The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1892-09-14

| scrutiny. our 1eet are not always In
the paths of God Sometimes in paths
of worldliness Our feet a divine and
glorious machinery for usefulness and
work, so often making missteps, so
often going in the wrong direction. God
God knowing every step, the patriarch
saying: Thou settest print on the
heels of my feet" Crimes of the hand,
crimes of the tongue, crimes of the eye,
crimes of the ear not worse than crimes
of the foot o, we want the wings of
humility to cover the feet. Ought we
not to go into self-abnegation before
the all-searching, all-scrutinizing, all
trying eye of God? The seraphs do.
How much more we. with twain he
covered the feet"
All this talk about the dignity of hui
man nature is braggadocio and sin.
Our nature started at the hand of God
regal, but it has been pauperized. There
is well in Belgium which once had
very pure water, and it was stoutly
masoned with stone and brick; but that
well afterward became the center of the
battle of Waterloo. At the opening of
the battle the soldiers with their sabers
compelled the gardener, William Won
Kylsom, to draw water out of the well
for them, and it was very pure water
But the battle ragged, and three hun
bred dead and half dead were flung into
the well for quick and easy burial, SO
that the well of refreshment became
the well of death, and long after, peo-
pie looked down into the well, and they
saw the bleached skulls but no water.
So the human soul was well of good,
but the armies of sin have fought
around it, and fought across it and been
slain, and it has become well of skel-
etons. Dead hopes, dead resolutions,
dead opportunities, dead ambitions. An
abandoned well; unless Christ shall re-
open and purify and fill it as the well
of Belgium never was. Unclean, I'M
clean.
Another seraphic posture in the text:
"With twain He covered the face" That
means reverence Godward. Never SC
much irreverence abroad in the world
as to-day. You see it in the defaced
statuary, in the cutting out of figures
from fine paintings, in the chipping OF
monuments for memento in the fact
that military guard must stand at the
grave of Grant and Garfield, and that
old shade trees must be cut down for
frewood, though fifty George Morr.ses
beg the woodmen to spare the tree, and
that calls a corpse a cadaver, and that
speaks of death as going over to the ma
jority, and substitutes for the reverent
terms father and mother, 'the old man
and 1.-The old woman" and finds moth
ing impressive in the ruins of Baalbel
or the columns of Karnac, and see nc
difference in the Sabbath from other
days, except it allows more dissipation
and reads the Bible in what is called
higher criticism, making it not The
Word of God, but good book with
some fine things in it. Irrevercnce new
err so much abroad. how many take the
name of God in vain, how many trivia
things said about the Almighty. No
: willing to have God in the world
they roll up an idea of sentiment
atty and humanitarianism and i'm
pudence and imbecility, and call it God
/ No wings of reverence over the face
no taking off of shoes on holy ground
You can tell from the way they tall
they could have made better worlt
: than this, and that the God of the Bibl
l shocks every sense of propriety. The,
talk of the love of God in a way tina
/ shows you they believe it does not max
any diff erence how bad man is here
he will come in at the shining gate
They talk of the love of God in such
way which shows you they think it is
' general Jail delivery for all the aban
: doned and the scoundrelism of the uni
verse, No punishment hereafter 10
} any wrong done here.
5 The Bible gives us two descriptions O
, God, and they are just opposite, an,
5 they are both true. In one place tn
} Bible says God is love. In anothe
: place the Bible says God is consumin,
5 fire. The explanation is pla in as plail
{ can be. God through Christ is love
) God out of Christ is fire. To win tn
} one and escape the other we have onl
to throw ourselves body, mind and sou
t into Christs keeping. NO" say
| Irreverence, 81 want no atonement,
, want no pardon, l want no interver
S ton; will go up and face God, and
l will challenge Him, and / will def
| Ill.,, / III osl- l. .
S to do with me" So the finite confront
S the infinite, so tack hammer tries {
4 break a thunderbolt, so the breath c
Q human nostrils defies the everlastin
e God, while the hierarchs of Heaven DO,
: the head and bend the knee as tn
/ Kings chariot goes by, and the arct
!, angel turns away because he cannc
: endure the splendor, and the chorus {
o all the empires of Heaven comes in wit
full diapason, "holy, holy, holym
e Reverence for sham, reverence for tn
S old merely because it is old, reverend
e for stupidity however learned, revel
' ence for incapacity however finely il
S augurated, have none But we war
: more reveren nee for God, more reverend
: for the sacraments, more reverence fc
. the Bible, more reverence for the pur,
. more reverence for the good. Reverend
= a characteristic of all great nature
: You hear it in the + oil of the master O
: atorios. You see it in the Raphaels an
r Titians and Ghirla ndiios. You stud
t it in the architecture of the Aholial
It and Christopher Wrens. Do not be Hi
l. pant about God. Do not joke abo,
S dnnth Ia not mn lrn fun Of thn pin