The Portland daily press., 1892-11-12

fell on top of these SO as to make roof
over him?
A missionary in Jamaica lost his way,
and in the night was wandering about,
and fire. fly flashed and revealed
precipice over which in moment more
he would have been dashed f. W. Rob-
ertson, the great preacher, of Brighton
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 COM
munication with Robertson. That ac-
quain tanceship kept him from joining
the dragons, and going to India ana
spending his life in military service,
and reserved him for the pulpit, the IN
fuence of which for gospelization will re-
sound for all time and all eternity.
Why did not Columbus sink hen 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 Mayhower
from the mouth of the Hudson for
which it was sailing. and sent it ashore
at Cape Cod, no divine supervisal? Does
anarchy rule this world, or God?
st. Felix escaped martyrdom by
crawling through a hole in the wall
across which the spiders Immediately
afterward wove web. His persecu-
tors saw the hole in the wall, but the
spiders web put them off the track. A
boy was lost by his drunken father,
and could not for years find his way
home. Nearly grown, he went into a
Fulton street prayer meeting aud asked
for prayers that he might find his par
ents. His mother was in the room, and
rose and recognized her long lost son.
Do you say that these things ssonly
happened sop Tell that to those who
do not believe in God and have nc
faith in the Bible. Do not tell it to me.
I said to an aged minister of much expe-
rience: 'sAll the events of my life seem
to have been divinely connected. Dc
you suppose it is so in all lives?" He
answered, 'sYes, but most people do not
notice the divine leadings" I 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 a misfortune or a persecu,
ton or a trial or disappointment how.
ever excruciating at the time that God
did not make turn out for my good.
NY one wish is to follow the divine
leading. want to watch the finger OF
God.
Nations also would do well to watch
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 it
would surely be here the following
summer because it was on the way. But
it did not come. The sanitary precau-
tons 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 sum
mer, 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 in this cholera scare, and
that He is pointing this nation to some
thing higher and better. It has
been demonstrated as never before that
we are in the hands of God. He al
lowed the plague to come to our very
gates and then halted it. The quaran-
tine was right and necessary, but oh
how easy the plague could have leaped
the barriers lifted against it. Thanks
to the president of the United States,
and thanks to the health officers, and
hanks 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
anything that has ever yet character
lied us as nation. We ought to quit
our national sins, our Sabbath break
ing, and our drunkenness, and our i'm
purities, and our corruptions of all sorts
as a 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 pros
perities Forward and upward! See
you not the finger of God in this pro-
tecting mercy?
I rejoice that there are many en-
couraging signs for our nation, and one
is that this presidential campaign has
less malignity and abuse than any
presidential campaign since we have
been a nation. Turn over to the pic
torials, and the columns of the political
sheets of the presidential excitements
all the way back and see what con-
tunaely Washington and Jefferson and
Madison and Monroe and jackson went
through Now see the almost entire
absence of all that. The political ora
tors notice this year are apt to begin
by eulogizing the honesty and good in
tentions of the opposing candidate, and
say that he is better than his party.
Instead of vitriol, chamomile flowers
That we seem to have escaped the
degradation of the usual quadrennial
billingsgate is an encouraging fact
Perhaps this betterment may have
somewhat resulted from the sadness
lowering over the home of one of the
candidates, sadness in which the