The Portland daily press., 1892-12-24

7 NV
know where our own world is. bounded
on all sides by realms OF glory, IN
stead Of being where Heslod IN his
poetry described it to be-namely, half
way between heaven and hell, an anvil
hurled out of heaven, taking ten days to
strike the earth, and hurled out of earth,
taking ten more days to strike perdltlon:
From the high heaven a brazen anvil cast,
Nine days and nights in rapid whirls woula
And reach the earth the tenth; whence strongly
hurled,
The same the passage to tn Internal world.
thank God that we have found out
that our world is not half way between
heaven and hell, bat is in slsterhood
of light, and that this sisterhood joins
all the other sisterhoods Of worlds, NOV
ing round some great homestead, which
is no doubt heaven, where God is and
our departed Christian friends are, and
we ourselves through pardoning mercy
expect to become permanent residents.
FurthermoreaI.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 i think l
have found the reason. To keep the
universe loyal to Holy God, it was i'm
portant in some gworld 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,
followed by murder, pain, theft, fraud,
impurity, falsehood, massacre, war and
all the denominations and horrors and
agonies of centuries. Although we know
comparatively little about the other
worlds lest we become completely dis
satisfied with our own, no doubt the
other worlds have heard and are now
hearing all about this world in the aw-
| full experiment. of sin which the human
race has been making.
| In some way interstellar communica-
tion is open, and all worlds, either by
wing of flying spirits or by direct COM
munication fromtG God, are learning that
disloyalty and .disobedience doom and
damn everything they touch, and the
spectacle practically says to all other
worlds: "Obey God, keep holy and stay
in the orbit where you were intended to
swing, or you will suffer that which that
recreant world out yonder has been suf-
fering for thousands of years" 1t is no
longer to me a mystery why SO small a
world as ours was chosen for the trag-
edy. A chemist can demonstrate all the
laws of earth and heaven in a small
laboratory, ten feet by five, and our
world was not too small to demonstrate
to the universe the awful chemistry OF
unrighteousness, its explosive and irving
and consuming power.
/ do not believe that there is a world
that has been in existence from the
time when Copernicus the astronomer
knocked on the door of heaven, to the
world that last week came within sight
of the observatory at Greenwich, but
| has heard of our terrific terrestrial exper
iment, and the awful object lesson has
thrilled the multimillions of stellar pop
ulation, especially when they heard that
in order to arrest the disaster of centuries
the World Maker and the World Starter
| and the World Upholder must give up
his only Son to assassination to expiate
and restore and save the victims of the
| planetary shipwreck.
THE TOWER OF PHAROs.
On the tower of Pharos, Egypt, a me-
tallic mirror WAS raised which reflected
all that occurred both on land and sea
for distance of three hundred miles,
and so Egypt was informed of the COM
| ing of her enemies long before their ar
rival. By what process I know not, but
in some way this ship of struggling
earth, l think, is mirrored to distant
worlds. Surely this one experiment of
world unloosing itself from God will
be enough for all worlds and all eter-
mites.
But notice that as other worlds rolled
into the first book Of the Bible, the
book of Genesis, they also appear in
the last book of the Bible, the book of
Revelation. They will take part in the
scenes of that occasion, which shall be
the earth's winding up and tremen-
dous occasion for you and me person
ally. Ny father was on the turnpike
road between Trenton and Bound
Brook, New Jersey. He was coming
through the night from the legislative
halls, where he was serving his state, to
his home, where there was sickness.
often heard him tell about it, It was
the night of the 18th and the morning of
the 18th Of November, 1888.
The sky was scloudlessg and the air
clear. Suddenly the whole heavens be-
came scene 1never to be forgotten.
From the constellation Leo nleteors be-
ganrto shoot out in all directions. For
the two hours between four and six in
the morning it was estimated that a
thousand meteors minute flashed and
expired. 1t grew lighter than monday.
Arrows of fire. Balls of fire. Trails of
fire. Showers of fire. Some Of the ap-
pearances We're larger than the full
| moon. All around the heavens explo-