The Opelousas courier., 1891-02-21

day whers q mai is iidt safer without d Dissoi
than with Ole. But all through bur Journeys
iii Palestine We required firearms. Nhilsthe
only Weapon ! had on my person was d New
%estafaeht #e vent through the regf6h Where
! said. TO the dragoman; David, are YOU
, armedP' and he said "Yes,n and I said: "Are
those fifteen or twenty mufeteers and bag
gage men and attendants armedr' and he
said "Yes," and ] felt safer,
On we roll through the plain Of Sharon.
Here grow the ross, after which Christ. YES
named, Rose of Sharon, celebrated IN all
Christendom and throughout all ages.
There has been controversy as to what flow
er it was. Some say it was a marshmalIow
that thrives here, and some claim this honor
for the rarcissus, and some for the blue iris,
and some for The scarlet attemone; fer you
t,.6ust know that this plain df Shdroii is d roll
ing ocean of color when the spring breezes
move acrossit, But leaving the botanists in
controversy as to what it is, | would take the
most aromatic and beautiful of them all and
twist them into a garland for the name
which is above every name"
Wonder = httle TO the north as We move
! 6it, is ths plaid of Ono. The Bible fneiftions
il again and again. The village standing ON
this plain Of n is a mud village. Two
| great basins OF rock catch the rains for the
people. Of more Importance in olden time
than in modern time was this plain Of Ono.
But as the dragoman announced it land in the
Bible Tread of il I was reminded Of ths vast
multitude af pgdple who now. dws1i in the
plain of Ono. They are, by tlieir nervous
constitution or by their lack of faith In. God,
always in the negative. VIII you help to
build a church, Oh, mol Will you start out
in some new Christian enterprise9 Oh, mol
Do you think the world is getting any bet
terf Oh, moi They lie dow in the path Of
all good movements, sanitary, political and
/ %a1scior1c Tho- ho11,1 er 4ba;r. 10000 ~rf@h 80
traces to pull ahead, but only breeding
straps to hold back. For all Christian work
I would not give for a thousand Of them the
price Of q clipped ten cent piece. They are
in the plain Of Oh, moi May the Lord multi
ply the Numbers of those who when anything
good is Undertaken are found to lvs Ii the
plain of Oh, yesI Will you support this new
charity? Oh, yesl Do you think that this
victim of evil habit can be reformsdf Oh,
yesI Are you willing to do anything,
whether obscure or r~esounding, for the well
fare of the church and the salvation Of a
worlds Oh. yesl But, I am sorry to say
that the most populous plain in all the earth
Here now we come where stood the fields
into which Samson fred the foxes. The
foxes are no rarity in this land. I counted
at one time twenty or thirty Of them in one
group, and the cry all along the line was
s'Foxesl Look at the foxesl' and at night
| they sometimes bark until all attempts to
sleep are an absurdity. Those 1 saw end
heard in Palestine might have been descend
ants of the very foxes that Samson employed
for an appalling incendiarism. The wealth
of that land was in the harvests, and 1t was
| harvest time and the straw was dry. Three
hundred foxes are caught and tied In couples
| by some wire or incombustible cord which
the flames cannot divide, and 1rebrands are
fastened to those couples of foxes, and the
~affrighted creatures are let loose n run
every whittier among the harvests, and in
the awful blaze down go the corn shocks, n
| the vineyards, and the olives, and all through
the valleys and over the hills and among the
villages is heard the cry of 'FireF' And In
the burnt pathway walk hunger and want
and desolation.
All this for spite. And some theologians
learn one thing and some another. But l
learn from it that a great man may some
times stoop toa very mean piece OF business,
and that if men would. use as much fngenu-
ity in trying to bless as they do in trying to
destroy, the world all the way down would
| be in better condition. Yet the fire Of the
foxes kindled that night in Palestine has not
gone out, but has leaped the seas, and the sly
| foxes, the human foxes, are now still run
| ming every whittier, kindling political fires,
fires of religious controversy, fires OF hate,
world wide fires and the whole harvest OF
Righteousness perish. 1t took the hard work
Of nultitudes ON these plains of Palestine for
months and months to rear the vine and raise
the corn, but it took only three hundred
worthless foxes one night to blaze all into
ashes.
Brace up your nerves now, that you nay
look while I point them out. Yonder is Kir-
~jath-Jearim, where the ark of God staid un-
| TIL David took it to Jerusalem. Wonder John
the Baptist was born. Yonder is Emmaus,
where Christ walked with his disciples at
eventide. Here are men blowing, only one
handle to the pillow, showing the accuracy. OF
Christ.s allusion. When we pillow in America
or England there are two n on TWO
handles, but in Palestine only one handle.
And SO Christ used the singular saying, mo
man having put his hand to she plow and
1 locking back IS fit for the kingd6m.p The OK
is urged on by a wooden stick pointed with
sharp iron, and the OK knows enough not to
kick, for he would only hurt himself instead
of breaking the goad. And the Bible refers
to that when it says to Saul, 1T is hard for
thee to kick against the goads."
Here is the valley Of Ajalon, famous Tor
Joshua's pursuit Of the five kings and the
lunar arrest. And in Imagination ] see the
moon in daytime halt. Who has not some
times seen the moon dispute the throne with
the sum- But when the king of day and the
queen of night, who never before Joshuass
| time nor since then stopped a moment In
their march, ha I'd at Joshue's ~
owas a scene, enough to make the universe
shiver: moon, stand thou still in the valley
| of AialonW At another time we will see the
sun stop above Gideon, but now we have only
to do with the moon, and you must remem-
her it was more of an orb than it is now. 1t
Is burnt out world now, a dead world now.
an extinct world now, a corpse laid out In
| state in the heavens, waiting for the judga
nlent day to bury it. But on the day OF
which / speak the moon was probably q liv-
ing world, yet it halted at the wave of JOSH
ua's finger, tsStand thou stilir Do not bulge
an inch until Joshua finishes thoseiye kings,
who are there tumbling over the rocks, sword
of man slashing them, hailstones out of the
! sky pelting them.
And there is the cavern of M%akkedah,
where they fed for safety, and where they
| were afterward locked in, and from which
| they were taken out to be slain, and in which
they were afterward buried, and you do
well to examine that cavern, for within a
few hours it became three things which no
| other cave ever was-fortress, prison,
s~epulcher.
Now we pass the place where once lived
one of the greatest robbers of the country,
Abou Gosh by name. From this point you
see he could look over the surrounding coun-
try, and long before the travellers came up to
him the plan for taking of their money or
their life, or both, was consumated. He one
day found a company Of monks who would
i not pay, and he smobhered them to death in
a hot oven. In his last days he lived here
ike an oriental prince, and had attendants
and admirers to whom he told his stories of
~brigandage and assassination. So late as
when our eminent and Beloved American,
William G.. Prime, passed through, Abou
Gosh, the scoundrelly Bedouin, sat at his
doorway smoking his pipe. His descendants
ivein this village, aud probably ara no NOR
honest than their distinguished ancestor, but
marauding and murder are not as safe d
business now as when all this route to
Jerusalem was subjected to ontrages pan