Keowee courier. [volume] (Pickens Court House, S.C.) 1849-current, 1893-04-20

are retained. But who declines TO be
LAWYER because there are so many IN
competent lawyers? Yet there are tens
of thousands of people who decline being
religious because there are so many ul-
worthy Christians. Now, I say it is IL
logical. Poor lawyers are nothing
against jurisprudence, poor physicians
are nothing against medicine, poor farm
ers are nothing against agriculture, and
mean, contemplate professors of religion
are nothing against our glorious Christi
anity.
THE wuL-o'-FHE-wIsp OF UNBELIEF.
Sometimes you have been riding along
on summer night by a swamp, and
you have seen lights that kindled over
decayed vegetation-hghts which are
called iack-o'- lantern or will-o- -rhe-wisp.
These lights are merely poisonous mias-
mata. Ny friends, on your way to
heaven you will want better light than
the will-o'-the-wisps which dance on the
rotten character of dead Christians. Ex-
udations from poisonous trees IN OR
neighbor's garden will make very poor
balm for our wounds.
Sickness will come, and we will be
pushed out toward the Red sea which
divides this world from the next. and DOT
the Inconsistency of Christians but the
rod of faith will wave back the waters as
q commander wheels his host. The jndg-
ment will come with It's thundershod so
lemnities. attended by bursting noun
tains and the deep ugh of earthquakes,
and suns will fly before the feet of God
like sparks from the anvil. and 10000
burning worlds shall blaze like banners
in the track of God omnipotent. Oh,
then we viii stop and say, There was q
mean Christian there was a cowardiy
Christian; there was a lying Christian;
there was an impure Christian. In that
dav as now, "If thou be wise. thou shalt
be wise for thvself, but if thou soonest
thou alone shall bear =" 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 a skillful doctor is neighbor-
hood where they are all poor doctors; the
best place for an enterprising merchant
to open his store is in a 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 tne 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
A 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
60, it can work pulley, it can pave a
street, it can fit wristbapd, it can write
q constitution. it can marshal host. 1t
is as appropriate to the astronomer as his
telescope, 70 the chemist as his labora-
tory, to the mason as his plumbline, to
the carpenter as his plane, to the child
as his marbles, to the grandfather as his
staff.
No time to be religious here. You have
no time not TO be religious. You might
as well have no clerks in your store, no
books in your library, no compass on
your ship, no rife in the battle, no hat
for your head, no coat for your back, no
shoes 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
g statesman, or Havelock any less Of a
soldier, or Grinnell any less Of mer-
chant. or West any less of u painter:
R>'ioon 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 a
lamp and trim it for that walk through
the darkness which otherwise will be
illumined only by the wniteness 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: Il
will come in perhaps at II or - o'clock.
will not be there at the opening of the
banquet, but will be there at the close. :
Not yet. Not yet.
Now, do not give any doieful 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
Addisons description of the Vision Of
Mira" where he represents human life
as being bridge of 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 al of them falling down
through the last span. 1t is very dis
NAL picture. l have not much sympathy
with the Spanish proverb which says.
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 cheerful view Of life we
must also confess that life is great un-
certainty. and that man who says, Il
can't become Christian because thereis
time enough yet" is running risk inf
mite. You do not perhaps realize tine
fact that this descending grade of sin
gets sleeper AID sleeper, ard 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.
It does not seem fair while our pulses are
in full play of he lth that we serve our