The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1888-05-30

| that night when looked in the dying room
of my infidel neighbor, there was something
on bis countenance which seemed to say:
''There is, there is, there is, there Is"
The mightiest restraints to-day against
theft, against immortality, against ibertin-
ism, against crime Of all sorts-the mightiest
restraints are the retributions Of eternity.
Men know that they can escape the law, but
down in the offenders soul there Is the real1-
Zation of the fact that they cannot escape
God He stands at the end of the road OF
prohigacy, and he will not clear the guilty.
Take ali idea of retrlbution and punishment
out of the hearts and minds of men, and it
would not be long before Brooklyn and New
York and Boston and Charleston and Chi
cago became Sodoms. The only restraints
against the evil passions Of the world to-day
are Bible restraints.
Suppose now these generals Of atheism
and infdelity got the victory, and suppose
they marshaled great army made up OF the
majority of the world They are in COM
panies, in regiments. in brigades-the whole
army. Forward, march, ye hosts Of lnhdels
flying behind, banners inscribed with the
words: mo God! No Christ! No punish
ment! No restraints Down with the Bible!
Do as you please!" The sun turned into
darkness.
Forward, march ye great army Of infdels
and atheistsl And first of all you Will attack
the churches Away with those houses OF
worship! They have been standing there so
long and deluding the people with consola:
tion in their bereavem ents and sorrows. All
those churches ought to be extirpated; they
have done so much to relieve the lost and
bring home the wandering, and they have so
long held up the idea Of eternal rest after the
paroxysm Of this life is over. Turn the st.
Peters and ST. Pauls and the temples and
tabernacles into club houses. Away with
those churches .
Toward, march ye great army OF in
fidels and atheists, and next OF al they scat
ter the Sabbath h-schools-theS Sabbath schools
filled with bright eyed, bright checked little
ones, who are singing songs on Sunday after
noon, and getting instruction when they
ought to be on the street corners playing
marbles or swearing on the common. Away
with them! Forward, march! ye great army
of infidels and atheists, and next of all they
will attack Christian asylums-the institu-
tions Of mercy supported by Christian PM,
lanthropies. Never mind the blind eyes and
the deaf ears and the crippled limbs and the
weakened intellects. Let paralyzed old age
nick up its own food, and orphans fight their
own way, and the half reformed go back to
their evil habits. Forward, march! ye great
army of infidels and atheists, and with your
battle axes hew down the cross and split up
the manger of Bethlehem.
On, ye great army Of in6dels and atheists,
and now they come to the grayeyards and
the cemeteries Of the earth. Pull down the
sculpture above Greenwoods gate, for it
means the resurrection. Tear away at the
entrance of Laurel Hill the figure OF Old
Mortality and the chisel On, ye great army
Of infldels and atheists, into the graveyards
and the cemeteries; and where you. see
"Asleep in Jesus" cut it away, and where
you find a marble story of heaven, blast it,
and where you find over little child's grave:
"SuRer little children to come unto me-"
substitute the words ''delusion" and sham" !"
and where you find On angel in marble strike
off the wings, and when you come to family
vault, chisel on the door: dead once, dead
forever"
But on, ye great army Of infidels and
atheists, on! They will attempt to scale
heaven. There are heights to be taken. Pile
hill on hill and Pelion upon OSsa, and then
they hoist the ladders against the walls OF
heaven. On and OH until they blow up the
foundations of jasper and the gates of pearl
They charge up the steep. Now they aim
for the throne Of him who liveth forever
high place the Father, the Son, the Holy
Ghost. Down with themr' they say.
Down with them from the throne" they
say ''Down forever! Down out Of sightI
He is not God He has no right to sit there.
Down with him! Down with Christi"
A world without a head, universe with.
out king. Orphan consultations Father.
less gelaxies Anarchy supreme: a de-
throned Jehovah. An assassinated God:
they mean. That is what they will have, If
they can, if they can if they can. Civiliza-
ton hurled back into setni-barbarism, and
semi-barbarism driven back into Hottentot
savagery. The wheel Of progress turned the
other way, and turned toward the dark ages.
The clock Of the centuries prt back 2OOO
years Go back, you Sandwich Islands, from
from your reformed condition, to what you
were in 1920, when the missionaries first
came. Call home the 500 mssi ionaries from
India and overthrow their 20OO schools
where they are trying to ntucate the
heathen, and scatter the 10000 lit
tie children that they have gathered
out of barbarism into civilization. OBJ
iterate all the work OF DR.. Duff In India,
of David Abeel in China, of DR.. King in
Brainard amid the American aborigines, and
send home the three thousand missionaries
of the cross who are toiling in foreign lands,
toiling for Christ's sake, toiling themselves
into the grave. Tell these three thousand
men of God that they are Of no use. Send
home the medical missionaries who are doc
toring the bodies as we'll as the souls OF the
nations Go home, London missionary So
ciety. Go home, American board Of foreign
missions. Go home, ye Moravians, and re-
linquish back into darkness and squalor and
filth and death the nations whom ye have
begun to lift.
Oh, my friends, there has never been such
nefarious plot on earth as that which inf
deity and atheism have planned. We were
shocked a few years ago because OF the at
tempt to blow up the parliament houses in
London; but if in6delity and atheism sue
ceed in their attempt they will dynamite a
this world will be a habitation of three rooms
"a habitation with just three roomsi the
one a madhouse, another a lazaretto, the
other q pandemonium. These in6del bands
of music have only just begun thsSr concert
yea, they have only been stringing their
instruments. to-day put before you their
whole programme from beginning unto close.
In the theatre the tragedy comes first and
the farce afterward; but in this infdel
drama Of death the farce comes first and the
tragedy afterward. And in the former athe-
lists and infdels laugh and mock, but in the
latter God himself will laugh and mock. He
says so: 81 will laugh at their calamity and
mock when their fear cometh."
From such a chasm ofindividual, national,
worldwide ruin, stand back. Oh. young
men, stand back from that chasml You see
the practical drift Of my sermon. want
you to know where that road leads. Stand
back from that chasm of ruin. The time is
going to come you and may not live to see
It, but it will come just as certainly as there
is God, it will Gomez when the infidels and
the atheists who openly and out and out
and above board preach and practice in
fidelity and atheism will be considered as
criminals against society, as they are
now criminals against God. Society
will push out the leper, and the wretch with