Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1892-01-14

where some very old people little deaf,
were talking over old times. you will find
that this age does not monopolize all the
young rilscals II may now be hard to get
young people up early enough in the morn
ing, but their grandparents always had to
he, pulled out of bed 1t is wrong now to
play mISchevions tricks on the unsus-
pecting. hut eighty years ago at
school that now venerable man sat
down on crooked pin not acciden
tally placed there, and purposely
drove the sleigh riding party too near the
edge OF the embankment that he might see
how they would look when tumbled into
the snow. And that man who has so little
patience with childish exuberance was in
olden times up 10 pranks, one-half of which
if practiced by the eight-year-old of to-day
would set grandfather and grandmother
crazy Revive your remembrance of what
you were between five and ten years of age,
and with patience capable Of everything
join with the young Put back the shadow
OF the dial not ten degrees. but fifty and
sixty and seventy degrees
Set back your clocks also by entering ON
new and absorbing Christian work In our
desire to inspire the young we have in our
essays had much TO say about what has
been accomplished by the young: of
Romulus who founded Rome when he was
twenty years of age; of Cortes, who had
conquered Mexico at thirty years. of Pitt,
who was prime minister of England at
twenty-four years, of Raphael who died at
thirty seven years. of Calvin, who wrote
his institutes" at twenty-six; of Melanc-
thon. who took learned professors chair
at twenty-one years; of Luther, who had
conquered Germany for the Reformation
by the time he was thirty five years. And
! it, is all very well for us to show how early
in life one can do very great things for God
and the welfare Of the world, but some of
the mightiest work for God has been done
by septuagenarians and octogenarians and
nonagenarians Indeed. there is work
which none but such can do. They pre-
serve the equipoise Of senates of religious
denominations of reformatory movements.
| Young men for action, old men for coun-
sci. Instead Of any of you beginning to
! fold up your energies, arouse anew your
energies, With the experience you have
obtained and the opportunities OF observa-
ton you have had during long life. you
ought to be able to do in one year now
more than you did in ten years right after
| you had passed ont Of your teens Physical
power less, your spiritual power ought TO
be more Up to the last hour of their lives
what power for good old DR. Archibald
Alexander, old DR. Woods old DR.. Halves,
old DR.. Minor, old DR. McIlyaine, old DIR.
| Tying. old DR. Candlsh. old DR. Chalmersl
What have been Bismarck TO Germany.
and Gladstone to England and Oliver
Wendell Holmes to America in the time Of
an advanced agei Let me say to those in
the afternoon of life; Don't be putting of
the harness; when God wants il off he will
take it off. Don't be frightened out Of
life by the grip as many are. At the first
sneeze Of an influenza many give up all as
lost. No new terror has come on the earth
The microbes as the cause of disease were
described in the Talmud seventeen hun
dred years ago as invisible legions of dan
gerous ones" Don't he scared out of life
by all this talk about heart failure. That
trouble has always been in the world
That is what all the people that ever
passed out Of this life have died of-heart
failure. Adam had it and all of his de-
scendants have had it or will have it, Do
not be watching for symptoms or you will
have symptoms of everything Some Of
you will yet die Of symptoms. Symptoms
are often only what we sometimes see in
the country-a dead owl nailed on a barn
door to scare living owls. Put your trust
in God. go TO bed at ten o'clock, have the
window open six inches to let in the fresh
air. sleep on your right side, and fear moth
ing The old maxim was right, Get thy
spindle and distaf ready, and God viii
send the flax"
~ SEE THE SHADOW MOVE"
But while looking at this sundial of
Ahaz and see the shadow OF il move, ! no
tice that it went back toward the sunrise
instead of forward toward the sunset--to-
ward the morning instead of toward the
night. That thing the world is willing
now to do, and in many cases has done.
There have great many things been writ
ten and spoken about the sunset of life. |
have said some Of them myself. But my
text suggests better idea The Lord who
turned back that day from going toward
shutdown and started it toward sunrise is |
willing to do the same thing for all of us. !
The theologians who stick to old religious
technictlities until they become soporifcs |
would not call it anything but conversion. |
| call it n change from going toward sun
down to going toward sunrise. That man
who never tries TO unbuckle the clasp of
evil habit and who keeps all the sins of the
past and the present freighting him and
who ignores the one redemption made by
the only one who could redeem, if that man
will examine the sundial he will find that
the shadow is going forward and he is on
the way to shutdown. His day is on the
road to night All the watches that tick,
all the clocks that strike. all the sand
glasses that empty themselves, all the
shadows that move on all the sundials in
dictate the approach of darkness But now,
in answer to prayer, as in my text the
change was in answer to prayer. the par
doning Lord reverses things and the man
starts toward sunrise instead of sunset.
He turns the other way. The captain of
salvation gives him the military command,
Attention. Right about FACET He was
marching toward indifference. marching
toward hardness of heart, marching tor
ward prayerlessness, marching toward sin,
marching toward gloom, marching toward
death. Now he turns and marches toward
peace. marches toward light and marches
toward comfort and marches toward high