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

cheek and the magnetism of an exquisite
presence. But now the husband, or the
father, is dead. The expenses of the obse
quies have absorbed all that was left in the
savings bank; and wan and wasted with
weeping and watching, she goes forth-a
grave, q hearse, coffin, behind her-tC
contend for her existence and the existence
of her children. When see such battle
as that open shut my eyes at the ghast.
| liness of the spectacle. Men sit with en-
broidered slippers and write heartless essays
about women's wages; but that question is
made up of tears and blood, and there is
more blood than tears. Oh, give women
free access to all the realms where she can
get livelihood, from the telegraph office
to the pulpit. Let mems wages be cut
down before hers are cut down. Men have
iron in their souls and can stand it. Make
the way free to her of the broken heart.
May God put into my hand the cold, bitter
CUP of privation, and give me nothing but
a windowless hut for shelter for many years,
rather than that after I am dead there
should go out from my home into the pitt
less world woman's arm to fight the
Gettysburg, the Austerlitz, the Waterloo of
life, for bread. H
And yet how many women there are
seated between the rock of bereavement on
the one side, and the rock of destitution on
the other, Bozez and Seneh interlocking
their shadows and dropping them upon her
miserable way. There is sharp rock on
the one side, and a sharp rock on the other
side." What are such to do? Som chow,
lot them climb up into the heights of the
glorious promise: "Leave thy fatherless
children; I will preserve them alive, and
L. Al, -, n. -.
to the heights of that other glorious pro-
mise, "The Lord preserveth the stranger
and relieveth the widow and the father
wages, OF ye widows turned out from the
once beautiful home. o! ye female teach
ers, kept ON niggardly stipend. o! ye de-
spairing woman, seeking in vain for work,
wandering along the docks, and thinking to
throw yourself into the river last night.
OF ye women of weak nerves and aching
sides, and short breath and broken heart,
you need something more than human
sympathy; you need the sympathy of God.
Climb up into His arms. He knows it all,
and He loves you more than father, or
mother or husband ever could or ever did;
and instead of sitting down, wringing your
hands in despair, you had better begin to
climb. There are heights of consolation
for you, though now tthere is a sharp rock
on the one side, and sharp rock on the
other side."
Again, that man is in the crisis of the
text who has wasted life on the one side
and an illuminated eternity on the other.
Though man may all his life have cultur.
ed deliberation and self-poise, if he gets in
to that position all his self. possession is
gone. There are all the wrong thoughts of
his existence, all the wrong deeds, all the
wrong words-strata above strata, granitic,
ponderous, overshadowing. That rock I
call Bozez. On the other side are all the
retributions of the future, the thrones of
Judgment, the eternal ages, angry with his
long defiance. That rock call Seneh. Be-
tween these two rocks Lord Byron perish
ed, and Alcibiades perished, and Herod
perished, and ten thousand times ten thou
sand have perished. O! man immortal,
man redeemed, man blood-bought, climb up
out of those shadows. Climb up by the
way of the Cross. Have your wasted life
forgiven; have your eternal life secured.
This morning just take one look to the past
aud see what it has been, and take one look
to the future and see what it threatens to
be. You can afford to lose your health,
you can afford to lose your property, you
C1A oAAOA0 w iOoO yOuA AOpuuobiOh, Dub yOu
cannot afford to lose your soul. That
bright, cleaning, glorious, precious, eternal
possession you must carry aloft in the day
when the earth burns up and the heaveas
burst.
You see from my subject that when
man goes into the safety and peace of the
Gospel, he does not demean himself. There
is nothing in religion that leads to mean
ness or unmanliness. The Gospel of Jesus
Christ only asks you to climb as Jonathan
did-climb toward God, climb toward heav-
en-, climb into the sunshine of Gods favor.
To become Christian is not to go mesnly
down; it is to come gloriously up-up into
the communion of saints, up into the peace
that passeth all understanding, up into the
companionship of angels. He lives up; he
dies up.
Of then, accept the wholesale invitation
which make this morning to all the peo-
pie. Come up from between your invalid
ism and financial embarrassments. Come
up from between your bereavements and
your destitution. Come up from between
wasted life and an unillumined eternity.
Like Jonathan, climb with all your might,
instead of sitting down to wiring your hands
in the shadow and in the darkness-''a
sharp rock on the one side, and sharp
rock on the other side.''