Daily Yellowstone journal., 1889-11-17

III HHc'RNiN' bA@A aaaAN 80 ~
go now. But the time will come, l
think, when | shall 90 over. want
to see what they do there. and | want
to see how they do il. | do not want
to be looking through the gates ajar
forever. want them to swing wide
open. There are ten thousand things
| want explained-about you, about
myself, about the government of this
world, about God, about everything.
We start in a plain path of what we
know, and in a minute come up
against a high wall Of what we do not
know. wonder how il looks over
there. Somebody tells me il is like a
paved city-payed with gold; and
another man tells me il is like a
fountain. and il is like a tree. and
it is like a triumphal procession;
and the next man | meet tells
me il is all fguativc. | really
want 10 know, after the body is rcsur-
rected, what they wear and what they
eat; and hayean unreasonable curl
osity TO know what il is, and how il is,
and wherei il is. Columbus riSEed his
life TO find the American continent,
and shall we shudder To go out on n
voyage of discovery which shall reveal
a vaster and more brilliant countryi
John franklin risked his life 10 find a
passage between icebergs, and shall
we dread To lind apasSage TO eternal
summerl Men in Switzerland travel
up the heights of the M~atterhorn,
with alpenstock. and guides, and
rockets, aud ropes, and, getting half
way up, stumble and fall down in a
horrible massacre. They just wanted
TO say they had been on the tops of
those high peaks And shall we fear
to- go out for the ascent of the eternal
hills which start a thousand miles be-
yond where stop the highest peaks
Of the Alps, and when in that
ascent there is no perili A
man doomed to die stepped on the
scatfold, and said in joy: Nov, in
ten minutes | will know the great
secret" One minute after the vital
functions ceased, the little child that
died last night knew more than Paul
himself before he died. Friends, the
exit from this world, or death, if you
please 10 call it, To the Christian is glo-
rious explanation. Ii is demonstra-
ton. 1t is illumination. 1t is sun
burst. 1t is the opening of all the
windows. Ii is shutting up the cate
chism of doubt, and the unrolling of
all the scrolls of positive and accurate
information. Instead Of standing at
the foot OF the ladder and looking up,
it is standing al the top of the ladder
and looking down. 1t is the last mys-
terry taken out of botany and geol-
ogy and astronomy and theology. Oh.
will il not be grand TO have all ques-
tons answered. The perpetually re-
curing Interrogation point changed
for the mark of exclamation. All
riddles solved. Who will fear TO 90
out on that discovery, when all the
questions are 10 be decided which we
have been discussing all u hvesl
Who shall not clap his hands in the
anticipation of that blessed country, if
it be no better than through holy Gu
riosityl AS this Paul of my text did
not suppress his curiosity, we need not
suppress ours. Yes, | have an unlimit-
ed curiosity about all religious things,
and as this city of Rome was so init
mately connected with apostolic times,
the incidents of which emphasize and
explain and augment the Christian re-
ligion, you will not take il as an evil
dence Of a prying spirit, but as the out
bursting of a Christian curiosity when
/ say | must also see Rome,
DESIRE TO BE CONFIRMED IN THE FU-
TURF.
Our desire to visit this city is also
intensified by the fact that we want
10 be confirmed in the feeling that
human life is brief, but its work lasts
for centuries, indeed forever. There
fore, show us the antiquities of old
Rome, about which we have been
reading for II lifetime, but never seen.
In our beloved America, we have no
antiquities. 4 church eighty years
old oycrawcs us with its age. We
have in America some cathedrals hum
drcds and thousands Of years old, but
they are in Yellowstone park, or Cali
fornian canon, and their architecture
and masonry were by the omnipotent
God. We want TO see the buildings,
or ruins Of old buildings, that were
erected hundreds and thousands Of
years ago by human hands. They
lived forty or seventy years, but the
arches they lifted, the paintings they
penciled, the sculpture they chiseled,
the roads they laid out, | understand,
are yet 10 be seen, and We want you
TO show them to US. / can hardly
wait until Monday morning. ! must
also see Rome. We want 10 be i'm
pressed with the fact that what
men do on a small scale or large
scale lasts a thousand years, lasts for
ever, that we build for eternity and
that w do 50 in a very short space of
time. God is the only old living pres
ence. But ii is an old age without
any Of the intirmities or limitations Of
old age. There is a passage of Scrip
ture which speaks Of the birth of the
mountains, for there was a time when
the Andes were born, and the Pyre-
nees were born, and the Sierra Ne
vadas were born, but before the birth
OF those mountains the Bible tells us,
God was born, aye was never born at
all, because he always existed. Psalm
&c, 2; Before the mountains we're
brought forth, or everthou hadst form.
ed the earth and the world, even from
everlasting 10 everlasting, thou art
4 I'll -- go. Ef. IL.