Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1893-12-09

the wing.
All night long while you were sleep
ing the frost was working, and you ought
not let the warmth -obliterate the scene
until you have admired 1t, studied it, alb
sorbed it, set it up in your memory for
perpetual refreshment, and realized the
force and magnitude and intensity of my
text, "By the breath of God frost is
given" Oh, what q God we have! What
resources are III piled by the fact that he
is able to do tEst by the finger of the
frost 90 times in one winter and on q
hundred thousand window panes for
thousands of wintersl
The great art galleries of Venice and
Naples and Dresden are carefully guard
ed, and governments protect them, for,
once lost, they can never be reproduced,
but God sets up in the royal galleries Of
the frost pictures such as no human art
could ever produce, hundreds of thou
sands of them. only for four or five
hours, and then rubs them out, making
the place clear for display just as mag
nifcent the next morning. No one but
God could afford to do that. 1twould
bankrupt everything but infnity and
omnipotence.
Standing here between the closed doors
of the pictured woods and the opening
doors Of the t,sassfgured window glass,
I want to cure my folly and your folly
of longing for glorious things in the dis
lance, while we neglect appreciation OF
glorious things close by. "Oh, if Icould
only go and see the factories of lace at
Brussels" says some one. Why, within
20 feet of where you awaken some De-
cember morning you will see richer lace
interviewer for your window panes by
divine fingers. "Oh, if l could see the
factories of silk at Lyons" says some one.
Why, without leaving your own house
on Christmas morning you may see
where the Lord has spun silken threads
about your windows this way and that
-embroideries such as no one but God
can work.
Alas, for this glorifcation Of the dis
tant and this belittling of the close by!
This crossing of oceans and paying a high
admission in expenses to look at that
which is not half as well done as some
thing we can see by crossing our own
room, and free Of charge. This praising
of Raphaels, hundreds of years gone,
when the greater Raphael, the frost, will
soon be busy at the entrances to your
own home.
Next I speak of the frost as physi-
clan. Standing at the gates of New York
harbor autumn before last, the frost
drove back the cholera. saying, THUS
far shalt thou come and no farther"
From Memphis and New Orleans and
Jacksonville he smote the fever plague
till it reeled back and departed. The
frost is physician that doctors cities,
nations and continents. He medicines
the world. Quinine for malaria, antife-
brile for typhoids, sulphonal for sleep
lessness, antispasmodic for disturbed
nerves, but in all therapeutics there is
no remedy like the small pellets prepared
by the cold, and no physician SO skillful
OF SO mighty as the frost.
Scotland has had great physicians,
but her greatest doctors have been the
Abernethies and Abercrombies that
have come down over the highlands
horsed on the north wind; England has
had her great physicians, but her great
est doctors have been the Andrew
Clarkes and. the Mackenzies who ap-
peared the first night the fields of Eng
land were trimmed with white. America
has had its great physicians, but her
greatest doctors have been the Willard
Parkers and Valentine Motifs who land
ed from bleak skies while our fingers
were benumbed and our ears tingled
with the cold. Oh, it is high time that
you add another line to your liturgy. 1t
Is high time that you make an adden-
dunn to your prayers. 1t is high time
that you enlarge the catalogue of your
blessings.
Thank God for frostI It is the best of
all germicides. 1t is the only hope in
bacteriology. Itis-the medicament of
continents. It is the salvation of our
temperate zone. 1t is the best tonic that
God ever gave the human race. 1t is
the only strong stimulant which has no
reaction. The best commentary on it l
had while walking near here one cool
morning with my brother John, who
spent the most OF his life as a missionary
in China, and in that part of 1t where
there are no frosts. He SAID there was
tingling gladness in his nerves indie
scribable and an almost intoxication of
delight from the fact that 1t was the
first time for years he had felt the sensa-
ton of frost. We complain Of it, we
scold it, we frown upon it, when we
ought to be stirred by it to gratitude
and hoist it on doxology.
But must go farther and speak of the
frost as jeweler. As the snow is frozen
rain, so the frost is frozen dew. God
transforms it from liquid into crystal.
It is the dew glorifed. In the thirty
eighth chapter of that inspired DRAMA
the book of Job, God says to the inspired
dramatist with ecstatic interrogation,
1.-The hoary frost of heaven, who hath
rendered it?" God there asks Job if he
knows the parentage of the frost. He in
quires about its pedigree. He suggests
that Job study up the frost's genealogical
line. a minute before God had asked
about the parentage of raindrop in
words that years ago gave me suggest
| i've text for sermon, Hath the rain
father?s But now the Lord Almighty is
catechising Job about the frost. He
practically says: do you know its IA
Their? Do you know its mother? In what
cradle of the leaves did the wind rock it?
'The hoary frost of heaven. who hath
gendered it?'
He Is stupid Christian who thinks SO
much Of the printed and bound Bible
that he neglects the Old Testament of
the fields nor reads the wisdom and
kindness and beauty of God written in