The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1890-05-07

tally blind. s,.,id all that crowd OF Wis., |!
ionless people what work for an occu.
list! And do not believe that one out
hundred of that Surgeons cures were
reported. He went up and down among
those people who were feeling slowly
their way By STAFF, or led by the hand OF
man or rope Of dog, and introducing
them to the faces Of their own house,
hold, to the sunrise and the sunset, and
the evening star He just ran His hand
over the expressionless face, and the
shutters of both windows were swung
open, and the restored went home, cry
ing: II see! see! Thank God, ! seer!
That is the oculist we all need. Till
He touches our eyes we are blind. Yea,
we were born blind. BY nature we see
things wrong If we sec them at ALL Our
best eternal interests are put before VS.
and we can not see them. The glories
of loving and pardonable Christ are
projected, and we do not behold them.
Or we have Q defective sight which
makes the things Of this world larger
than the things Of the future--tsms big
ger than eternity. Or rive are color-blind
and can not see the differcnce between the
blackness of darkness forever and the
roseate morning OF an everlasting day.
But Christ the Surgeon comes in, and
though we shrink back afraid to have
Him touch US, yet He puts Ills
fingers on the closed eyelids Of the
soul, and midnight becomes mid-noon;
and we understand something Of the
Joy of the young man Of the Bible, who,
though he had never before been able to
see his hand before his face, now, by the
touch Of Christ, had two headlights
kindled under his brow, cried out in Ian
guage that COMPOUNDED the jeering crowd
who were deriding the Christ that had
effected the cure. and wanted to make
Him out bad man. whether He be o
| sinner or no, know not; one thing
know, that whereas / was blind, now I
see."
But this surgeon was just as wonder.
full as an aurist. Very few people have
two good ears. Nine out Of ten people
are particular to get on this or that side
Of you when they sit or walk or ride
with you, because they have one dis
abled ear. Many have both ears dam
aged, and what with the constant racket
of our great cities, and the catarrhal
troubles that sweep through the land, 1t
is remarkable that there are any good
ears at all. Most wonderful instrument
is the human ear. 1t is heart and drum
and telegraph and telephone and whis-
pering-gallery all In one. So delicate
and wondrous Is its construction that
the most difficult Of all things to recon-
struct is the auditory apparatus. Tho
mightiest Of scientists have put their
skill to its returning, and sometimes
they stop the progress Of its decadence
or remove temporary Instructions, but
not more than one really deaf ear out Of
hundred thousand is ever cured. 1t
took God to make the ear and 1t takes
a God to mend it. That makes me curl.
GUS to see how Christ the surgeon sue
ceeds as an aurist.
We are told of only two cases he oper.
ated on as an ear surgeon. His friend
Peter, naturally high-tempered, saw
Christ insulted by q man by the name Of
Malchus, and Peter let his sword fly,
aiming at the mans head, but the sword
slipped and hewed of the outside ear,
and our Surgeon touched the laceratioD
and another ear bloomed in the place Of
the one that had been slashed away.
But it is not the outside ear that hears.
That is only a funnel for gathering
sound and pouring it into the hidden
and more elaborate ear. On the beach
of Lake Galilee our Surgeon found a
man deaf and dumb. The patient dwell
in perpetual silence, and was speeches..
He could not hear note of music or a
clap Of thunder. He could not call
father or mother or wife or children by
name. What power can waken that dull
tympanum or reach that chain of small
bones, or revive that auditory nerve,
or open the gate between the brain and
the outside world? The Surgeon put
His fingers in the deaf ears and agitated
them, and kept on agitating them until
the vibration gave vital energy to all
} dead parts, and they responded, and
when our Surgeon withdrew His fingers
from the ears, the two tunnels Of sound
were clear for all sweet voices of music
and friendship. For the firsttime in his
life he heard the dash of the waves Of
Galilee. Through the desert Of painful
silence had been built kings highway
of resonance and reclamation. But ye
he was dumb. No word had ever leapei
,, over his lip. Speech was chained undel
his tongue. Vocalization and accentu
alton were to him an impossibility. HI
could express neither love nor indigna
ton nor worship.
Our Surgeon, having unbarred his ear
will now melt the shackle OF his tongue
The Surgeon will use the same linimen
. or salve that He used on two occasion!
for the cure Of blind people, namely, thu
!. moisture of His own mouth. The appli
cation is made. And 10, the rigidity o
, the dumb tongue is relaxed, and be
tween the tongue and teeth were born
whole vocabulary, and words few int
= expression. He not only heard but h
!, talked. One gate Of his body swung il
to let sound enter, and the other gat
, swung out to let sound depart. Why i
!. it that other surgeons used knives an
forceps and probes and spectroscopes
, this Surgeon used only the ointment O
His own lips? To show that all the Gu
:, rative power we ever feel comes straigh
1