News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1891-11-12

men in bauishment-Hom and Mil
ton banished into blindness; Beethoven
hanished into deafness; Dante writing
his "Divina Commedia" during the
nineteen years of Punishment from his
native land; Victor Hugo writing his
LES Miserables" exiled from home and
country on the island of Guernsey, and
the brightest visions of the future have
been given to those who by sickness or
sorrow were exiled from the outer
world into rooms of suffering. Only
those who have been imprisoned by
very hard surroundings have had great
revelations made to them.
So Patmos, wild, chill and bleak
and terrible, was the best island in all
the archipelago, the best place in all
the earth for divine revelations. Be
fore a panorama can be successfully
seen, the room in which you sit must be
darkened, and in the presence of John
was to pass such panorama as no
man ever before saw or ever will see in
this world, and hence the gloom of his
surroundings was help rather than
hindrance.
All the surroundings of the place af
fected st. Johns imagery when he
speaks of heaven. st. John, hungry
from enforced abstinence, or having no
food except that at which his appetite
revolted, thinks of heaven; and as the
furnished man is apt to dream of boun-
tiful tables covered with Injuries, so st.
John says of the inhabitants of heaven,
They shall hunger no more" Scarcity
of fresh water on PatnOs and the lot
tongue of ST. Johns thirst leads him to
admire heaven as he says, They shall
thirst no more" St. John hears the
waves of the sea wildly daching against
the rocks, and each wave has voice,
and all the waves together make a
chorus, and they remind him of the
multitudinous anthems of heaven, and
he says, They are like the voice of
many waters.
One day, as he looked off upon the
sea, the waters were very smooth, as it
is today while we sail them in the Min
erva, and they were like glass, and
the sunlight seemed to set them on fire,
and there was a mingling of white light
and intense flame, and as st. John
looked out from his cavern home upon
that brilliant sea, he thought of the
splendors of heaven and describes them
''As a sea of glass mingled with fire"
Yes, seated in, the dark cavern OF Pat
mos. though homesick and hungry and
loaded with DOmitlan's anathemas, st.
John was the most fortunate man on
Earth because of the panorama that
passed before the mouth of that cavern.
LET US VIEW THE PANORAMA.
Turn down all the lights that we
may better see it. The panorama
passes, and Ioi the conquering Christ,
ROBBED, girdled, armed, the flash of
golden candleSticks and seven stars in
his right hand, candlesticks and stars
meaning light held up and light scat
tered. And there passes a throne and
Christ on it, and the seals broken, and
the woes sounded and dragon slain,
and seven last plaques swoop, and
seven walls are poured out, and the
vision vanishes And we halt mo-
ment to rest from the exciting spec
tacle.
Again the panorama moves on be-
fore the cavern of Patmos, and John
the exile sees a great city representing
all abominations-Bab lowered,
palaced, tempted, fountained, foliaged,
sculptured, hanging gardens, suddenly
going crash crash! and the pipers cease
to pipe, and the trumpets cease to
trumpet and the dust and the smoke
and the horror fill the canvas, Will
from above and beneath are voices an
nouncing, Babylon is fallen, is fallen!"
And we halt again to rest from the
spectacle.
Again the panorama passes before
the cavern of Patmos, and John the
exile sce, Z, mounted Cl1rie+ r, snow
white charger leading forth the cavalry
of heaven. the long line of white charg
ers galloping through the scene, the
gathering of hoofs, the climbing of
bride bits and the flash of spears, all
the earth conquered and all heaven in
Doxology. And we halt again to rest
from the spectacle. Again the pano-
rama passes before the cavern of Pat
mos, and John the exile sees great
thrones lifted thrones of martyrs,
thrones of apostles, thrones of prophets,
thrones of patriarchs, and a throne
higher than all on which Jesus sits,
and ponderous books are opened,
their leaves turned over, revealing
the names of all that have ever lived,
the good and the bad, the renowned
and the humble, the mighty and the
weak, and at the turn of every leaf the
universe is in rapture or fright, and the
sea empties its sarcophagus of all the
dead of the sunken shipping, and the
earth gives way, and the heavens van
ish. AI;in we rest a moment from the
spectacle. The panorama moves on be-
fore the cavern of Patmos, and John
the exile beholds city of gold, and
river more beautiful than the Rhine or
the Hudson rolls through it, and fruit
trees bend their burdens on either bank,
and all is surrounded by walls in which
the upholstery of autumnal forests,
and the sunrises and sunsets of all the
ages, and the glory of burning worlds
seem to be commingled.
And the inhabitants never breathe a
sigh, or utter q groan, or discuss a diff
ference, or frown a dislike, or weep a
tear. The fashion they wear is pure
white, and their foreheads are encir-
cled by garlands, and they who were
sick are well, and they who were old
are Young, and they who were bereft
are reunited. And as the last figure of
that panorama rolled out of sight, |
think that John must have fallen back
into his cavern, nerveless and exhaust
ed. Too much was it for naked eye to
look at Too much was it for human
strength to experience.
OPEN THE GATES.
My friends, | would not wonder
if you should have a very similar
vision after awhile You will be
through this world, it's cares and ia
tigues and struggles, and if you have
served the Lord and have done the
best you could, should not wonder if
your dying bed were a Patmos 1t
often has been so. l was reading of a
dying boy who, while the family stood
round sorrowfully expecting each breath
would be the last, cried: "Open the
gates Open the gates Happy Hap
py Happy"
John Owen in his last hour said to
his attendant, "Oh, Brother Payne,