The Laurens advertiser. (Laurens, S.C.) 1885-1973, 1891-12-01


Acropolis and yonder$ YOU sse q stain,
OF Hygeia, and the statute 81 These,,,
| fighting the Minotaur and theS Sstasile
OF Hercules Staying serpents. N3SSn
der that Petronius said 1t Yves easiefto
find god than man ia Athens. Oh
! the Acropolis! The most OF It's telA.
Piles and statues made from the marbl,
quarries of Mount Pentelicum, q littl,
way from the city.
But we cannot stop lolger here, TO,
there is a hill Lsar by Of more interest
though 1t has not one chip ofymarble
to suggest statue or a temple. We
hasten down the Acropolis toy ascend
the Areopagus, or Mars Hill,-aS - 4,
called. 1t took only about tiiree minu'
tes to walk the distance, and the two
hiiltops are so near that what I said IN
religious discoui 20 on Mars Hill was
heard distinctly by some English gen,
tlemen ON the AcropoJis. This MAJ
eIIill is a rough pile OF rock @tlftx..saet
AFSh. 1t was famous lGag befo,ltNew
1A Pment times. y
TffS Persians easily and terriblytpla.
saulted the,Acropolis from this hi,fon
Here assembled the court to To crimi.
nails. 1t was held i3tthe fiia6ttime. so
that the faces of the juagsS could not
be seen, nor the faces OF the lawyers
who made the plea, and si.irstead Of a
trial being one of emAl /, 1t must
have been one of .Gna Justice. But
there was one OCCASION on this hill
memorable aboveali others.
A little man, physically weak, and
his rhetoric dfsciibed by himself as
contemptible,f fad by his sermons rocked
Athens with3commotion, and he was
summoned ,hther by writ of law or
40 IF inuHatinn fn onp,n ,,-o.
pulpit of rock and give specimen of
his theology All the wise-acres of
Athens tuEded out and turned up to
hear him. /The more venerable of them
set In an amphitheater, thea. granite
seats 9sffe 9sf stu sss... visih,c t tS n;,
other people swarmed on all sides of
the hill and at the base OF it to hear
this.man, whom some called a fanatic.
and others called a madcap, and others
a blasphemer, and Others STYLED con-
temptuously "this fellow"
Paul arrived in answer to the writ or
Invitation, and confronted them and
gaze them the biggest dose that NOR
Gals eVei tse0k. He was so built that
nothing could scare him, and as for
Jupiter and Athena, the god and the
goddess, whose images were in full
sight on the adjoining hill, he had not
SO much regard for them as he had for
the ant that was crawling in the sand
under his feet. In that audience were
the first orators Of the world, and they
had voices like flutes when they were
passive, and like trumpets when they
were aroused, and think they laughed
in the sleeves of their gowns as this in
significant looking man rose to speak.
In that audience were Scholiasts, who
knew everything, or thought they did,
and from the end of the longest hair on
the top of their craniums to the end of
the nail on the longest toe, they were
stuffed with hypercriticism, and they
leaned backswith supercilious look to
listen. AS in 1889, / stood on that rock
where Paul stood, aud slab of which
| brought from Athens by consent of
the queen, through Mr.. Tricoupis, the
prime minister, and had placed In yon-
der Memorial Wall, 1 read the whole
story, Bible in hand.
What have so far said in this dis
ourse was necessary in order that you
may understand the boidneSs, the def.
ance, the holy recklessness, the mag
nsEcence of Paul's speech. The first
he launched at the opposite
h''l-the Acropolis-t moment all
aglitter with idols aud temples. He
cries out, "God who made the world !"
Why, they thought that Pr0metheus
made 1t, that Mercury made it, that
Apollo made 1t, that Poseidon made it,
that Eros made it, that Pandrocus made
1t, that. Boreas made 1t, that it took all
the gods of the Parthenon, yea, all the
gods and goddesseS OF the Acropolis to
make 1t, and here stands q man with
out any ecclesiastical title, neither ID.
d., nor even reverend, declaring that
the world was made by the Lord o.
heaven and earth, s I'd hence the infer
ence that all the, splendid COY ering of
the Acropolis, SO near that the people
standing on the steps of the Parthenon
could hear 1T, was deceit, a falsehood,
q sham, Q blasphemy. Look at the
faces of his auditors; they are turning
pale, and then red, and then wrathful.
There had been several earthquakes in
that region, but that was the seYerest
shocls hese men had ey er felt.
The Persians had bombarded the
Acrnpolis from the heights Of Mars
Hill, but this Pauiiae bombardment
was greater and more terrific. What,
said his hearers, shave we been hauling
with many yoEes of oxen for centuries
these blocks from the quarries of Mount
Pentelicum, and have we had our arch
itects putting up these structures of un-
parelleled Splendor, and have we had
the, greatest of all sculptors, Phidias,
with his men chiseling away at those
wondrous pediments and cutting away
at these frieZeS, and have we taxed the
nations resources to the Utmost, now
to be told chat those statues see moth
Ing, hear nothing, know nothing7"
Oh, Paul, stop for amoment and giva
these startled and overwhelmed audi
tors time to catch their breathl Make
a rhetorical pause! Take a look around
you at the interesting landscape, and
give your hearers time to recoveri Ne
he does not make even period, or SO
much as a colon or semicu; n, hut laun.
ches the second thunderbolt right after
tbe first and In the same breath goes
on to say, God "dwelleth not in temples
made with hands" Oh, PAUL. Is not
deity more In the Parthenon, or more
IN the Erechtheiupr " more in the
temple OF Zeus i.npius than in the
open air, more Than on the, hill where
we are sitting, more tbfsl on Mount
Hymettus out yonder, ON which the
bees get their honey iy|tNo morel" re-
spends Paul, "He dwelleth not In tenn
pies made with hands,"
But surely the preacher on the pull
pit OF rock on Mars Hill will stop now
His audience can endure no more. Two
thunderbol5s are enough. No, In the
same breath he launches the third thun
derbolt, which to them Is more fiery
more terrible, more demolishing thar
| the others as he cries out. "hath made