Staunton spectator. [volume] (Staunton, Va.) 1849-1896, 1889-10-16

that Pentecost, all the chief nations o.
Europe and Asia, North and South
America, will be represented at our Worlds
Fair in 1899, and Pentecost here and
then would mean the salvation of the
round world.
But, you say, we may have at that tair
the people of all lauds and all the mschins-
ry for gospelisation, the religious printing
presses and the churches, but all that
would not make a Pentecost; we must
have God. Well, you can have Him. Has
He not been 2raciously waiting? and
nothing stands in the way but our own
unbelief and Incidence and sin. May God
break down the barriers. The graudest
opportunity for the evangelsation of all
nations since Jesus Christ died on the
cross will be the Worlds Exposition of
1899. God may take US out of the harvest
/ field before that, but let it be known
| throughout Christendom that that year,
between May and November, will be the
mountain of Christian advantage, the AL
pine and Himalayan height of opportunity
overlapping all others for salvation. In
stead of the slow process Of having to send
the gospel to other lands by our own Amer
ican missionaries, who have difficult toll in
acquiring tie foreign language and then
must contend with foreign prejudices,
| what grand thing to have able and in
fuential foreigners converted during their
visit in America and then have them re-
turn to their native lands with the glorious
tidingsl Oh, for an overwhelming work of
grace for the year 1892. that work begin
ming in the autumn of 1889!
Another opportunity, if our public men
see it, and it is the duty of pulpit and
tn hc1 tn yuilt
be the calling at that time and place of
great peace congress for all nations. The
convention of representatives from the
governments Of North and South America,
now at Washington, is only type of
what we may have on q vast and world
vide scale at the International Exposition
of 1892. By one stroke the gorgon of war
might be slain and buried so deep that
neither trumpet of human dispute or of
archangel's blowing could resurrect it.
When the last Napoleon called such con-
gress of nations many did not respond, and
those that did respond gathered wondering
what trap that willy destroyer of the French
Republic and the builder of French
monarchy might spriug on them. But
what il the most popular government on
earth-l mean the United States govern
ment-should practically say to all ma
tions: On the American continent in 1892
we will hold a worlds fair, and all pations
will send to it specimens of their products,
their manufactures and their arts, and we
invite all the governments of Europe,
Asia and Africa to send representatives to
peace convention that shall be held at
the same time and place. and that shall es-
tabish an International arbitration com
mission to whom shall be referred all con-
troversies between nation and nation, their
decision to be final, and so all nations
would be relieved from the expense of
standing armies and naval equipment war
Eaying been made an everlasting impossi-
bility.
All the nations of the earth worth con-
sideration would come to it, mighty men of
England and Germany and France and
Russia and all tho other great nationalities,
Bismarck who worships the Lord of Hosts,
and Gladstone who worships the God of
Peace, and Boulanger who worships him
self. The fac Is that the nations are sick
of drinking out of chances made out of hu-
man skulls and filled with blood. The
United States Government is the only
Government in the whole world that could
successfully call such Congress. Sup
pose France should call it, Germany would
not come; or Germany should call it,
France would not come; or Russia should
call it, Turkey would not come; or Englapd
should call it, nations long jealous of her
overshadowing power in Europe would not
come. America, in favor with all national
tiles, standing ont independent and alone,
is the spot and 1892 will be the time. May
it please the President of the United
States, may it please the Secretary of
State, may it please the Cabinet. may it |
please the Senate and House of Represen-
tatives, may it please the printing presses
and the churches and the people who lift
up and put down our American rulers!
To them l make this timely and solemn
and Christian appeal. Do you not think
people die fast enough without this whole
sale butchery of war? Do you not think
that we can trust to pneumonias aud con-
sumptions and apoplexies and palsies and
yellow fevers and Asiatic choleras the work
of killing them fast enough? Do you not
think that the greedy, wide-open jaws of
the grave ought to be satisfied if filed by
natural causes with hundreds of thousands
of corpses a year2 Do you not think we
can do something better with men than to
dash their life out against easements or
blow them into fragments by torpedoes or
send them out into the world, where they
used all their faculties, footless, armless,
eyeless2 Do you not think that women
might be appointed to ao easier place than
the edge of grave trench to wiring their
pale hands and weep out their eyesight in
widowhood and childlessness? Why, the
last glory has gone out of war.
There was time when it demanded that
quality which we all sdmire-namey, cour-
age-for man had to stand at the hilt of
his sword when the point pierced the foe,
and while he was staying another the other
| might slay him; or it was bayonet charge
| But now it is cool and deliberate murder,
| and clear out at sea bombshell can be
| hurled miles away into city, or while
| thousands of private soldiers, who have no
| interest in the contest, for they were con-
scripted, are losing their lives, their general
NAV sit smoking one of the best Havana
cigars after dinner of quail on toast 1t
may be we'll enough for graduating students
of colleges on commencement day to crate
about the poetry of war, but do not talk
about the poetry of war to the men of the
| Federal or Confederate armies who were at
the front, or to some of US who, as men,
bers of the Christian commission. saw the
CHASTITY hospitals at Autietam and Hagers-
town. All! you may worship the Lord of
brought again from the dead our Lord
Jesus Christ, that great Shepherd of the
sheep"
War is an accursed monster and it was
| born in the lowest cavern of perdtion, ard
pray that it may speedily descend to the
place from which it arose. its last sword and
shield aud musket rattlipg on the bottom of
the rec hot uarl of hell. Let there be call
ed peace convention for 1892, with dele
gates sent by all the decent governments of
Christeudom, and while they are in session,
if you should some night go out and look
into the sky above the exposition buildings,
you may fin6 that the old gallery of crystal,
tha5 was taken down after the Bethlehem
anthem of eighteen centuries ago was sung
out, is rebuilt again in the clouds, aud the
same angelic singers are returned with the
same librettos of light to chant "Glory to
God ia- the highest, and on earth peace,
good will to men,"
Again, I suggest in regard to the Worlds
Fair that, while appropriate places are pre-
| pared for all foreign exhibits, We make no