Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1892-01-21

echo shall come back TO him in five ruined
lifetimes and five destroyed eternities.
You see the Echoes are an octave lower than
he anticipated On the other hand, some
rainy day, when there are hardly any Gus
toners, the Christian merchant comes out
from his counting room and stands among
the young men who have nothing to do,
and says: well, boys, this is n dull day,
| but it will clear off after awhile. There
are good many ups and downs in bust
ness, but there is an overruling Provi-
dence.
Years ago made up my mind to trust
Hod and he has always seen me through.
| remember when | was your age, had
Just come to town and the temptations Of
city life gathered around me, but resisted.
The fact is there were two old folks out on
the old farm praying for me and | knew
it, and somehow could not do as some of
the clerks did or go where some of the
/ clerks went. tell you, boys. it is best al
ways to do right, and there Is nothing to
keep one right like the old fashioned re-
ligon of Jesus Christ. John, where did
you go to church last Sunday? Henry, how
is the Young Mems Christian association
prospering"
About noon the rain ceases and the sun
comes outNnd the clerks go to their places,
and they say within themselves: WELL he
is u successful merchant and | guess he
knows what he is talking about, and the
Christian religion must be n good thing
God knows want some help in this battle
with temptation and sin" The successful
merchant who uttered the kind words did
not know how much good he was doing
but the Echo will come back in five life
tines of virtue and usefulness and five
Christian dCathbeds and five heavens
From all the mountains Of rapture and all
the mountains of glory and all tho noun
tains Of eternity, he will catch what Eze-
kiel in my text styles 1.-The sounding again
of the mountains"
TINES pOINGs ECHOED N ETERNITY.
Yea, | take step further in this subject
and say that our own eternity will be
reverberation Of our own earthly lifetime.
What we are here we will be there, only
on II larger scale. Dissolution will tear
down the body and embank it, but our
faculties Of mind and soul will 90 right on
without the hesitancy of a moment and
without any change except enlargement
and ntensilcation. There will be no more
difference than between lion behind the
iron bars and lion escaped into the field,
between all eagle in a cage and an eagle IN
the sky. Good here, good there; bad here,
bad there Time is only u bedWarfcd eter-
nifty. Eternity is only an enlarged time.
In this life our soul is in dry dock. The
moment we leave this life we are launched
for our great voyage, and we sail on for
centuries quintilion, but tho ship does not
change it's fundamental structure after it
gets ont OF the dry dock, it does not
pass from brig to schooner or from schoon
er to man-of-war. What we are when
launched from this world we will be in
the world to come Oh, God! by thy con
verting and sanctifying spirit make us
right here and now .hat we may he right
forever
well" says some one this idea of
moral, spiritual and eternal Echo is new
to me. Is there not some way Of stopping
this Echo?" My answer is, God can and
he only" If it is II cheerful Echo we do
not want it stopped; if Il baleful Echo we
would like to have it stopped. Tie hard
est thing in this world to do is to stop an
Echo. Many an Grafton has been spoiled
and many nu orator COMPOUNDED by an
Echo. Costly churches, cathedrals, thea
tcrs and music hall, have been ruined by
an Echo Architects have strung wires
across aUditoriums t. arrest the Echo, AMI
hung upholstery against the walls. hoping
to entrap it, and hundreds of thousands Of
dollars have been expended in public
buildings Of this country to keep the air
from answering when it ought to be quiet
| Aristotle and Pythagoras and Isaac New
ton and La Place and our own Joseph Hen
ry tried to hunt down the Echo, but still
the UNEMPLOYED realms of acoustics are
J larger than the explored. When our first
Brooklyn Tabernacle was being construct
ed, we were told by architects that il was
/, of such a shape that the human voice
could not be heard in it, or, if heard, it
| would be tangled into Echoes
In state of worrment went to Joseph
l Henry, the president of the Smithsonian
institution at Washington, and told him of
this evil prophecy, and lie replied 81 have
. probably experimental more with the laws
, of sound than any other man, and | have
t got as far rs this, Two buildings may
G seem to be exactly alike and yet in one the
acoustics may be good and in the other
t bad Go on with your church building
: and trust that all will be we'll" And all
5 was yell Oh, this mighty law of sound
t Oh this subtle Echo! There is only one
8 being in the universe who thoroughly UNI
f derstands 1.-THE sounding again of tho
: mountains"
ETERNAL MORAL CONSEQUENCES.
c And if it is 50 hard to destroy natural
$ Echo, how much harder to stop moral
Echo, a spiritual Echo, an immortal Echo
: You know that the Echoes are affected by
e the surfaces, and the shape Of rocks, anc
e the depth Of ravines, and the relative posi-
/ ton of buildings? And once in HEAVIER
c God will so arrange the relative position
n of mansions ana temples and thrones that
G one of the everlasting charms OF HEAVIER
will be the rolling, bursting, ascending
t descending, chanting Echoes. All The
: songs we ever sang devoutly, all the pray
9 ers we have ever uttered earnestly, all the
n Christian deeds we have ever done will b.
. waiting to spring upon us in Echo
G The scientists tell us that in this worlc
n the roar OF artillery and the boom of the
6 thunder are SO loud, because they are ;
G combination Of Echoes-all the hillsides
# and the caverus and the walls furnishing
share of the resonance And never will WI
= understand the full power aud music of al
Il Echo until with supernatural facultie
G able TO endure them we hear all the con
Il joined sounds of heavenly Echoes-hnrp
y and trumpets, orchestras and oratoros
n hosannahs and hallelujahs, east side o