Weekly expositor. (Brockway Centre, Mich.) 1882-1894, 1893-01-27

not, be forgotten. III thousand years
after the world has gone to ashes, you
or want to recall how the earthly
skies looked in summer noon. or the
mid -ocean in a calm, we Will have only
To look at the second row OF the founda-
ton of the wall of Heaven. Oh, / am
so glad that St John told us about .C,
1.-The second. sapphirel' While we are
living in sight OF that wall, spirits
who have come from other worlds. and
who never saw our earth, will visit us,
and we will visit them, and some time
we will be in converse about this eartl
when 1t was yet a-aoat and a-swing,
and we shall want to tell them about
how il looked at certain times, and
then it will be a great object lesson for
all eternity, and we will say to our
visitor from some other world as we
point toward the wall Of heaven: at
looked like that stratum of foundation
next to the lowest" John, 2lst chap
ter and 10th verse: '"rhe second sap
phire.'
A step higher and you come to chal-
cedony, another lay-r in the founda-
hon OF the wall . al running 1900
miles around ths heavenly city.
Chaicedony! Tran lucent. A divine
mixture OF agates and opals and cor
nelians. Striped With white and gray.
Dashed of paIior flushing into red and
darkening into purple. Iceland and
the He6rldes hole forth beauI full speci-
mems OF chalceds ny.
But now we must make b swift
ascent to the top of the foundation
wall, for we car not minutely examine
all the layers, upd so putting one foot
on the chalc 'dony, of which we
have been spe iking, we spring to the
emerald, and NE are one third of the
way To the top of the foundation, for
the fourth row Is emerald. That /
would judge il Gods favorite among
gems, because it holds what seems evil
dent is his fa' orite color on earth, the
green, since that is the color most
widely diff Aed across all the earth's
| continents- the grass, the foliage,
the every day dress OF nature.
The emer2 Id! Kings used it as n seal to
stamp p onunciamentos. T'se rain
bow aroI nd the throne of God is by
ST. Johr compared TO it. Conquerors
have co isidered it the greatest prize to
captur- What ruthlNssness when the
soldie of kizarro pounded it with
their hammers. Emeralds have had
muc'I to do with the destiny of Mexico
Five of them were presented by CorteE
to his bride, me of them cut into the
shape of a rose, another into the shape
of bell, with tongue of pearl, and this
presentation aroused the jealousy of
the throne and caused the consequent
| downfall of Cortez Bat the depths OF
the sea were decorated with those emer-
aids, for in q shipwreck they went
down off the coast of Barbary. Napo-
leon wore an emerald at Austerlitz- In
the Kremlin museum at Moscow, there
are crowns and sceptres and outspread
miracles of emerald Ireland is called
the Emerald Isle, not because of its
verdure, but because it was presented
to Henry III. of England with an
! emerald ring. Nero had magnifying
glass of emerald through which he
looked at the gladiatorial contests of
Rome. But here are fifteen hundred
miles of emerald sweeping around the
heavenly city in one layer.
But upward still, and you put your
foot on "a stratum of sardonyx, white
and red, a seeming commingling of
snow and fire; the snow cooling the
! fire, the fire melting the snow.
Another climb and you reach the
| sardius, named after the city of Sar-
dius. Another climb and you reach
the chrysolite. A specimen of this,
belonging to Epiphanus, in the fourth
century, was said to be SO brilliant
that whatever was put over to conceal
1T was shone through, and the EN-
peror of China had a specimen that is
described as having such penetrating
radiance that it makes the night as
bright as the day.
A higher climb, and you reach the
beryl. Two thousand years ago the
Greeks used this precious stone for en-
craving purposes. 1t was accounted
among the royal treasures of Tyre
The hilt of Murat's sword was adorned
with 1t. 1t glows N the imperial
crown of Great Britain. Luther
thought the beryl of the heavenly
wall was turquoise. Kalisch thought
it was chrysolite. Josephus thought
it golden -coiored jewel. The wheels
of Ezekiel's vision fiamed with beryL
and were revolving fire. The
beryl appears in six-sided prisms.
and is set in seals and intaglios, in
necklaces and coronets. 1t was the
JOY of ancient jewelry. 1t ornamented
the afiluent with ear-drops. Charlie
magne presented it to his favorites.
Beautiful beryl! Exquisitely shaped
oeryl! Dlv-neiy coloreu beryll IL
seems like concealed co.or. 1t looks
like frozen fire.
But stop not here. Climb higher
and you come to topaz, a bewilder-
ment of beauty and named after an
island of the Red Sea.
Climb higher and you come to chry-
soprasus, of greenish golden hue and
hard as flint
Climb higher and you reach the
iacinth, named after the flower hya-
clint and of the reddish blue.
Take one more step and you reach
the top of the foundations of the wall,
and St. John cries out: "rhe twelfth.
an amethystr' This precious stone,
when found lin Australia or India or
Europe stands in columns and pyra-
mids. For color it is violet blooming
in stone. For its play of light, for its
deep mysteries of color, for it's uses in
Egyptian. in Etruscan in Roman art, it
has been honored. The Greeks thought
this stone a preventive of drunken
ness. The Hebrews thought it.
source of pleasant dreams For all
lovers of gems, it is a subject of admi-