Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1890-12-19

s ;. De Its opportunity. Not such are
laose Vasciilating Christians who arc so
pious on Sunday that they have no re-
'lslon left for the weekday. As the ana
conda gorgcs itself with food and thrn
seems fora long time to lie thorourhly
iiinsenslble, so there arc men who will ON
sunday get such a religious surfcit that
inc rest of the week they seem thor
oughly dead to all religious emotion.
They weep in church under u charity
sermon, but if on Monday a subject Of
want presents itself at tho door the bcp-
CARS safety will depend entirely on
quick limbs and an unobstructcd stair
way. 1t takes all the grace thcy can
get to keep them from committing as
sault and battery on those intruders
who come with pale faces and stories of
distress and subscription papers. The
reason that God planted these eedars in
the Blble was to suggest that VIC ought.
IN our religious character, to be deem
like the cedar, high like the cedar
broad-branched as the cedar.
But what has been the history of most
OF The great ccdars in merchandise. in
ART, IN law, in medicine, in Statesman
ship, in Christian usefulness? John.
get up and milk the cows: it's late: it's
half past in the morning. Split all
armful OF wood on your way out. so that
we can build the fires for breakfast. Put
your bare feet on the cold oil Cloth and
break the ice in your pitcher before Won
can wash. Yes, it has been showing and
drifting again last night, and we will
have to break the roads, The bows ed
ucational advantages, the long oak plank
without any back to it in the country
school house, and stove throwing out
more smoke than heat. Pressing on
from one hardship to another.
After while a position on salary or
wages small enough to keep life, but
keep it at it's lowest ebb. Starting in
occupation or business with prosperous
men trying to fight you back at every
step. But after good while fairly on
your feet. and your opportunities widen
ing, and then by some sudden turn you
are triumphant. You are master of the
situation and defiant of all earth and
hell. A Lebanon cedar! John Milton
on his way up to the throne of the
worlds sacred pocsy must sell his copy
right of paradise Lost for seventy
two kallars in three payments. And
William Shakespeare. on his way up to
be acknowledged the greatest dramatist
OF all ages, must hold horses ut the door
OF the London theatre for a sixpencc,
and Homer must struggle through total
blindness to Immortality, and John Bun
yam must cheer himscf on the way
up by making a flute out of his
prison stool, and Canova, the sculptor,
must toll on through orphanage, model
ing lion in butter before he could cut
his statues in marble. And the great
Stephenson must watch cows in the field
for few pennies and then become a
stoker, and afterward mend clocks be-
| fore he puts the locomotive on it's track,
and calls forth plaudits from parlia-
ments and medals from kings. Abel
Stevens is picked up a neglected child of
the street. and rises through his conse.
Grated genius to be one of the most illus
trious clcrgymen and historians of the
century. And Bishop James of the same
church in boyhood worked his passage
from Ireland to America and up to use
fulness, where, in the bishopric, he was
second to no one who ever adorned it.
| While i'll Punishment Xenophon wrote
his ''Anabasis;' and Thucydides his
''History of the Peloponnesian War;
and Victor Hugo must be cNilcd for
many years to the island of Guernsey
before he can come to that height in the
affections of his countrymen that crowds
the Champs Elysees, and the adjoining
boulevards with one million mourners,
as his hearse rolls down to the Church
of the Madeleine. Oh, it is a tough old
world, and it will keep you back and
! keep you down and keep you under as
long as it can.
Thirty years from now the foremost
men in all occupations and professions
will be those who are this hour in
awful struggle of early life, many OF
them without five dollars to their name.
So in spiritual life it takes u course OF
bereavements, prosecutions, sicknesscs,
aud losses to develop stalwart Christian
character. got q letter few days ago
saying: 81 have hardly seen a we'll day
since was born, and l could not write
my own name until was fifty years of
age, and am very poor; but l am, by
the grace of God, the happiest man in
Chicago"
The Bible speaks of the SHOWS of lie.
banon, and at this season of the year
the SHOWS there must be tremendous.
The deepest snow ever seen in America
| would be insignificant compared with
| the mildcSt winter of SHOWS on those Lee
I AAO SSNoAo S0VSd
| that skyfull of crystals on their brow and
on their long arms. Piled up in great
heaps are those SHOWS, enough to crush
other trees to the ground, splitting the
branches from the trunk and leaving
them rent and torn, never to rise. But
what do the cedars care for these SHOWS
on Lebanon? They look up to the win.
ter skies an say: ''Snow on! Empty
the white heavens upon us, and when
the storm is passed let other process
sions of tempest try to bury us in their
fury. We have for 500 winters been &C.
customed to this, and for the next soc
winters we will cheerfully take all you
have to send; for that is the way we de-
velop our strength, and that is the way
we serve God and teach all ages how te
endure and conquer" So / say: Good
cheer to all people who are showed un.
der! Put your faith in God and you will
come out gloriously. Others may be
stunted growths. or weak jumpers OF
. the lower levels of spirituality, but yol
are going to be Lebanon cedars. AT las,
it will be said of such as you: ''Thest
are they who came out of great tribula'
tion and made white i'll the blood OF the
. Lamb"
But while crossing over these noun.
, tains of Lebanon l bethink myself Of
> hn ruyk1n