Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1892-05-20

said. II charge thee to CONS out of him."
takes people by the wholesale. In the most
responsive religious audience have you no.
ticed how many people never sing at ally
They have a book, aud they have voice,
and they know how 70 read. They know
many OF the tunes, and yet are silent while
the great raptures Of music pass by. Among
those who sing not one out OF a hundred
sings loud enough to hear his own voice.
They hum it, They give sort OF religious
grunt. They make the lips 60, but it is iu-
audible. With voice strong enough to stop
q street car one block away, all they can af-
ford in the praise of God is about half a
whisper. With enough sopranos enough
altos enough bassos to make a small heaven
between the four walls, they let the oppor-
tunity 60 by unimprovei.
The volume of voice that ascends from the
largest audience that ever assembled ought
TO be multiplied about two thousand fold.
But the minister rises and gives out ths
hymn; the organ begins; the choir or pre-
centor leads; the audience are standing 50
that the lungs may have full expansion, aud
a mighty harmony is about to ascend, when
the evil spirit spoken OF In my text-the
dumb devil-spreads his two wings one over
the lips of one-halt the audience and the
other wing over the lips Of the other half Ut
the audience, and the voices roll back into
the Threats from which they started, and
only here aud there anything is heard, AMI
nine-tenths of the holy power Is destroyed;
and the dumb devil, as he flies away, says:
II could not keep Isaac Watts from writing
that hymn, and / could not keep Lowell
Mason from composing the tune to which
it is set, but | smote into silence or half
silence the lips from which it would have
sDread abroad to bless neighborhoois AMI
cities and then mount the wide open hsav-
ems" Give the long meter doxology the
full support of Christendom, and those four
lines would take the whole earth for God.
During the cotton famine in Lancashire.
England, when the suffering was something
terrific, as the first wagon load OF cotton
rolled in, the starving people unlocked the
horses and drew the load themselves sing
ing, until all Lancashire joined in with tri-
umphant voices, their cheeks sopping with
tears. praise God from whom all blessings
now." When Commodore Perry, with hi1
warship. the Mississippi, lay off the coast of
Japan, he bombarded the shores with "Old
Hundred" played by the marine band.
Glorious "Old Hundred" composed by Will
lam Franc of Germany. In war prison,
at ten o'clock at night the poor fellows far
from home and wounded and sick and dy-
ing, one prisoner started the "Old Hundred
Doxology, and then score OF voices Joined,
then all the prisoners on the floors took up
the acclaim until the building, from founda-
ton to topstone, fairly quaked with the
melodious ascription.
A British man-of-war, lying off foreign
coast, heard a voice singing that doxology,
and Immediately guessed, and guessed
Alright. that there was an Englishman in
captivity to the Mohammsdans; and in the
small boats the sailors rowed TO shore AMI
burst into d gauri-house and set the captive
free. don't know what tune tina trumpets
of resurrection shall play. but it may be the
doxology which is now sounding across
Christendom. How much more hearty we
would be in our songs, and how easily we
could drive back the dumb devil from all our
worshiping assemblages, if we could realize
that nearly all our. hymns have stirring his
tory,
That glorious hymn, "Stand Up for
Jesus" was suggested by the last words of
Dudley Tying, who was dying from having
his right arm torn off in thrashing ma
chine. That hymn, what a Friend we
Have in Jesus" heard through telephone,
converted an obdurate soul. shall We
Gather at the Riverg was hymn first sung
in our Brooklyn Prospect Park, at the chill
dren's May anniversary, and then started
10 encircle the world. "Where Is My Wan
iering Boy To-nighty is a song that has
saved hundreds of disspated young men.
Tom, the drummer boy in the army, was
found crying, and an officer asked him what
was the matterl "Oh," he said, II had
dream last night Ny sister died ten years
ago. and my mother never was herself again
ana she died soon after. Last night dreamt
was killed in battle. and that mother and
sister came down to meet me-" After
the next battle was over, some one crossing
the field heard a voice that he recognized as
the voice of Tom, the drum ner boy singing
''JesuS. Lover of Ny Soul" But at the eni
of the first verse the VOICE became very
feeble, and at the end of the ssconl verso it
stopped. and they went up and foual Ton,
the drummer boy, leaning against stump
and dead.
That hymn, "Oh, for Thousand Tongues
to Sing" was suggested to Charles Wesley
by Peter Boiler, who, after his conversion.
said. II had better keep silent about it."
No" said Wesley, ''if you had ten thousand
tongues you had better use them for Christ"
And then that angel of hymnology penned
the words:
OBJ for a thousand tongues to sing
NV dear Redeemer's praise,
The glories of my God aud King,
The trumphs of His grace.
Jesus, the name that Gains our fears,
That bids our sorrows cease;
IT'S music in the sinners ears,
Ills life aud health aud peace.
While much of the modern music is a
religious doggerel, a conSecrated nonsense.
sacred tomfooery, would like to see some
great musician OF our time lift the baton and
marshal Luthers Judgment Hymn, Var
mouth, Dundee, Ariel, Brattle Street, Tx
bridge, Pleyeps Hymn. Harwell, Antioch,
Mount Pisgah and Coronation, with few
regiments OF mighty tunes made in our time,
and storm Asia, Africa and America for the
kingdom of God But the first thing to do
is to drive out the dumb devil of the text
from all our churches.
Do not however let us lose ourselves in
generalties. Not one of US but has had our
lives sometimes touched by the evil spirit Of
the text-this awful dumb devil. We had
Inst one opportunity of saying a Christian
word that might have led man or woman
into Christian life. The opportunity was
fairly put before us. The wor1 Of invita-
ton or consolation or warning came to the
inside gate of the mouth, but there it halted.
Some hindering power locked the jaws to-
gether so that they did not open. TIE
tongue lay ia and still in the bottom of the
mouth as though struck with paralysis We
were mute. Though Col had given us the
physiological apparatus for speech, and our
lungs were filled with air which, by the
command of our will, could have made the
laryngeal muscles move an the vocal
organs vibrate, we were wickedly anf
fatally silent. For all time and eternity we
missed cur chance.
Or it was a prayer meeting, and the SER
vice was thrown open for prayer and re-
marks, and there was q dead halt-svery-
thing silent as a graveyard at midnight.
Indeed it was a graveyard and midnight.
An embarrassing pause took place that put
wet blanket on all the meeting. Men. bold
enough on business exchange or in worldly
circles, shut their eyes as though they were
praying in silencs, but they were not pray
ing at all They were busy hoping some
body else would do his duty. The women
flushed under the awful pause and made
their fans more rapidly futter. Some
brotbsr with no cold coughed, by that sound
trying to fill up the time, and the meeting
was slain. But what killel it?-ths dumb
devil.
This is the way account for thu fact that
the stupidest places OIL earth are some
prayer meetings. do not ses how man
keeps any grace if he regularly attends
them They are spiritual refrigerators.
Religion kept on ice. How many Of US hlvs
lost occasions OF usefulness. In a sculptors
studio stool figure OF the god Opportunity.
The sculptor had made the hair fail down
over the face Of the statue so as to complete
ly cover it, and there were wings TO the feet.
When asked why he so represented Oppor-
tunity, the sculptor answered, The face OF
the statue is thus covered up because we do
not recognizs Opportunity when 1t comes.