Democratic messenger., 1892-12-24

covered with light: What is the use
of light if there are no eyes of inhabit-
ants to enjoy and employ that light:
OTHER WORLDS THAN OURS.
l admit that scientific exploration has
discovered that around many worlds
there is an atmosphere in which lungs
like ours could not breathe. and there
are heats or colds that physique like
ours could not endure. But do you
suppose that we have the only kind Of
lungs that God can make? Do our
bodies exhaust divine ingenuity, and
must he make all intelligent creatures
with our respiration or pulsation o.
mastication or digestion or habitude, or
not make them mt all: Because organ
isms like ours cannot live in Mercury or
Saturn or Jupiter or the sun we have no
right to conclude that those globes are
lifeless
Without any telescope and without
any observatory and without any astro-
nomical calculation, l know that the
other worlds are inhabited, because my
Bible and my common sense tell Inc so.
IL has been estimated that in the worlds
belonging to our solar system there is
room for at least twenty-five trillion of
population. And | believe it is all oc-
cnpied or will be occupied by intelligent
beings. God will not fill them with
brutes. He would certainly put into
those worlds beings intelligent enough
TO appreciate the architecture, the color
ing, the grandeur, the beauty, the har-
mony of their surroundings.
Yea. the inhabitants Of those worlds
have capacity of locomotion like ours,
for they would not have had such spa
cious opportunity for movement if they
had not powers Of motion. Yea, they
have sight. else why the light and hear
ing; else how get on with necessary Ian
guage and how clear themselves from
advancing perils: Yea, as God made our
human race in his own image he prob
ably made the inhabitants of other worlds
III his own iinage-in other words, il is
as near demonstration as / care to have
it, that while the inhabitants of other
worlds have adaptations of bodily struc-
ture to the particular climate in which
- NCt vi
mental and spiritual characteristics
among all the inhabitants of the uni
verse of God, and made in his image
they are made wonderfully alike.
Now what should he the practical re-
suit of this discussion founded on Scrip
ture and common sense: 1t is first of all
TO enlarge our ideas of God and SO in
tensify our admiration and worship.
Under Such consideration how mach
more graphic the Bible question, which
seems To roll back the sleeve of the AL
mighty and say. Hast thou an arm like
God:" The contemplation also en-
courages us with tine thought that If God
made all these worlds and populated
them it will not b, very much of an un-
dertaking for him TO make our little
world over again and reconstruct the
character of its populations as by grace
they are to he reconstructed.
SCIENCE AND REVELATION.
What Il monstrosity Of ignorance that
the majorit. of Christian people listen
not 10 the voices of other worlds, al
though the book says. 1.-The heavens de-
clare the glory of God, and again, The
works Of the Lord are great and to be
sought out" How much have you sought
them cut! You have been satisfying
yourself with some things about Christ,
but have yen noticed that Paul calls you
10 consider Christ rs the creator of other
worlds. "by whom also he made the
worlds"
Ii is time you Christians start on a
world hunt. That is the chief reason
why God makes the night-that you NAV
see other worlds. Go out tonight and
look up at the great clock of the heavens.
Listen TO the silvery chime of the mid
night sky. See that your children and
grandchildren mount the heavens with
telescope for alpenstock. leaping from
acclivity of light to acclivity of light.
What beautiful and sublime thing
that John Quincy Adams, the ex-presi-
dent, borne down with years undertook
st the peril of his life the journey from
Washington to Cincinnati that he might
lay the cornerstone of the pier Of the
great refractins telescope and there
making his last Grafton.
What service for all mankind when
in 1899 Lord Rosse lifted ON the lawn of
his castle. eighty miles from Dublin.
telescope that revealed worlds as fast as
they could roll in, and that started an
enthusiasm which this moment concen-
ters the eyes of many of the most de-
vout in all parts of the earth on celestial
discovery. Thank God that we now
know where our own world is. bounded
on all sides by realms of glory, in
stead of being where Hesiod in his
poetry described il to be-namely. half
way between heaven and hell, an anvil
hurled out of heaven. taking ten days TO
strike the earth. and hurled ont of earth,
taking ten more days to strike perdition:
From the high heaven n brazen anvil cast.
Nine days and nights in rapid whirls would
last
And reach the earth the tenth; whence strongly
hurled.
The same the passage 10 tn Internal world.
thank God that we have found ont
that our world is not half way between
heaven and hell, but is in sisterhood
of light. and that this sisterhood joins
all the other sisterhoOds of worlds, NOV
ing round some great homestead, which
is no doub. heaven, where God is and
our departed Christian friends are. and
we ourselves through pardoning mercy
expect to become permanent residents.
Furthermore. get now from all this
an answer to the question which every
intelligent man and woman since the
earth has stood has asked and received
no answer-why did God let sin and
sorrow come into the world when he
could have prevented them from com
ing? | wish reverently to say think !
have found the reason. To keep the
universe loyal to Holy God, it was i'm
portant in some world somewhere TO
demonstrate the gigantic disasters that
would come upon any world that allow
ed sin to enter. Which world should it
be? Well. the smaller the world the bet
ter. for less numbers would suffer. So
our world was selected. The stage was
plenty large enough for the enactment
of the tragedy. Enter on the stage sin.