Orange County observer. [volume] (Hillsborough, N.C.) 1880-1918, 1892-06-04

III yOAA hhoNA&Ct . III RiIlo"s AZ
of the Christ, who for you went through
the agonies OF assassination on the rocky
bluff back5of Jerusalem. you dared not face
a sickly joke. Better load up with q few
questions SO that next time you will be
ready.
Say to the ~scoffer: MY dear sir, will you
tell me what makes the difference between
the condition OF woman in China and the
United States: What do you think Of the
sermon on the mount. How do you like the
golden rule laid down in tina Scrintrraes Arm
you IN favor or the ten commandments. In
your large and extensive reading have you
come across a loueiier character than Jesus
Christ? VIII you please to name the triun n
plant deathbeds OF infidels and atheists.
How do you account for the fact that among
we're such persons as BENJAMIN Franklin
Macaulay. William Penn, Walter Scott,
Charles Kingsley, Horace Bushnell, James
A. Garfield. Robert r. Lee, S~tonewall Jack
son, Admiral Foote, Admiral Farragut,
Ulysses S. Grant, John Milton, William
Shakespeare Chief Justice Marshall, John
Adams Daniel Webster. George Washing
toni How do You account for their fondness
for the Christian religion Among the in
Vulnerable colleges and universities OF the
earrn Will you name me three started by
infldels and now supported by infidelss
Down in your hoart are you really happy in
the position you occupy antagouistic to the
Christian religion When do you have the
most rapturous views OF the next worlds
10 at him with a few such questions and
he will &c: SO red in the face as TO suggest
apoplexy. AMI he will look at his watch and
saV he has an engagement and must 90.
You Will put hum In a sweat that will beat a
Turkish BATH. You will put him
on a reut compared with which our
troops at Bull Run made no time
at all. Arm yourself, no with argu-
ments but interrogation points, and | promise
you victory. Shall sucn a man as you, shall
such a woman as you surrender to one OF the
meanest spirits that ever smoked up from
the pit--the dumb devil spoken of in the
text
ticular spirit that Christ exercised when He
said. II charge thee to come out Of him."
takes people by the Wholesale. In the most
responsive religious audience have you no.
ticed how many people never sing at all?
They have a book, and thew have a voice,
and they know how to read. They know
many OF the tunes. and vet are silent while
the great rapuures or music pass py. Among
those who sing not one out OF a hundred
sings loud enough to hear his own voice.
They hum it. They give q sort Of religious
grunt. They make the lips go, but it is in
audible. With a voice strong enough to stop
a street car one block away, all they can af-
lOI III tIC IL u IVA IL 1hA O
whisper. With enough sopranos, enough
altos, enough bassOs to make a small heaven
between the four walls, they let the oppor-
tunity 60 by unimproved.
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 the
hymn; the organ begins; the choir or pre-
centor leads; the audience are standing SO
that the lungs may have full expansion, and
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-half the audience and the
| other wing over the lips or the other half of
the audience, and the voices roll back into
the threats from which they started, and
only here aud there anything is heard, and
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 l 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
spread abroad to bless neighborhoods and
cities, and then mount the wide open heav-
ems" Give the long meter doxologv 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 III, the starving people uQnOOkeO 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
aow." When Commodore Perry, with his
warship, the Mississippi. lay Oft the coast OF
Japan. he bombarde1 the shores with "Old
Hundred played by the marine band.
J Glorious "Old Hundred, composed by Will
lam Franc, of Germany. In a war prison.
at ten o'clock at night, the poor fellows far
from nome and wounded and sick and dy-
ing, one prisoner started the 'Old Hundred
Doxology," and then a 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 a foreign
coast, heard a voice singing that doxology,
and Immediately guessed, and guessed
Alright, that there was an Englishman iu
captivity to the Nohammedans; and In the
small boats the sailors rowed to shore anC
burst into d gaurl-hou-e and sat the captive
free. dom know what tune the trumpets
of resurrection shall play. but 1t may be the
doxology which is now sounding across
Christendom. How much more hearty W.
would be in our songs, and how easily w
could drive back the dumb devil from all oul
worshiping ~assemblages. if we could realize
that nearly all our hymns have a stirring his
tory.
lnaC glorious HSulI .cLduu Up tOi
Jesus" was suggested 10y the last words d
Dudley Tying, who was dying from having
his right arm torn OIL in a thrashing ma
chine. That hymn. What q Friend w
Have in Jesus" heard through q telephone
converted an obturate soul. 'Shal. w
Gather at the River" was a hymn first sun:
in our Brooklyn Prospect Park. at the chill
dren's May anniversary. and then started
to encircie the world. Where Is My War
dering Boy Tonight" is a song that ha
saved hundreds Of dissipated young men.
Tom, the drummer boy in the army, wa
found frying, anu an officer asked him VIVA
was the matter! Oh he said, Il had
dream lasc-night. Ny sister died ten year
ago, and my mother never was herself agai
and she died soon after. Last night | dream
was killed in battle. and that mother an
sister came down 20 meet me-" -Afre
the next battle was over, some one crosSln
the field heard Il Voice that he recognized a
the voice OF Tom, the boy. singing
Jesus, Lover o, Ny Soul Blu, at the en-
NJ the first versa tSe voice became yer
feeble, and at the end Of the saconl verse i
stopped, and they went up and fount Tom
the drumme boy, leaning against a STUN:
and dead