Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1890-09-01
then completes it in the Ionic, and is


START RIGHT AND KEEP ON
Young man, start right and keep on
| Have decision of character Charac-
ter is like the goldfinch of Tonquin; it
is magnificent while standing firm, but
loses all its beauty in fight. How much
decision of character in order that these
young men may be Christians! Their
old associates make sarcastic filings at
them They go on excursions and they
do not invite them. They prophesy
that he will give out They wonder if
he is not getting wings. As he passes
they grimace and wink and chuclzle,
and say, There goes a saint.
Oh, young man, have decision of char
acter You can afford in this matter
of religion to be laughed at. What do
you care for the SCOTS of these men
who are affronted because you will not
go to ruin with them? When the grave
cracks open under their feet, and grim
messengers push them into it, and eter-
nifty comes down hard upon their
spirit, and conscience stings, and hope
less ruin lifts them up to hurl them
down, will they laugh then?
I learn also from my subject that
men may take religion into their
worldly business. Daniel had enough
work to do to occupy six men. All the
affairs of state were in his hands
questions of finance, questions of war,
of peace, all international questions
were for his settlement or adjustment.
He must have had a correspondence
vast beyond all computation. There
was not a man in all the earth who
had more to do than Daniel, the secre-
tary of state, and yet we find him three
times day bowling before God in
prayer. There are men in our day
who have not hundredth part of
Daniels engagements who say they
are too busy to be religious. They
have an idea somehow that religion
will spoil their worldly occupation,
that it will trip the accountants pen,
or dull the carpenters saw, or confuse
the lawyers brief, or disawange the
merchants store shelf
IMPERTINENT RELIGION
They think religion is impertinent.
They would like to have it very well
seated beside them in church on the
Sabbath, to find the place in the psalm
book, or to nudge them awake when
they get sleepy under the didactic dis
course; or they would like to leave it
the pew on Sabbath evening, as they
go out closing the door, saying, ''Good
night, religion; I'll be back next Sun
day!" But to have religion go right
along by them all through life, to have
religion looking over their shoulder
when they are making a bargain, to
have religion take up a bag of dishonest
gold and shake it and say, "Ha! ha!
where did you get thatW-they think
that is an impertinent religion. They
would like to have a religion to help
them when they are sick, and when the
shadow of death comes over them they
would like to have religion as sort of
night key with which to open the door
of heaven but religion under other cir
cumstances they take to be an imperti-
nence Now, my friends, religion never
robbed a man of dollar. Other things
being equal, a mason will build a bet
ter wall, a cabinet maker will make a
better chair, a plumber will make a
better pipe, a lawyer will make a better
plea. a merchant will sell o better bill
of goods.
say other things being equal. OF
course when religion gives man a new
heart it does not propose to give him
new head, or to intellectualize him, or
to change a mans condition when his
ordinary state is an overthrow of the
philosophical theory that a total vacu-
um is impossible; but the more letters
you have to write, the more burdens
you have to carry, the more miles you
have to travel, the more burdens you
have to lift, the more engagements you
have to meet the more disputes you
have to settle, the more opportunity
you have of being Christian.
THE BUSIEST MEN THE BEST MEN.
If you have thousand irons in the
fire, you have thousand more oppor-
tunities of serving God than if you
had only one iron in the fire. Who so
busy as Christi And yet who mill
ionth part as holy? The busiest men
the best men. All the persons convert
ed in Scripture busy at the time of
their being converted. Matthew at
tending to his custom house duties the
Prodigal Son feeding swine; Lydia
selling purple; Simon Peter hauling in
the net from the sea; Saul squirting his
horse toward Damascus, going down on
his law business. Busy busyi Daniel
with all the affairs of state weighing
down upon his soul, and yet three times
a day worshiping the God of heaven.
Again, learn from this subject that
man may take religion into his
politics. Daniel had all the affairs of
state on hand, yet a Christian. He
could not have kept his elevated posi-
ton unless he had been a thorough
politician, and yet all the thrusts of Of
fcials and all the danger of disgrace
did not make him yield one iota of his
high toned religious principle. He
stood before that age, he stands before
all ages, a specimen of a Christian
politician.
So there have been in our day and
in the days of our fathers men as emf
nent in the service of God as they have
been eminent in the service of the
state Such was Benjamin E. Butler,
dUUOTuOy S0u0Ietl I'll AN6W AOlh LII ul1C
time of your fathers. Such was John
Mclean, of Ohio. Such was George
Briggs of Massachusetts,. Such was
Theodore Frelinghuysen, of New Jer-
sey Men faithful to the state, at the
same time faithful to God.
OUR HOPE IS IN THE YOUNG MEN.
1t is absurd to expect that men who
have been immersed in political wick
edness for thirty or forty years shall
come to reformation; and our hope is
in the young men who are coming up,
that they have patriotic principle and
Christian principle side by side when
they come to the ballot box and cast
their first vote, and that they swear al
legiance to the government of heaven
as well as to the government of the
United States. We would have Bunker
Hill mean less to them than Calvary,
and Lexington mean less to them than
Bethlehem.
R1t baooI1ca tbnrn ara had mon