Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1893-12-18

ties for usefulness.
Who built the pyramids? The king
who ordered them built? No; the plain
workmep who added stone after stone
and stone after stone. Who built the
dikes of Holland? The government that
ordered the enterprise? No; the plain
workmen who carried the earth and rang
their trowels on the wall. Who are those
that built these vast cities? The capital
lists? No; the carpenters, the masons,
the plumbers, the plasterers, the timers,
the roofers, dependent on days wages
for a livelihood. And so in the great
work of assuaging human suffering and
enlightening human ignorance and halt
ing human iniquity. In that great work,
the chief part is to be done by ordinary
men, with ordinary speech, in an ordinary
manner, and by ordinary means.
The trouble is that in the army OF
Christ we all want to be captains and
colonies and brigai.ier generals. We are
not willing to march with the rank and
file and do duty with the private soldier.
We want to belong to the reserve corps
and read about the battle while warming
ourselves at the campires or on fur
Tough at home, our feet upon an otto
man, we sagging back into an armchair
AS you go down the street you see an
excavation, and four or five men are
working and perhaps 90 Or 80 leaning on
the rail looking over at them. That is
the way it is in the church of God to-
day. Where you find one Christian hard
at work, there are so men watching the
job.
Oh! my friends, why do you not go to
work and preach the gospel? You say,
ST have no pulpit" You have. 1t may
be the carpenters bench, it may be the
mason's wall. The robe in which you
are to proclaim this gospel may be
shoemaker's apron. But woe unto you
if you preach not this gospel somewhere,
somehow! If this world is ever brought
to Christ it will be through the unani-
NOUS and long continued efforts of men
who, waiting for no special endowment,
consecrate to God what they have.
Among the most useless people in the
world are men with 10 talents, while
many one with only two talents, or no
talent at ali, is doing a great work, and
SO ''the lame take the prey"
There are thousands of ministers of
whom you have never heard-in log
cabins at the west, in mission chapels at
the east-who are warning against the
1egions of darkness, successfully war
ring. Tract distributors, month by
month undermining the citadels of sin.
You do not know their going or their
coming, but the footballs of their minis
try are heard in the palaces of heaven.
Who are the workers in our Sabbath
schools throughout this land today? Men
celebrated, men brilliant, men of vast
estate? For the most part, not that at all.
I have noticed that the chief charac-
teristic of the most Of those who are sue
cessful in the work is that they know
their Bibles, are earnest in prayer, are
anxious for the salvation of the young,
and Sabbath by Sabbath are willing to
sit down unobserved and tell of Christ
and the resurrection. Tlase are the
humble workers who are recruiting the
great army of Christian youth-not by
might, not by power, not by profound
argument, not by brilliant antithesis,
but by the blessing of God on plain talk,
and humble story, and silent tear, and
anxious look, ''the lame take the prey"
Oh! this work of saving the youth of
our country-how few appreciate what
the grave-we will soon all be gone.
What of the next
| NOT TALENTS, BUT EFFORT.
| An engineer on q locomotive going
across the western prairies day after day
| saw a little child come out in front of a
cabin and wave to him. So he got in
the habit of waving back to the little
child, and it was the days joy to him to
see this little one come out in front of
the cabin door and wave to him while
he answered back.
One day the train was belated and it
came on to the dusk of the evening. AS
the engineer stood at his post he saw by
the headlight that little girl on the track,
wondering why the train did not come,
looking for the train, knowing nothing
of her peril. A great horror seized upon
the engineer. He reversed the engine.
He gave it in charge of the other man on
board, and then he climbed over the en-
CINE, and he came down on the cowcatch-
er. He said, though he had reversed the
engine, it seemed as though it were go
ing at lightning speed, faster and faster
though it was really slowing up, and
with almost supernatural clutch he
caught that child by the hair and lifted
it up, and when the train stopped and
the passengers gathered around to See
what was the matter, there the old en-
gineer lay, tainted dead away, the little
child alive and in his swarthy arms.
"Oh," you say, "that was we'll done.
But want you to exercise some kindness
and some appreciation toward those in the
community who are snatching the little
| oooc fYo,,, ,1n1a7 tho ulao1c Of toro rlt a
ton and sin-snatching them from under
laundering rail trains of eternal disaster
bringing them up into responsibility il
this world and into glory for the world
to come. You appreciate what the en-