Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1890-03-15

DSttei IMAM uiu DeIOfe anu nave LOF uIby
years been studying his weaknesses and
win weave a stronger web of circumstances to
catch him next time.n And Satan would
concenter his forces or this one man, and the
last state of that man would be worse than
the first My friends, our faces are in the
right direction. Better go forward than
backward, even if we had the choice. The
greatest disaster / can think of would
be for you to return TO boyhood in 1890 Oh,
if life were smooth Luzerne or Cayuga Lake,
| would like to get into yacht and sail over
| It. not once, but twice-yea, a thousand
times. But life is an uncertain sea, and
some of the ships crash on the icebergs Of
cold indifference, and some take fire of evil
passion, and some lose their bearings and run
into the skerries. and some are never heard
OF. Surely on such a treacherous sea as that
one voyage is enough.
Besides all this, do you know if you could
have your wish and live life over again it
would put you so much further from reun-
ion with your friends in heavens If you are
in the noon of life or the evening of life you
are not very far from the golden gate at
which you are to meet your transported and
emparadised loved ones You are now. let
| us say, twenty years or ten years or one year
off from celestial conjunction. Now suppose
you went back in your earthly life thirty
years or forty years or fifty years, what an
awful postponement of the time of reunion
II would be as though you were going to San
Francisco to great banquet, and you got to
Oakland, four or five miles this side of it. and
then came back to Hoboken or Harlem to get,
better start; as though you were going
to England to be crowned and having come
in sight &c the mountains of Wales
you put back TO Sandy Hook in order
to make a better voyage. The further
on you got in life, if a Christian, the,
nearer you are TO the renewal of broken
lranW. 1r,rnE l.a.~ II
time turns in the right direction, and it is
well it turns SO fast. Three hundred and
sixty-five revolutions in a year and for
ward. rather than three hundred and
sixty-hve revolutions in year and back
ward. But hear vel hear yel while tell
you how you may practically live your life
over again and be all the better for it. You
may put into the remaining years of
your life all you have learned of wisdom
in your past life. You may make the
coming ten years worth the preced-
ing forty or fifty years. When a man says
he would like to live his life over again be-
cause he would do SO much better, and yet
goes right on living as he has always lived,
do you not see he stultifies HIMSELF He
proves that if he could go back he would do
almost the same as he has done. If man
eat green apples some Wednesday in cholera
time and is thrown into fearful cramps and
says on Thursday II wish had been more
prudent in my diet; oh, if | could live Wednes-
day over again" and then on Friday eats ap-
Piles just as green, he proves that it would
have been no advantage for him to live
Wednesday over again. And If we, deplor-
ing onr past life and with the idea of i'm
provement long for an opportunity to try it
over again, yet go on making the same mis-
takes and committing the same sins, we only
demonstrate that the repetition of our exist
ence would afford no Improvement. 1t was
grsen apples before and it would be
green apples over again. As soon as ship
captain strikes rock in the lake or sea he
reports it and buoy is swung over that reef
and marines henceforth stand off from
that rock. And all our mistakes
in the past ought to be buoys warning us to
keep in the right channel. There is no ex-
cuse for us if we split on the same rock
where we split before. Going along the
sidewalk at night where excavations are be-
ing made we frequently see lantern on a
framework, and we turn aside, for that lam
tern says, keep out of this hole. And all
along the pathway of life lanterns are set as
warnings, and by the time we come to mid
life we ought to know where it is safe to walk
and where it is unsafe.
Beside that we have all these years been
learning how to be useful, and in the next
decade we ought to accomplish more for God
and the church and the world than in any
previous four decades The best way to
atone for past Incidence OF past transgres-
sion is by future asSiduity. Yet you often
find Christian men who were not con-
verted until they We're forty or fifty,
as old age comes on, saying: well,
my work is about done and it is time for me
to rest" They gave forty years of their life
to Satan and tn world little fragment of
their life to Gid. and now they want to rest.
Whether thai belongs to comedy or tragedy
l say not. he man VINO gave one half OF his
earthly ex stenee to the world and of the re-
naming quarters one to Christian work
and the other to rest, would not, | sup
pose, get very brilliant reception in
hea- en-. If there are any dried leaves
in heaven they would be appro-
T late for his garland or if there is any
hrone with broken steps it would be apLro-
pirate for his coronation or any harp with
relaxed string it would be appropriate for
his lingering. Ny brother, you give nine
tenths of your life to sin and Satan and then
get converted and then rest awhile 10 sancti-
fled laziness and then go up to get your heav-
emily reward, ana | warrant it will not take
the cashier OF the royal banking house
a great while to count out to you all
your dues. He will not ask you whether you
will have it in bills of large denomination o:
small would like to put one sentence of
my sermon in italics, and have it under
scored, and three exclamation points at the
end of the sentence. and that sentence Is
this: As we cannot live our lives over again,
the nearest we can come to atone for the past
is by redoubled holiness and industry in the
future.
If this rail train of life has been detained
and switched off and is far behind the time
table tie engineer for the rest of the way
must put on more pressure of steam and go
mile minute in order TO arrive at the
right time and place under the approval of
conductor and directors.
As | supposed it would be, there are multi
tudes of young people listening to this sermon
on whom this subject has acted with the
force of a galvanic battery Without my
saying word to them, they have soliloquized,
saying: "As one cannot live his life over
again, and | can make only one trip, | must
look out and make no mistakes; | have out
one chance and l must make the most of it."
My young friends, | am glad you
made this application of the SER
mon yourself. When min
lister toward the close of his sermon savs:
NOW a few words by way of application"
people begin to look around for their hats
and get their arm through one sleeve of their
overcoats, and the sermonic application is
failure | am glad you have made your own
application and that you are resolved. like
Quaker of whom l read years ago, who. in
substance said: 4 shall be along
this path of life but once and 50 | must co
an Tue hiuuiltsS L CdD anu an tue SOpu NnH
Ny hearers the mistakes of youth can never
be corrected. Time gone is gone forever.
An opportunity passed the thousandth part
of a second has by one leap reached the
other side of a great eternity. In the.
autumn when the birds migrate you look up
and see the sky black with wings and the
flocks stretching out into many leagues of
air. and so to-day | look up and see two
large wings in full sweep They are
the wings of the flying year. That is fol-
lowed by flock of three hundred and sixty
five, and they are the flying days Each Of
the flying days is followed by twenty four.
and they are the flying hours and each of
| these is followed by sixty, and these are the
Aying minutes Where did this great flock
start from? Eternity past Where are they
bound? Eternity to come. You might
as well go a-gunning for the quails that
whistled last year in the meadows or
| the robins that last year caroled in
the sky as to try to fetch down and bag one
| of the past opportunities of your life. Do
| not saw, 81 will lounge now and make it up
afterwardn Young men and boys, you can't
make it up. Ny observation is that those
who in youth sowed wild oats, to the end of
] their short life sowei wild oats, and that
| those who start sowing Genesee wheat al
WAYS sow Genesee wheat. And then the
reaping of the harvests is so different There
is grandfather now. lie has lived TO
old age because his habits have been
good. His eyesight for this world has got
somewhat dim, but his eyesight for heaven is