The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1894-07-30


as you: if it be true, then which OF US is
saferl
Let me also ask whether your trouble
has not been that you COnfOunded Chris
tianity with the inconsistent character OF
some who profess il. You are a lawyer.
In your profession there are mean aud
dishonest men. Is that anything against
the law You are "A doctor. There are
unskilled and contemplate men in your
profession. Is that anything against
medicine, You are a merchant There
are thieves and defrauders in your bust
ness. Is that anything against mer-
chandise2 Behold, then, the unfairness
of charging upon Christianity the wicked
ness of its disciples. We admit some Of
the charges against those who profess
religion. Some of the most gigantic
sw1ndles Of the present day have been
carried on by members of the
church. There are men in the
churches who would not be trusted
for five dollars without good cOllat-
eral security They leave their business
dishOnesties in the vestibule of the church
as they 60 in and sit at the communion.
Having concluded the sacrament, they
get up wipe the wine from their lips, 90
out, and take up their sins where they
left of. To serve the devil is their regu-
lar work; 10 serve God a sort of play
spell. With Sunday sponge they expect
to wipe of from their bushes slate all the
past weeks inconsistencies You have
no more right TO take such mans life as
a specimen of religion than you have to
take the twisted irons and split timbers
that lie on the beach at Coney Island as a
specimen of an American ship IT is time
that we drew line between religion and
the frailties of those who profess it.
Do you not feel that the Bible, take it
all in all, is about the best book that the
world has ever seem DO you know any
book that has as much in it? Do you not
think, upon the whole, that it's influence
has been benehcent2 ] come to you with
both hands extended toward you. In one
hand l have the Bible, and in the other |
have nothing. This Bible in one hand l
will surrender forever Just as soon as in
my other hand you can put book that is
better
Today l invite you back into the good
old fashioned religion of your fathers-tO
the God whom they worshipped, to the
Bible they read to the promises on which
they leaned, to the cross on which they
hung their eternal expectations. You
have not been happy a day since you
swung Oft; you will not be happy.aminute
until YOU swing back.
Again; There may be some of you who
in the attempt after a Christian life, will
have TO run against powerful passions and
appetites. Perhaps IL is a disposition to
anger that you have to contend against .
and perhaps, while in a very serious
mood, you hear of something that makes
you feel that you must swear or die.
know of Christian man who was once
so eXasperated that he said to a mean Gus
toner, Il cannot swear at YOU myself, for
| am a member of the church but if you
will go down stairs my partner in business
will swear at you" All your good resolu-
tions heretofore have been torn to tatters
by explosions of temper. Now there is
no harm in getting mad if you only get
mad at sin. You need to bride and sad
die these hot-breathed passions, and with
them ride down injustice and wrong There
are a thousand things in the world that
we ought TO be mad at. There is no harm
in getting red hot if you only bring to the
forge that which needs hammering. A
man who has no power of righteous indig-
nation is an imbecile. But be sure it is a
righteous indignation, and not a petu-
lancy that blurs, and unravels, and de-
pletes the soul
There is large class of persons in mid
life who have still in them appetites that
were aroused in early manhood, at a time
when they prided themselves on being a
little fast" high livers,' free and
easy" hail fellows well met" They are
now paying in compound interest for trou-
bles they collected twenty years ago.
Some of you are trying to escape, and you
will-yet very narrowly, "as with the
skin of your teeth" God and your own
soul only know what the struggle is
Omnipotent grace has pulled out many a
soul that was deeper in the mire than you
are They line the beach of heaven-the
multitude whom God has rescued from
the thrail of suicidal habits. If you this
day turn your back on the wrong and
start anew God will help you. Oh, the
weakness of human help Men will sym
pathize for awhile, and then turn you off.
II you ask for their pardon they will give
it, and say they will try you again: but
falling away again under the power of
temptation they cast you off forever. But
God forgives seventy times seven; yea,
seven hundred times; yea, though this be
the ten thousandth time he is more ear
nest, more sympathetic, more helpful this
la@ time than when you took your first
misstep.
If, with all the influences favorable
for right life, men make so many mis-
takes, how much harder it is when, for
instance. some appetite thrusts its iron
grapple into the roots of the tongue, and
pulls man down with hands of destruc-
ton! If under such circumstances, he
break away, there will be no sport in the
undertaking, no holiday enjoyment, but a
struggle in which tle wrestlers move
from side TO side, and bend, and twist.
aud watch for an opportunity TO get in a
heavier stroke, until with one final effort,
in which the muscles are distended and
the veins stand out and the blood starts
the swarthy habit falls under the knee of
the victor-escaped at last as with the
skin of his teeth.
The ship Emma" bound from Gotten
burg 10 Harwich, was sailing on, when
the man on the lookout saw something
that he pronounced a vessel bottom up
There was something on it that looked
like a sea-gull, but was afterward found
to be a waving handkerchief. In the
small boat the crew pushed out to the
wreck, and found that it was a capsized
vessel and that three men had been digging
their way out through the bottom of the
ship. When the vessel capsized they had
no means of escape The captain took
his penknife and dug away through the
planks until his knife broke. Then an Ole
nail was found, with which they attempted
TO scrape their way out of the darkness
each one working until his hand was well
nigh paralyzed, aud he sank back faint
aud sick. After rlong and tedious work
the light broke through the bottom of the
ship. A handkerchief was hoisted. He'll
came, They were taken on board the
vessel and saved. Did ever men come 81
near a watery grave without dropping
into it? How narrowly they escaped
escaped only with the skin of theil
! teeth -
There are men who have been capsizeC
| OF evil passions, and capsized mid-ocean
Z ~ IL.