, that
acid-sponge will be pressed to our lips. l
sometimes have curiosity to know how l
will behave when come to die. Whether
I will be calm or rexcited-whether will be
filed with reminiscence or with anticipation.
cannot say. But come to the point. must
and YOU must. In the six thousand years
that have passed, only two persons have got
into the eternal world without death, and I
do not suppose that God is going to send
carriage for US with horses of flame, to
draw us up the sleeps of heaven: but l sup.
pose we will have to go like the preceding
generations. An officer from the future
world will knock as the door of our heart
and serve on US the writ of ejectment, and
we will have to surrender. And we will
wake up after these autumnal, and wintry,
and vernal, and summery glories have van.
shed from our vision-we will wake up in
| to realm which has only one season, and
that the season of everlasting love. But
you say: 81 don't want to break out from
my present associations. 1t is SO chilly and
SO damp to go down the stairs of that vault
l don't want anything drawn so tightly
over my eyes, Ifthere were only some way
of breaking through the partitions between
the worlds without tearing this body all tc
shreds. l wonder if the surgeons and the
doctors cannot compound a mixture by
which this body and soul can all the time
be kept together? Is there no escape from
this separation" None; absolutely none.
So look over this audience to-day-the
vast majority Of you seeming in good health
and spirits-and yet realize that IN a short
time all of US will be gone-gone from
earth, and gone forever. A great many
men tumble through the gates of the fu-
Eture, as it were, and We do not know where
they have gone, and they only add gloon
and mystery to the passage; but Jesus
Christ so nightly stormed the gates Of that
future world, that they have never since
been closely shut. Christ knows what it is
to leave this world, of the beauty of which
He was more appreciative than we ever
could be. He knows the exquisiteness ofthe
phosphoresence of the sea; He trod it. He
knows the glories of the midnight heavens;
for they were the spangled canopy of His
wilderness pillow. He knows about the
lilies; He twisted them into His sermon.
He knows about the fowls of the air; they
whirred their way through his discourse.
He knows about the sorrows of leaving this
beautiful world. Not taper Was kindled
in the darkness, He died phF sicianless.