Essex County herald. [volume] (Guildhall, Vt.) 1873-1964, 1888-03-09

|
That is well, but my subject sweeps a thou
sand years, a million years, a quadrillion Of
years. / cannot stop at one cradle, / am
looking at the cradles that reach all around
the world and across all time | am not talk
ing of mother Eunice. am talking of grand
mother Lois. The only way you can tell the
force OF current is by sailing up stream; or
the force of an ocean wave, by running the
ship against it. Running along with it we
cannot appreciate the force. In estimating
maternal influence we generally run along
with it down the stream of time, and
so we don't understand the full force
| Let us come up to it from the
eternity side. after It has been working ON
for centuries, and see all the good It has done
and all the evil it has accomplished, multi
piled in magnificent or appalling compound
| interest. The difference between that moth
ers influence ON her children now. and the
influence when it has been multiplied in
| hundreds of thousands of lives, is the
difference between the Mississippi River way
up at the top of the continent starting
from the little lake Itasca, seven miles long
and one vide, and its mouth at the Gulf Of
| Mexico where navies might ride Between
the birth of that river and its burial in the
sea the Missouri pours in, and the Ohio pours
in, and the Arkansas pours in, and the Red
and White and YazoO Rivers pour in, and all
| the States and Territories between the ALE
ghany and Rocky Mountains make contribu-
ton. Now, in order to test the power Of a
| mothers influence, we need to come in or or
the ocean of eternity and sail toward the one
| cradle, and we will find ten thousand trib-
utaries of influence pouring in and pouring
down. But it is after all one great river Of
power rolling on and rolling forever.
Who can fathom it, Who can bridge
mothers better be intensifying their
prayers! Had they not better be elevating
their example,! Had they not better be
rousing themselves with the consideration
that by their faithfulness or neglect they
are starting an influence which will be
| stupendous after the last mountain of earth
| is fiat, and the last sea has been dried up,
and the last flake of the ashes of CON
sumed world shall have been blown
| away, and all the telescopes of other worlds
directed to the track around which our world
once swung shall discova" not so much as a
cinder of the burned down and swept-off
| planet In Ceylon there is a granite column
thirty-six square feet in size, which
is thought by the natives to decide
the worlds continuance. An angel
| with robe spun from Zephyrs is once q CEN
fury to descend and sweep the hem of that
robe across the granite, and when by that at
triton the column is worn away they say
time will end. But by that process that
granite column would be worn out of eXis-
tence before that mothers influence will be-
| gin to give away
If mother tell a child if he is not good
some bugaboo will come and catch him. the
fear excited may make the child a coward,
and the fact that he fin1s that there is no
| bugaboo may make him liar and the echo
of that false alarm may be heard after fifteen
generations have been born and have expired.
If mother promise a child reward for
| good behavior and after the good behavior
forgets to give the reward, the cheat may
crop out in some faithlessness half thousand
years further on If a mother culture a
childs vanity and euiogize his curs and extol
the night-blacl1 or sky-blue or nut brown Of
the child's eyes, and call out in his presence
the admiration and pride of specta-
tors, pride and arrogance may be
prolonged after half dozen fam
lily records have been oblterated If a
mother express doubt about some statement
of the Holy Bible in a child's presence, long
after the gates of this historical era have
closed and the gates of another era have
opened, the result may be seen in a champion
blasphemer. But, on the other hand
if a mother walking with a child
see suffering one by the way
side and says; my child, give that
ten cent piece to that lame boy" the result
may be seen on the other side Of the follow
ing century in some George Muller building
a whole village of orphanages If a mother
sit almost every evening by the trundle bed
of child and teach it lessons of a Saviour's
love and a Saviours example, of the i'm
portance of truth and the horror
of lie, and the virtues Of in
and self sacrifice, long after the mother has
gone and the child has gone and the lettering
shall have been washed out by the storms of
innumerable winters. there may be standing,
as a result of those trundle-bed lessons, fam
ing evangels, word-mo sig reformers, weep
ing Paysons, laundering Whitefields, emanci-
pating Washingtons.
Good or bad influence may skip one genera
ton or two generations, but it will be sure to
land in the third or fourth generation Just as
the Ten Commandments, speaking of the
visitation Of God on families, says nothing
about the second generation, but entirely
skips the second and speaks of the third and
fourth generation: "Visiting the iniquities
of the fathers upon the third and fourth
generations of them that hate me-" Parental
influence, right and wrong, may jump over a
generation, but it will come down further on
as sure as you sit there and l stand here.
Timothys ministry was projected by his
grandmother, Lois There are men and
women here, the sons and daughters of
the Christian Church, who are such as
a result of the conservation of great
great-grandmothers Why, who do you
think the Lord is? You talk as though His
memory was weak. He can no easier remem-
Der prayer five minutes than he can fivs
centuries. This explains what we often see
| some man or woman distinguished for
benevolence when the father and mother
were distinguished for penuriousness, or you
see some young man or woman with 8
DAD father ana a nard moJner conn
out gloriously for Christ and maxi
the church sob and shout and sing unde
their exhortations We stand in corners o
the vestry and whisper over the matter ant
To-, Co. off, in
and daughters of such parental worldlines
and sng" | will explain it to you if you viii
fetch me the old Family Bible containing tn
full record. Let some septuag enarian look will
me clear upon the page OF births and mar
riages, and tell me who that woman wa
with the old-fashioned name of Jemima OF
Betsy or Mehtabel. All there she is, the OLE
grandmother, or great grandmother, VIII
had enough religion to saturate century
There she is the dear old soul, Grand
mother Lois. In our beautiful Greenwood
may we all sleep there when our work i
done, for when l get up in the resurrection
morning | want my congregation all abou
me)-in Greenwood there is the resting plac
: Of George W. Bethune, once a minister o
Brooklyn Heights, his name never Spoken
, among intelligent Americans without sug
, costing two things-eloluence and evangel
ism. In the same tomb sleeps his grandmother
, Isabella Graham, who was the chief inspira
l ton of his ministry. You are not surprises
t at the poetry and patho and pulpit power o
! the grandson when you r. I'd of the faith AM
l devotion Of his wonderful ancCstress. Whe
l you read this letter, in which she poured on
her widowed soul in longings for sons sa
A walton, YOU will not wonder that succeeding
generations have been blessed:
$ With such grandmother, would you nc
4 have right to expect a George w. Bethune
and all the thousands CONVERTED through hi
+ ministry may date the saving power back
- Isabella Graham.
u New YORK. May 20, 1891.
l. This day my only son left me in bitter wringine
q OF heart; he is again launched the ocean, God
? ocean. The Lord saved him from shipwrecl
n brought him to my home, and allowed me ono