News and citizen. [volume] (Morrisville, Vt. ;) 1881-current, 1893-04-20

| then we Will SCOp anu bdy, AuS1o was ="
mean Christian; there was a cowardly
Christian; there was Il lying Christian;
there was an impure Christian" In that
dav as now, eff thou be wise, thou shalt
be wise for thyself, but if thou soonest
thou alone shall bear it." Why, my
brother, the inconsistency of Christians
SO far from being an argument to keep
you away from God ought to be an ar
gument to drive you to him. The best
place for skillful doctor is neighbor
hood where they are all poor doctors; the
best place for an enterprising merchant
to open his store is in place where the
| bargain makers do not understand their
business, and the best place for you who
want to become the illustrious and COM
plete Christians-the best place for you is
to come right down among us who are so
! incompetent and so inconsistent some
| times.
Other persons apologize for not becom-
ing Christians because they lack time,
as though religion muddled the brain of
the accountant, or tripped the pen of the
author, or thickened the tongue of the
orator, or weakened the arm of the me-
chanic, or scattered the briefs of the
| lawyer, or interrupted the sales of the
merchant. They bolt their store doors
against it and fight it back with trowels
and with yard sticks and cry, "Away
with your religion from our store, our
office, our factory"
! RELIGION FOR WORKERS.
They do not understand that religion
in this workaday world will help you to
do anything you ought to do. 1t can lay
keel, it can sail ship, it can buy car
J 10, it can work pulley, it can pave a
street, it can fit a wristband, it can write
| 4 constitution. it can marshal host. 1t
is as appropriate to the astronomer as his
telescope, to the chemist as his labora-
tory, to the mason as his plumbline, to
lle carpenter as his plane, to the child
SIS his marbles, to the grandfather as his
Ctaff
| No time to be religious herel You have
no time not to be religious. You might
rs well have no clerks in your store, no
books in your library, no compass on
your ship, no rifle in the battle, no hat
for your head, no coat for your back, no
fhoes for your feet. Better travel on to-
ward eternity bare headed and bare footed
and houseless and homeless and friend
less than to go through life without re-
ligion.
Did religion make Raleigh any less of
statesman, or Havelock any less of a
folder, or Grinnell any less of a mer-
chant. or West any less of a painter?
Religion is the best security. in every
bargain, it is the sweetest note in every
song, it is the brightest gem in every
coronet. No time to be religious! Why,
you will have to take time to be sick, to
be troubled, to die. Our world is only
the wharf from which we are to embark
for heaven. No time to secure the
friendship of Christ. No time to buy
lamp and trim it for that walk through
the darkness which otherwise will be
illumined only by the whiteness of the
tombstones. No time to educate the eye
for heavenly splendors, or the hand for
choral harps, or the ear for everlasting
songs, or the soul for honor, glory and
immortality. One would think we had
time for nothing else.
Other persons apologize for not enter
ing the Christian life because it is time
enough yet. That is very like those per-
sons who send their regrets and say: II
will come in perhaps at II or IL o'clock.
/ will not be there at the opening of the
banquet, but will be there at the close"
Not yet! Not yet!
Now, I do not give any doleful view
of this life. There is nothing in my ma
ture, nothing in the grace of God, that
tends toward doleful view of human
life. have not much sympathy with
Addison's description of the "Vision Of
Mira" where he represents human life
as being bridge of a hundred arches,
and both ends of the bridge covered with
clouds, and the race coming on, the most
of them falling down through the first
span, and all of them falling down
through the last span. 1t is very dis
NAL picture. have not much sympathy
with the Spanish proverb which says,
1.-The sky is good, and the earth is good
that which is bad is between the earth
and the sky"
CHRISTIANS SHOULD BE HOPEFUL.
But while we Christian people are
bound to take a cheerful view of life we
must also confess that life is great I'M
certainty, and that man who says, 81
can't become Christian because there is
time enough yet" is running a risk inf
mite. You do not perhaps realize the
fact that this descending grade of sin
gets sleeper and sleeper, and that you are
gathering up rush and velocity which
after awhile may not answer to the
brakes. Oh, my friends, be not among
those who give their whole life to the
world and then give their corpse to God.
1t does not seem fair while our pulses are
in full play of health that we serve our
selves and serve the world and then make
God at last the present of a coffin. 1t
does not seem right that we run our ship
from coast to coast, carrying cargoes for
ourselves, and then when the ship is
crushed on the rocks give to God the
shivered timbers. 1t is great thing for
a man on his dying pillow to repent
better than never at all-but how much |
better, how much more generous, it |
would have been if he had repented so |
years beforei My friends, you will never
get over these representations.
Here is delusion. People think, 81
can go on in sin and worldliness, but |
after awhile l will repent, and then it |
will be as though had come at the very |
start" That is delusion. No one ever
gets fully over prOcrastination. If you |
give your soul to God, some other time |
than this, you will enter heaven with |
only half the capacity for enjoyment and |
knowledge you might have had. There |
will be heights of blessedness you might |
have attained, you will never reach; |
thrones of glory on which you might |
have been seated, but which you will |
never climb. We will never get over |
procrastination, neither in time nor in |
eternity. We have started on march |
from which there is no retreat. The |
shadows of eternity gather ON our path |
way. How insignificant is time COM |
pared with the vast eternity! I was |
thinking of this while coming down over
the Allegheny mountains at noon, by |
that wonderful place which you have all |
heard described as the Horseshoe-a de-
preston in the side of the mountain |
where the train almost turns backs again |
upon itself, and you see how appropriate |
is the description of the Horseshoe-and |
thinking on this very theme and prepar-
ing this very sermon it seemed to me as
if the great courser of eternity speeding
along had just struck the mountain with
one hoof and gone ON into illimitable
space. So short is time, so insignificant
is earth, compared with the vast eternity! |
This morning voices roll down the sky,
and all the worlds of light are ready to
rejoice at your disenthrallment. Rush