The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1891-12-02

chral voice, About midnight" Though 1t
would be keeping unreasonable hours, I con-
cluded to stay on deck, for I must see
Rhodes, one of the islands associated with
the name Of the greatest missionary the
world ever saw or ever will see. Paul
landed there, and that was enough to make
1t famous while the world stands, and ia
nous m heaven when the world has become
q charred wreck.
This island has had O wonderful history.
With six thousand Knights Of st. John, it at
one time stood out against two hundred
thousand warriors under "Solyman the
Magnificent" The city had three thousand
statues. and statue to Apollo called Co.
lossus, which has always since been con-
sidered one Of the seven wonders OF the
world. 1t was twelve years in building and
was seventy cubits high, and had a winding
stairs to the top. It stood hfty-six years
and then was FRUSTRATED by an earthquake.
After lying in ruins for nine hundred years,
It was purchased to be converted to other
purposes, and the metal, weighing seven
hundred and twenty thousand pounds, was
put on nine hundred camels and carried,
away. We were not permitted to go ashore,
but the lights all up and down the hills show
where the city stands, and nine boats come
cut to take freight and to bring three pas
sengers. Yet all the thousands Of years OF
its history are eclipsed by the few hours or
days that Paul stopped there.
As I stood there on the deck OF the Min.
erva, looking out upon the place where the
Colossus once stood, 1 bethought' myself Of
the fact that the world must have, q God Of
some kind. It is to me an infinite Dathos-
this Colossus not only Of Rhodes, but the
colossi in many parts Of the earth. This is
only the worlds blind reaching up and feel
ing after God. Foundered human nature
must have q supernatural arm to help it
ashore. All the statues and images Of heath
endom are attempts to bring celestial forces
down into human affairs. Blessed be our
ears that we have heard Of an ever present
God, and that through Jesus Christ He comes
into our hearts and our homes, and with
more thar fatherly and motherly interest
and affection He is with us in all Jul strug-
giles aud bereavements and vicissitudes.
Rhodes needs something higher than the
Colossus, and the day will come when tbs
Christ, whom Paul was serving when he
sailed into the harbor Of Rhodes, shall take
possession Of that island.
AS we move on up through this archi-
pelago, I am reminded Of what an important
part the islands have taken in the history Of
the world. They are. necessary to the
balancing Of the planet. The two hemis-
pheres 'ust lave them. As you put down
upon q scale the heavy. pound weights, and
then the small ouuces-and no one thinks OF
despising the small weights-so the con-
tinents are tbs pounds and the islands are
the ounces. A continent is only a larger
island, and an island only a smaller CONT
nent. Something Of what part the islands
have taken In the worlds history you will see
when I remind you that the Island Of Salamis
produced Scion, and that the Island Of Chios
produced Homer, and the Island OF Samos
produced Pythagoras and the Island Of Coos
produced Hippocrates.
But there Is one island that I longed to see
more than any other. I can afford to miss
the princes among the islands, but l must see
the king Of the archipelago. b one longed
as Cyprus or Crete or Paros or Naxos or
Scio or Mitylene, but I had rather, In this
sail through the Grecian archipelago, see
that than all the others; for more OF the
glories Of heaven landed there than on all
the islands and continents since the world
stood. As we come toward 1t 1 feel my
pulses quicken. II, John, was in the island
that Is called Patmos." It is q pile Of rocks
twenty-eight miles IN circumference. A few.
expresses and inferior olives pump a living
out of the earth, aud one palm tree spreads
its foliage. But the barrenness n gloom
and loneliness Of the island made 1t a prison
lOT Uuo Ddul6u0u 6thhhO4ots
Domitian could not stand his ministry,
and one day, under armed guard, that min
lister OF the Gospel stepped from q tossing
boat to these dismal rocks and walked up to
the dismal cavern which was to be his home
and the place where should pass before him
all the conflicts Of coming time and all the
raptures of a coming eternity. Is 1t not rs-
markable that nearly all the great revela-
tions Of music and poetry and religion have
been made to men In Punishment -Homer
and Milton banished into blindness; Beeth-
over banished into deafness; Dante writing
bis "Divina Commedia" during the nineteen
years Of Punishment from bis 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 revela-
lions made to them.
So Patmos, wild, chill and bleak and ter.
rible was the best island in all the archi-
pelago, the best place in all the earth for
divine revelations. Before 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 a panorama as no
man ever before saw or ever will see IN this
world, and hence the gloom Of his surround
ings was a help rather than an hindrancs:
Ali the surroundings Of the place affected
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 famished man Is apt to
dream of Doubtful tables covered with
luxuries. 80 St John says of the inhabitants
z.-a- SgT6o- chall h,,nnaS M rnpro "
Scarcity Of fresh water on Patmos and the
hot 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
dashing against the rocks, and each wave
has a voice, and all the waves together make
a chorus, and they remind him OF the multi
tudinous anthems of heaven, and he says:
s'They are like the voice of many waters"
One day, az he looked OFF upon the sea, the
waters were very smooth, as 1t Is to-day
while we sail them in the Minerva, and they
were like glass, and the sunlight seemed to
set them on fire, and there was q mingling OF
white light and intense fame, 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 q sea OF
glass mingled with fire." Yes, seated in the
dark cavern OF IaGUOs, tuouSu HoniosiSA ano
hungry and loaded with Domitian's anathe-
mas, St John was the most fortunate man
on earth because Of the panorama that
passed before the mouth of that cavern.
Turn dcwn all the lights that we may bet
ter see 1t. The panorama passes, aud 10! the
%conquering Christ, robed, giriled, armed. the
flash Of golden candlesticks and seven stars
in His right hand, candlesticks and stars
meaning light held up and light scattered.
And there passes a throne and Christ on it,
and the seals broken, and the woes sounded,
and a dragon slain, and seven last plaques
swoop, and seven walls are poured out, and
the vision vauishes. And we halt a moment
m rest from the exciting spectacle. Again