The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1891-09-11

| their domestic condition that demands
sympathy. And yet the most of the
worlds sympathy amounts to absolute
" nothing. People go to the wrong
crib or they go in the wrong way.
| When the plague was in Rome a
great many years ago there were
eighty men who chanted them
| selves to death with the litanies of
Gregory, the Great-literally chanted
themselves to death-and yet it did
not stop the plague. And all the mu-
sic of this world can not halt the plague
of the human heart. / come to some
one whose ailments are chronic, and /
say: I'm Heaven you will never be
sick" That does not give you much
comfort. What you want is a soothing
power for your present distress. Lost
children, have you? / come to you and
tell you that in ten years perhaps you
will meet those loved ones before the
throne of God. But there is but little
coincidence in that. One day is year
| without them, and ten years is a small
eternity. What you want is SYM
pathy now-present help. l come
to those of you who have lost
dear friends, and say: TRY to
| forget them. Do not keep the
departed always in your mind" How
can you forget them when every figure
in the carpet, and every book, and every
picture, and every room calls out their
name. Suppose / come to you and say
! by way of coincidence: God is wise"
''OP you say, that gives me no help"
| Suppose / come to you and say: GOD.
from all eternity, has arranged this
trouble "Ahr' you say, that does me
no good" Then l say: ''With the swift
| feet of prayer GO direct to the corn-crib
for a heavenly supply" You go.
You say: Lord, help me; Lord, COM
fort me-" But no help yet. No
comfort yet. 1t is all dark. What
| is the matter? 1 have found. You
ought to go to God and say: Here. o
Lord, are the wounds of my soul, and
bring with me the wounded Jesus Let
His wounds pay for my wounds, His
| bereavements for my bereavements,
His loneliness for my loneliness, His
heart-break for my heart break. o
Godl for the sake of the Lord Jesus
Christine God, the Man, the Benjamin,
! the Brother-deliveI my agonized soul.
| o, Jesus of the weary foot, ease my
| fatigue. o, Jesus of the aching bead,
heal my aching head. D, Jesus of the
Bethany sisters, roll away the stone
from the door of our grave" That is
the kind of prayer that brings help,
and yet how many of you are getting
| no help at all, for the reason that
there is in your soul, perhaps, a secret
| trouble. You may never have mon-
| toned it to single human ear, or you
may have mentioned It to some one
who is now gone away, and that great
sorrows is still in your soul After
Washington Irving was dead they
found a little box that contained a
braid of hair and miniature, and the
Dame of Matilda Hoffman, and memo
randum of her death, and emarl1
| something like this: ''Th@ world after
that was a blank to me. I went into
the country, but found no peace in soli
tude. l tried to go into society, but 1
found no peace in society. There has
been a horror hanging over me by night
and by day, and | am afraid to be
! alone"
go further, and find in my subject
hint as to the way Heaven opens to the
departing spirit. We are told that
Heaven has twelve gates, and some
people infer from that fact that all the
people will go in without reference to
their past life, but what is the use of
having gate that is not sometimes to
be shut? The swinging of a gate inn
plies that our entrance into Heaven is
conditional. it is not a monetary con-
dition. If we come to the door of an
exquisite concert, we are not surprised
that we must pay a fee, for we know
that fine earthly music is ex-
cessive; but all the oratorios of
Heaven cost nothing. Heaven pays
| nothing for its music. 1t is all free.
There is nothing to be paid at that door
| for entrance; but the condition of get
| ting into Heaven is our bringing our
Divine Benjamin along with us. Do
you notice how often dying people call
| upon Jesus? 1t is the usual prayer Of
| fered-the prayer offered more than all
the other prayers put together-Lord
| Jesus, receive my spirit" One of our
congregation, when asked in the clos
ing moments of his life: do YOU know
us?" said: 20, yes, know you. God
bless you. Good-by. Lord Jesus.
receive my spirit" and he was
1 y
ments of our life we must have
Christ to call upon. If Jacobs sons
had gone toward Egypt, and had gone
with the very finest equipage. and had
not taken Benjamin along with them,
and to the question they should have
| been obliged to answer: 'Sir. we didn't
bring him, as father could not let him
go; we didn't want to be bothered with
him." voice from within would have
said: go away from us. You shall
not have any of this supply. You shall
4 not see my face because your brother is
not with you" And if we come up to-
| ward the door of Heaven at last, though
we come from all luxuriance and brill
| liancy of surroundings, and knock for
admittance, and it is found that
Christ is not with us, the police of
| Heaven will beat us back from the
bread-house, saying: Depart, never
| knew you" If Jacobs sons, coming
toward Egypt, had lost everything on
the way; if they had expended their
last skel1el; if they had come up utter
| ly exhausted to the corn-cribs of Egypt.
and it had been found that Benjamin
was with them, all the store-houses
would have swung open before them.
And SO, though by fatal casualty wa
may be ushered into the eternal world
though we may be weak and exhaust
ed by protracted sickness-if. in that
last moment, we can only just stagger,
and faint, and fall into the gate of
4 all %I,o of&s-r,-