Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1892-10-24

OdIOilIld
chief production. Can you not see the
finger of God in that incident? Rev.
John Fletcher, of England, many will
know, was one of the useful ministers
of the Gospel who ever preached. Be-
fore conversion he joined the army and
had bought his ticket on the ship for
South America The morning he was
to sail some one spilled ON him a kettle
of water, and he was SO scalded he could
not go. He was very much disappoint-
ed, but the ship he was going to sail on
went out and was never heard of again.
Who can doubt that God was arranging
the life Of John Fletcher? Was it
merely accidental that Richard Rodda,
a Cornish miner. who was on his knees
praying, remained unhurt. though heavy
stones fell before him and behind him,
and on either side of him, and another
fell on TOP of these SO Us to make a roof
over him?
A missionary in Jamaica lost his way,
and in the night was wandering about,
when a FREELY flashed and revealed
precipice over which in moment more
he would have been dashed. F. W.
Robertson, the great preacher of Brigh
ton, England, had his life work decided
by the barking of his dog. A neighbor
whose daughter was i'll was disturbed
by the barking Of that dog one night.
This brought the neighbor into commu-
nication with Robertson. That acquaint-
anceship kept him from joining the
dragons and going to India and spend
ing his life in military service, and re-
e., hit 1,a inf, r.
which for Gospeljzation will resound for
all time and all eternity.
Why did not Columbus sink when in
early manhood he was afioat six miles
from the beach with nothing to sustain
him till he could swim to land but
boats oar? [ wonder if his preservation
had anything to do with America? Had
the storm that diverted the Mayfower
from the mouth of the Hudson for which
it was sailing and sent it ashore at Cape
Cod no divine supervisal? Does an
archy rule this world, or God?
st. Felix escaped martyrdom by crawl
ing through hole in the wall across
which the spiders Immediately afterward
wove a web. His prosecutors saw the
hole in the wall, but the spiders web
by his drunken father and could not for
years find his way home. Nearly grown
he went into q Fulton street prayer
meeting and asked for prayers that he
might find his parents. His mother was
in the room and rose and recognized l-e3'
long lost son. Do you say that these
things 'Eonly happened so?" Tell that to
those who do not believe in a God, and
have no faith in the Bible. Do not tell
it to me. | said to an aged minister Of
much experience: ''All the events of my
life seem to have been divinely con-
nected. Do you suppose it is so in all
lives?' He answered, Eyes, but most
people do not notice the divine leadings.'
l stand here this morning to say from
my own experience that the safest thing
in all the world to do is to trust the
Lord. [ never had misfortune or a
persecution or trial or a disappoint-
ment, however excruciating at the time.
that God did not make turn out for my
good. My one wish is to follow the
divine leading. want to watch the
finger of God.
A NATIONAL APPLICATION.
Nations also would do well to waloh
for the finger of God. What does the
cholera scare in America mean? Some
say it means that the plague will SWEEP,
our land next summer. do not believe
a word of it, There will be no cholera
here next summer. Four or five sum
mers ago there were those who said l.
would surely be here the following sum
mer because it was on the way. But it
did not come. The sanitary precautions
established here will make next summer
unusually healthful. Cholera never
starts from where it stopped the season
before. but always starts in the filth Of
Asia, and if it starts next summer it
will start there again-it will not start
from New York quarantine. But it is
evident to me that the finger of God is IL
this cholera scare, and that he is point
ing this nation to something higher and
better 1t has been demonstrated as never
before that we are in the hands of God
He allowed the plague to come to our
very gates, and then halted it. The
quarantine was right and necessary, but
oh, how easily the plague could have
leaped the barriers lifted against i'll
Thanks to the president of the United
States, and thanks to the health officers,
and thanks to the Thirteenth regiment,
and thanks to all who stood between this
evil and our national health, but more
than all and higher than all thanks to
God! Out of that solemnity we ought
to pass up to something better than any
thing that has ever yet characterized us
as nation. We ought to quit our ma
tional sins, our Sabbath breaking, and
our drunkenness, and our impurities, and
our corruptions of all sorts as people.
The tendency is in self graduation at our
prosperity to forget the mercy of God
that has kept us from being blotted out
for our crimes, and that still multiplies
our temporal properties. Forward and
upward See you not the finger of God
in this protecting mercy?