Daily tobacco leaf-chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1890-1895, 1890-04-28

mountains and among ruins and ON the shore
Of waters, living and undying evidences Of
our glorious Christianity.
] THEY HAVE COME BACK BELIEVERS.
Men who have gone to Palestine infidels
have come back Christians. They VINO were
blind and deaf to the truth at home have
seemed TO see Christ again preaching upon
Olivet, and have beheld in vivid imagination
the Son of God again Walking the hills about
Jerusalem. Caviglia once rejected the truth,
but afterwaad said, II came TO Egypt, and
the Scriptures and the pyramids converted
men When l was in Beyrout, Syria, last
December, our beloved American missionary,
Rev Dr. Jessup, told me Of his friend who
met skeptic at Joppa, the seaport Of Jeru-
salem, and the unbeliever said to his friend:
81 am going into the Holy Land to show up
the folly of the Christian religion. am go
| ing to visit all the so called sacred places
aud write them up, and show the world that
the New Testament is an imposition upon the
worlds credulityn Months after DIR. Jes-
sups friend met the skeptic at Beyrout after
he had completed his journey through the
! Holy Land well, how is itf' said the
! aforesaid gentleman to the sxeptic The an
swer was; II have seen it all, and l tell you
the Bible is truel Yes; it is all trueln The
man who went to destroy came back to de-
fend
After what myself saw during my recent
absence, conclude that any one who can go
through the Holy Land and remain an UNI
| believer is either badnan or an imbecile.
God employed men to write the Bible, but he
! took many of the same truths which they
recorded and with his own almighty hand
he gouged them into the rocks and drove
them down into dismal depths, and, as docu-
ments are put in the corner stone of tenn
| pie, so in the very foundation of the earth he
folded IN aud placed the records of heavenly
| truth. The earth'S corner stone was laid,
like that of other sacred edifces, in the name
of the Father, and of the Son, and of the
! Holy Ghost. The author of revelation,
standing among the great strata, looked upon
Moses and said, "Let us record for future
ages the worlds history; you write it there
on papyrus; | will write it here ON the bowl
ders."
THE STATELY SYCAMORE
Again, nature offers an invaluable contri-
button TO Christianity by the illustration she
makes of divine truth. The inspired writer's
seized upon the advantages offered by the
natural world. Trees and rivers and clouds
and rocks broke forth into holy and enthu-
siastic utterances. Would Christ set forth
the strength of faith, he points to the syca-
more, whose roots spread out, and strike
down, and clinch themselves amid great
depths of earth, and he said that faith was
strong enough to tear that up by the roots.
At Hawarden, England, Mr.. Gladstone,
while showing me his trees during a pro-
ionged walk through his magnificent park,
pointed out sycamore, and with wave OF
the hand said: "In your visit to the Holy
Land did you see any sycamore more impress
sive than that" | confessed that had not.
Its branches were not more remarkable than
its roots 1t was to such tree as that Jesus
pointed when he would illustrate the power
of faith. "Ye might say unto this sycamore
tree, BE thou plucked up by the root and be
thou cast into the sea- and it would obey
you" One reason why Christ has fascinated
the world as no other teacher is because in
stead of using severe argument he was al
ways telling how something in the spiritual
world was like unto something in the natural
world Oh, these wonderful "likesn of our
Lord Like grain of mustard seed. Like
treasure hid in field. Like merchant seek
ing goodly pearls. Like unto a net that was
cast into the sea. Like unto householder.
EXPRESSIVE SMILES
| Would Christ teach the precision with
which he looks after you, he says he counts
the hairs of your head Well, that is long
and tedious count if the head have the aver
age endowment. 1t has been found that if
! the hairs of the head be black there are about
| 600, or if they be haxen there are about
! 900. But God knows the exact number:
1.-THE hairs of your head are all numbered"
Would Christ impress us with the divine
watchfulness and care, he speaks Of the spar
| rows that were "A nuisance in those times
| They were caught by the thousands in the
net They were thin and scrawny and had
comparatively no meat on their bones They
seemed almost valueless, whether living or
! dead. Now, argues Christ, ii my Father
takes care of them, will he not take care of
you9 Christ would have the Christian, de-
spondent over his slowness of religious devel-
opment, go to his corn field for a lesson. He
watches first the green shoot pressing up
through the clods, gradually strengthening
into stalk, and last of all the husk swelling
out with the pressure of the corn: "First the
blade, then the ear, after that the full corn
in the ear"
Would David set forth the freshness and
beauty of genuine Christian character, he
sees an eagle starting from its nest just af-
ter the melting season, its old feathers shed,
and its wingseand breast decked with new
|
cred as that of her young ones just begin
ming to try the speed of their wings. Thus
rejuvenated and replumed is the Christians
faith and hope, by every season Of communion
with God. "Thy youth is renewed like the
eagles" Would Solomon represent the an
noyance of a contentious woman's tongue,
he points to a leakage in the top of his house
or tent, where, throughout the stormy day,
the water comes through, falling upon the
hoor--drip! dripl dripl And he says: "a
continual dripping in very rainy day and
contentious woman are alike"
Would Christ set forth the character Of
those who make great profession of piety,
but have no fruit he compares them to bar
rem fig trees, which have very large and
snowy leaves, and nothing but leaves. Would
Job illustrate deceitful friendships, he speaks
OF brooks in those chimes, that wind about in
different directions, and dry up when you
want to drink out of them; my brethren
have dealt deceittully as a brook, and as the
stream of brooks they pass away" David
when he would impress us with the despond-
ency into which he had sunk, compares it to
IA Quagmre of those regions through which
he had doubtless sometimes tried TO walk, but
sunk in up to his neck, and he cried: 81 sink
in deep mre where there is no standing"
Would Habakkuk set forth the capacity
which God gives the good man to walk safely
amid the widest perils, he points to the wild
animal called the. hind walking over slippery
rocks, and leaping from wild crag to wild
crag, by the peculiar make Of its hoofs able
calmly to sustain itself in the most danger
Gus places; THE Lord God Is my strength,
and he will make my feet like kinds feet"
ALL NATURE PAYS TRIBUTE.
Job makes all natural objects pay tribute