The Caucasian. (Clinton, N.C.) 188?-1913, 1889-04-11


ter to tse stopped There Is not per
SOL IN tho house bat Is interested in
. that question. Young man. arm your
self The object Of my sermon ia so
put a weapon III each Of your hands
for your own defense Wait no; for
Young Mems Christian associations To
protec; you, or churches 10 protect
you Appealing 20 God for help. take
care o. yourself.
First, have room somewhere that
you can call your own. Whether il
he the back parlor of fashionable
boarding house, or a room in the fourth
story Of cheap lodging, care not.
Only have that one room your for
tfess- Let not the disSipator or an
clean stsp over the threshold. II they
come up the long fight of stairs and
knock nj the dCor, meet them face Ia
face and kindly yet firmly refuse them
admittance. Have n few family por-
traits on the wall, il YOU brought them
with you from your country home.
Have Bible on the stand. II YOU can
afford 1t and you can play ON one,
have an instrument of music-harp or
autc, or cornet, or melodeon. or violin,
or piano. Every morning before you
leave that room, pray. Every night
after you come home in that room.
pray. Make that room your Gibral-
tar, your Sebastopol, your Mount
Zion. Let no bad book or newspaper
come into that room, any more than
you would allow a cobra 10 coil on
your table.
Take care of yourself. Nobody else
will take care of you Your help will
not coTitc uI} two or three or four
flights of stairs; your help will come
through the roof, down from heaven,
from that God who in the six thousand
years of the worlds history never be-
trayed q young man who tried 10 be
good and Christian. Let me say in
regard To your adverse worldly circum-
stances, III passing, that you are on a
level now with those who are finally
TO succeed Mark my words. Young
man, and think of it thirty years from
now. You will find that those who
thirty years from now are the million
aires OF this country, who are the ora
tors OF the country, who are the poets
of the country, who are the strong
merchants of the country, who are the
great philanthropists of the country
mightlest in church and state-aN this
morning on a level with you, not an
inch above, and you in straitened cir
cumStanccS now.
EVERY NAN HAS A NATURAL EQUIPMENT.
Herschel earned his living bv play
ing violin at parties, and in the in
terstices of the play he would go out
and look II-O ~ thn ,,,iln
the fields of his immortal conquests.
George Stephenson rose from being the
foreman in a colliery to be the most
renowned of the worlds engineers. No
outfit, no capital TO start with Young
man, go down to the Mercantile IL
brary and get some books and read of
what wonderful mechanism God gave
you in your hand, in your foot, in
your eye, in your ear, and then ask
some doctor to take you into the dis
secting room and illustrate to YOU
what you have read about. and never
again commit the hlaSphemy of say
ing you have no capital to start with.
Equipped! Why, the poorest young
man in this house is equipped as only
the God o. the whole universe could
afford to equip him. Then his body
"a very poor affair compared with his
wonderful soul-oh, that is wha.
makes me solicitous. l am not SO
much anxious about you, young man,
because you have so little to do with,
as L am anxious about you because
you have much to risk and lose or
gain.
There is no class of persons that SO
stS my sympathies as young men in
great cities Not quite enough salary
to live on, and all the temptations that
come from that deficit Invited on all
hands to drink, and their exhausted
nervous system seeming to demand
stimulus Their religion carcaturcd
by the most of the clerks in the store
and most of the operatives in the fac
tory. The rapids of temptation and
death rushing against that young man
forty miles the hour, and he in frail
boat headed up stream, with nothing
but broken oar to work with Unless
Almighty God help them they will go
under
All! when 1 told you to take care of
yourself you misunderstood me if you
thought | meant you are to depend |
upon human resolution, which may |
be dissolved in the foam of the wine |
cup, or may be blown out with the
frst gust of temptation. Here is the
helmet, the sword of Lord God Al |
mighty. Clothe yourself in that pan
oply and you shall not be put to con
fusion. Sin pays well neither in this
world nor the next, but right thinking
and right believing and right acting |
will take you-in safety through this
life and in transport through the next
| never shall forget prayer heard |
4 young man make some fifteen years
ago. 1t was very short prayer, but
t was tremendous prayer: "Oh Lord,
nelp us. We find it SO very easy to do
wrong and SO hard to do right Lord,
help US" That prayer, l warrant you,
reached the ear of God, and reached
MS heart. And there are in this house
A hundred men who have found out
4 thousand young men, perhaps, who
nave found out that very thing 1t is |
80 very easy to do wrong, and so hard
% do right
| got a letter, only one paragraph Of
which | shall read: Having moved
around somewhat | have run across
many young men of intelligence,
ardent strivers after that wilI-o' the
visp, fortune, and of one of these |
would speak. He was young Eng
ishman of twenty-thrce or four years,
who came to New York, where lie had
lcquaintances, with barely sufficient
o keep him couple of weeks He
lad been dendcrly reared; perhaps |
should say too ten1erly, and was not
Used to earning his living, and found
t extremely difficult to get any posi-
ion that he was capable of filing.
After many vain efforts in this di'ec-
ion he found himself on Sunday even
ng in Brooklyn, near your church,
with about three dollars left of his
small capital. Providence seemed to
cad him TO your door, and he de-
to go in and hear you.
HE told me his going To hear you
hat night was undoubtedly the turn
ng point in his life, for when be
went into your church he felt des-
oeJ,afn hut while lictaoiuc, IN ,-r,,r |