The Russellville Democrat., 1890-10-16

after partaking food together. To that custom Walter Scott refers in his i'm mortal .'Talisman," where Saladin, with one stroke of the sword, strikes the head from an enemy who stands in l Saladin's tent with a cup in his hand and before he has time to put 1t to his lip. and does it so suddenly that the body of his enemy, beheaded, stands for moment after the beheading, with the cup still in his right hand. After the cup had been slipped 1t would have been l impossible, according to the laws of Oriental hospitality, to give tho fatal blow.
 The only lands where it is safe to l travel unarmed arc Christian lands Human life is more highly valued and personal rights are better respected, and l am glad to believe that in our country, from the Atlantic ocean to the Pacific ocean, there is not q place to- day where man is not safer without pistol than with one. But all through our journeys in Palestine we required firearms. While the only weapon had on my person was New Testament, we went through the region where 1 said to the dragoman: David, are you armed?' and he said ''Yes" and I said Are those fifteen or twenty muleteers and baggagemen and attendants armed?" and he said ''Yes,n and I felt safer. On we roll through the Plain of Sharon. Here grew the rose after which Christ was named. Rose of sharon, celebrated in all Christendom and throughout all ages. There has been controversy as to what flower it was. Some say it was marsh-mallow that thrives here, and some claim this honor for the narcissus, and some for the blue iris, and some for the scarlet anemone, for you must know l that this Plain of Sharon is a rolling ocean of color whom the spring breezes move across it But leaving the bot anists in controversy as to what 1t is,
 I would take the most aromatic and beautiful of them all and twist them | into garland for the Name which is
 above every nanie."
 Wonder, little to the north as we move on. in the Plain of Ono. The Bible mentions 1t again and again The village standing on this Plain of Ono Is a mud village. Two great basins of rock catch the rains for the people. Of more importance in olden time than in modern time was this Plain of Ono. But | as the dragoman announced it and in | the Bible l road of it. l was reminded of the vast multitude of people who now dwell in the Plain of Ono. Thoy are, | by their nervous constitution or by their lack of faith in God, always in the neg atiye. Will you help to build a church? Oh, mol Will you start out in some new Christian enterprise? Oh, no! Do you think the world is getting any better? On, mol They lie down in the path of all | good movements, sanitary, social, politi- cal and religious. They harness their 1 horses with no traces to pull ahead, but only breeching straps to hold back. For all Christian work I would not give for a thousand of them the price of a clipped ten,cent piece. They are in | the Plain of Oh, no! May the Lord multiply the numbers of those who, when any thing good is undertaken, are found to live in the Plain of Oh, yesl l Will you support this new charity? Oh, l yes Do you think that this victim of evil habit can be reformed? Oh, yesl Are you willing to do any thing, whether obscure or resounding, for the welfare of the Church and the salvation of a ruined world? Oh, yes! But am sorry to say that the most populous plain in in all the earth to-day is the Plain of | Ono.
 Here now VIC come where stood the 1 fields into which Samson fired the foxes. The foxes were no rarity in this land
 l counted at one time twenty or thirty of them in one group and the cry all along the line was Foxes. Look at the foxes" And at night they sometimes bark until all attempts to sleep are an absurdity. Those l saw and heard in Palestine might have been descendants l of the very foxes that Samson em- ployed for an appalling incendiarism. l The wealth of that land was in the l harvests, and 1t was harvest time and the straw was dry. Three hundred | foxes were caught and tied in couples | by some wire or incombustible cord, which the flames can not divide. and | fire brands are fastened to those couples of foxes, and the affrightened creatures are let loose and run every whither among the haryests, and in the awful blaze down go the corn shocks and the vineyards, and the olives and all through the valleys and over tho hills and among the villages is heard the cry of fire. And in the burnt pathway walk hunger and want and desolation. l All this for spite. And some theolo- gians learn one thing, and some another But I learn from it that a great man may sometimes stoop to very mean piece of business and that if men would use as much ingenuity in trying to bless as they do in trying to de- stroy, the world all the way down would have been in better condition. Yet the fire of the foxes kindled that night in Palestine has not gone out, but has leaped the seas, and the sly foxes, the human foxes, arc now still running every whither, kindling political fires, fires of religious controversy, fires of hate, worldwide fires, and whole har- vests of righteousness perish. It took the hard work of multitudes on all these plains of Palestine for months and months to rear the vine and raise the corn, but it took only three hundred worthless foxes one night to blaze all into ashes.
 Brace up your nerves now, that you may look while l point them out Wonder is Kirjath-Jearim, where the Ark of God stayed until David took it to Jerusalem. Wonder John the Bap- tist was born. Wonder is Emmaus, where Christ walked with the disciples at eventide. Here are men blowing, only one handle to the blow, showing the accuracy of Christs allusion. When we blow in America or England there are two hands on two handles. but in Palestine only one handle. And so Christ uses the singular saying: No man having put his hand to the blow, and looking back is fit for the King dom. The OK is urged on by wooden stick pointed with sharp irons and the