The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1888-03-14

nursery You have ben thinKlny OF 1n'
the right path. You have b. an thinking 0
your childS destiny for the ns.St> SnsS yea,
if it should pass on to be an och'> tta,,
That is we'll, but my subject sweeps = on .n'. y
sand years, million years, quadrf!fS =" y, -
years. | cannot stop at one cradle, A>
looking at the cradles that reach all arouH'
the world and across all time l am not talk
ing of mother Eunice am talking of grand
mother. Lois The only way you can tell tbs
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
materne! 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
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 wide, 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 Allie
ghany and Rocky Mountains make contribu-
ton. Now, in order to test the power OF
mothers influence, we need to come in off of
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
Who can fathom it? Who can bridge
it? Who can stop. it, Had not
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 discover not so much as
cinder Of the burned down and swept.oR
planet. In Ceylon there is granite column
thirty-six square feet in size, which
is thought by the natives to decide
shs rSSs S5S spun rom asp Once
tury 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 eXls-
gin to give away.
If a mother tell 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 finls 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 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
child's vanity and eu,ogize his curls and extol
the night-black 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 q dozen fam
lily records have been obliterated. IT
mother express doubt about some statement
of the Holy Bible in 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 champion
blasphemer. But, on the other hand,
if mother walking with child
see suffering one by, the way
side and says: ''My child, give that
ten cent piece to that lame boy" the result
ing century in some George Muller building
a whole village of orphanages IT mother
sit almost every evening by the trundle bed
of child and teach it lessons of Saviours
love and Saviour's example, of the inl-
portance of truth and the horror
Of a lie, and the virtue, Of in
dustry and kindness and sympathy
and self sacrifice, long after the mother has
gone and the child has gone and the lettering
innumerable winters, there may be standing,
as result of those trundle-bed lessons, fam-
ing evangels, world-moving reformerS, weep
ing Paysons, laundering Whitefelds, emanci-
pating Washingtons.
Good or bad influence may skip one genera
tion or two generations, but it will be sure to
land in the third or fourth generation, just as
the Ten COMPARTMENTS, 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
generation, but it will come down further on
as sure as you sit there and stand here.
Timothy'S 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
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-
ber prayer FIVE minutes than he can five
centuries. This explains what we often see
some man or woman distinguished for
benevolence when the father and mother
were distinguished for penuriousness, or ycu
see some young man or woman with
bad father and hard mother come
out gloriously for Christ and make
the church sob and shout and sing under
their exhortations We stand in corners Of
the vestry and whisper over the matter and
say: "How is this, such great p!ety in sons
and daughters of such parental worldliness
and sin!" will explain it to you if you will
fetch me the old Family Bible containing the
full record Let some septuagenarian look with
me clear Upon the page of births and mar
riages, and tell me who that woman was
with the old-fashioned name of Jemima or
Betsy or Mehtabel All, there she is. the old
otbQr who