The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1892-06-16

through bright air a voice drops
from afar, sayl g: up and down this
sapphire floor pace, to teach men that,
like me, they are passing away. L
gather up the waters from lake
and sea, and then, when the
thunders toll, refresh the
| earth, making the dry ground to
laugh with harvests of wheat and fields
of corn. / catch the frown of the storm
and the hues of the rainbow. At even=
/ ing tide on thy western slopes l will
pitch my tent, and over me shall dash
the saffron and the purple and the fire
| of the sunset. A pillar of cloud like me
led the chosen across the desert, and
surrounded by such as l the Judge of
| Heaven and earth will at last descend,
for Behold He cometh with cloudsn"
Oh, my friends, if everything in the in
animate world be useful, let us immor-
tai men and women be useful, and, in
| that respect, be like the palm tree. But
| mnst not be tempted by what David
| says of that green shaft of Palestine,
that living and glorious pillar in the
eastern gardens, as seen in olden times
| the palm tree; l must not be tempted
by what the Old Testament says OF it,
to lessen my emphasis of what John,
the evangelist, says of 1t in my text.
Notice that 1t was beautiful and
lawful robbery of the palm three that
helped make up Christ's triumph on the
road to Jerusalem that Palm Sunday.
| The long, broad, green leaves that were
| strewn under the feet of the colt and in
the way of Christ. were torn off from
the trees. What a pity, some one might
say, that those stately and graceful
trees should be despoiled. The sap
oozed out at the places where the
branches broke. The glory of the
palm tree was appropriately sacrificed
for the Saviour's triumphal procession.
SO 1t always was, SO it always will be
in this world-1io worthy triumph of
any sort without the tearing down of
something else. Brooklyn bridge, the
glory of our continent, must have two
architects Frustrated, the one slain by
his tolls and the other for a life time
invaded. The greatest pictures of the
world had in their richest coloring0 the
blood of the artists who made them.
The mightiest Oratorios that ever rolled
through the churches had, in their
pathos, the signs and groahs of the
composers, who wore their lives out in
writing the harmony. American indie
pendehce was triumphant, but if moved
on over the lifeless forms of tens of
thousand of men who fell at Bunker
| Hill and Yorktown and the battles be-
tween, which were the hemorrhages of
the nation. The Kingdom of God adj
vances in all the earth, but it must be
over the lives of missionaries who die of
malaria in the jungles, of Christian work
ers who preach and pray and toll and
die in the service. The Saviour tri-
umphs in all directions-but beauty and
strength must be torn down from the
palm trees of Christian heroism and
conservation and thrown in His path
| way. To what better use could
those palm. trees on the southern
shoulder of Mount Olivet, and clear
down into the valley of Gethsemane,
put their branches than to surrender
them for the making of Christ's jour
ney toward Jerusalem the more pictur-
esque, the more memorable, and the
more triumphant? And to what better
use could we put our lives than into the
sacrifice for Christ and lis cause and
the happiness of our fellow-creatures?
Shall we not be willing to be torn down
that righteous shall have triumphant
way? Christ was torn down for us.
Can we not afford to be torn down for
Him? If Christ could suffer so much for
us, can we not sitter little for Christ?
If we can afford on Palm Sunday to
travel to Jerusalem to carry a cross
can we not afford a few leaves from
our branches to make emerald His way?
The process is going on every moment
in all directions. What makes that
father have such hard work to find the
hymn to-day? He puts on his spectacles
and holds the book close up, and then
holds it far off, and is not quite sure
whether the number is $50 or 100. and
the fingers with which he turns the
leaves are very clumsy. He stoops a
good deal, although once he was straight
as an arrow and his eyes were as keen
as hawks, and the hand he offered to
his bride on the marriage day was of
goodly shape and as God made it. l will
tell you what is the matter. Forty years
ago he resolved his family should have
no need and his children should be well
educated and suffer none of the disad-
vantages of lack of schooling from which
he had suffered for lifetime, and that
the wolf of hunger should never put it's
paw on his door-sill, and for forty or
fifty years he had been tearing off from
the palm tree of his physical strength
and manly form branches to throw
in the pathway of his household 1t
has cost him muscle, and brain, and
health, and eyesight, and there have
been twisted off more years from his
life than any man in the crowd on the
famous Palm Sunday twisted of
branches from the palm trees on the
road from Bethpage to Jerusalem.
What makes the mother look older than
she really is? You say she ought not
yet to have one gray line in her hair.
The truth is, the family was not al
ways as well off as now. The married
pair had a hard struggle at the start.
Examine the tips of the forefnger and
thumb of her right hand, they will tell
| Won the StoTU of tho raaJln +Ia4 -.