Sacramento daily record-union. [volume] (Sacramento [Calif.]) 1875-1891, 1890-05-12

fringment. But man is under spiritual
laws also. There are moral duties ne
is especially commissioned to fulfill,
and these may be classed as obliga-
tons TO the practice of reverence,
of humility, of love, of self-denial and of
purity. 1t he fails in these things. he suf-
fers hereafter, doubtless, but he suffers even
here, suffers in spirit; he feels the up
braidings of conscience, he experiences the
pangs of remorse, and in one way or an
other he feels the consequences of his
transgression, and always after the seed
plan of the world, like producing like.
There is poetic justice in much of this
which absolutely startles. Conscience does
not give the only testimony; there is much
of naturalness remaining in the world not
withstanding its arbitrary systems of gov
eminent and its conventions of society. A
man cannot be irreverent, or proud, or
bitter, or selfish, or impure, without,
through his mingling with men in the
most ordinary of relationships he is made
to feel the consequences. His crime is
primarily and principally. as have already
said, against the spirit, against the mind
and the affections, but the natural order of
things in which he is involved impresses
the tact OF his transgression upon him,
and he suffers through the condi-
tons inevitably imposed. Is he
treacherous? He feels the scorn
of men. Is the cowardly? They visit him
with contempt. Is he untruthful? He
Iorfeits their trust. Is he proud? He loses
their sympathy, is he selfish? They leave
him alone. Lord Byron in his lode to
Napoleon" has eloquently expressed the
thought that l have Just been trying to pre-
sent, of how a poetic justice seems some
times to prevail, and q mans delinquency
suffer in kind, when he writes thus of the
conquered conquerer:
The desolator, desolate,
The victor overthrown,
The arbirer of Others fate,
suppliant for his own.
We may have gotten away from any
allegiance to old-time views of Justice and
OF Judgment views which religion has
ignorantly and inconsistency proclaimed,
but these realities of the moral world re-
main, and remain to conjure terrors for
any unrepentant soul. We have seen how
the spirit OF man acts under transgression;
we have seen how, in mans natural rela-
tons with his fellows, a nemesis follows
upon every iniquity, manifesting itself in a
loss of sympathy and respect, in marked
distrust and enforced isolation.
All we have to do is to abstract our
thought of these things from any connec-
ton with the things of sense, to think of
them simply in their moral implications,
to imagine them eternally present and
operating, and | can conceive of nothing
calculated to inspire deeper awe, or as
calling with more emphatic accent to re-
pent.
In regard to the details of conduct /
have never thought it my province to give
advice or say anything that might be
thought to have a specifically personal
bearing. | have always contented myself
with simply upholding ideals and present.
ing principles, and that is all 1 have in
tended to do this morning. But I cannot
refrain from thinking that if religion is to
have any meaning to us at all, these con-
siderations respecting moral things should
be familiar to US. What we have particu-
larly to understand is, that we are build |
ing for eternity now, that in all that we do
we are laying the substructure of an en-.
during fabric. 1t is pertinent there.
fore for each one to inquire what
of honesty, of purity, of affection,
OF faith, he is putting into this immortal
edifice OF character, that rising steadily
upon some stately plan, it may be doomed
at last by what shall wear the signature of
imperishable beauty. What l would i'm
press upon you is that life is real and
earnest, great and significant, and we abuse
opportunities and miss our most precious
"ohaie "Aeu VIC iail " incorporate INTO
our characters that which is useful and no
BILE and grand. To know that whatsoever
man soweth that shall he also reap, both for
time and for eternity, is an awful and stu
pendous, but at the same time attractive
and encouraging thought. To know that
our destiny is something that we may our
selves control, that virtue reaps as well as
vice, for truth and faith takes all the terror
out of the fact that cause inevitably acts,
acts increasingly and everlsstingly. There
is nothing really to fear except our own
bad wills. We get return for all we have
sown. Ii we are virtuous and trusting, we
say, leaning on Gods mercy:
"Forever from the hand that takes