The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1894-01-19

tue WARDROBE. And that mother who
sits at the window watching for vain.
glorious triumph of millinery and fine
colors and domestic pageantry will aft.
or awhile hear as bad news from hei
children out in the battle of life as Sis.
era's mother heard from the struggle al
Esdraelon.
AN APoSTRoPHE TO MOTHERS.
But if you still press the question,
where's mother?" I will tell you
where she is not, though once she was
there. Some of you started with her
likeness in your face and her principles
in your soul. But you have cast her
out. That was an awful thing for you
to do, but you have done it. That hard,
grinding, dissipated look you never got
from her. If you had seen any one
strike her, you would have struck him
down without much care whether the
blow was just sufficient or fatal; but,
my boy, you have struck her down
struck her innocence from your face and
struck her principles from your soul.
You struck her down. The tent pin
thCt Jael drove three times into the
skull OF Sisera was not so cruel as the
stab you have made more than three
times through your mother heart. But
she is waiting yet, for mothers are slow
to give up their boys-waiting at some
window, it may be window on earth
or at some window in heaven. All 9th
ers may cast you off. Your wife may
seek divorce and have no more patience
with you. Your father may disinherit
you and say, "Let him never again
darken the door of our house, But
there are two persons who do not give
you up-God and mother.
How many disappointed mothers
waiting at the window! Perhaps the
panes of the window are not great glass
plate, bevel edged and lowered over by
exquisite lambrequin, but the window
is made OF small panes, 1 would say
about six or eight of them, in summer
wreathed with trailing vine and in
winter pictured by the Raphaels of the
forest, a real country window. The
mother sits there knitting, or busy with
her needle on homely repairs, when she
looks up and sees coming across the
bridge of the meadow brook stranger,
who dismounts in front of the window.
He lifts and drops the heavy knocker of
the farmhouse door. Come imp is the
response. He gives his name and says,
II have come on sad errand." "There
is nothing the matter with my son
in the city, is there?" she asks. "Yes!"
he says. Your son got into an unfor-
tunate encounter with young man in.
d liquor saloon last night and is badly
hurt. The fact is he cannot get we'll.
hate to tell you all. 1 am sorry to
say he is dead" "Deadr" she cries as
she totters back. "Oh, my sonl my
SON. my son! Would God | had died
for thee!' That is the ending of all
her cares and anxieties and good coun-
sells for that boy. That is her pay for
her self sacrifices in his behalf. That is
the bad news from the battle. So the
5idings of derelict or Christian sons trav-
ii to the windows of earth or the win
lows of heaven at which mothers sit.
But, says some one, ARE you not
mistaken about my glorified mother
hearing of my evildoings since she
went away" Says some one else, "Are
you not mistaken about my glorified
mother hearing of my self sacrifice and
moral bravery and struggle to do
'ight?" Mol Heaven and earth are in
constant communication. There are
rains running every five minutes
rains of immortals ascending and de-
cending-spirits going from earth to
heaven to live there. Spirits descend
ng from heaven to earth to minister
md help. They hear from us many
lines every day. Do they hear good
Jews or bad news from this battle, this
sedan, this Thermopyla, this Auster-
itz, in which every one of us is fight
ng on the right side or the wrong side.
God, whose l am, and whom | am
rying to serve, as a result of this ser
non, roll over on all mothers a new
ense of their responsibility, and upon
ii children. whether still in the nur-
cry or out on the tremendous Esdraelon
f middle life or old age, the fact that
heir victories or defeats sound clear
ut, clear up to the windows of sympa-
hetic maternity. Oh, is not this the
minute when the cloud of blessing
lied with the exhaled tears of anxious
lothers shall burst in showers of mercy
n this audience?
There is one thought that is almost
DO tender for utterance. | almost fear
} start it lest 1 have not enough con-
-ol of my emotion to conclude it. AS
hen we were children we so often
anne in from play or from a hurt or
'om some childish injustice practiced
pom us, and as soon as the door was
pened we cried, Where's mother"
nd she said, Here / am" and we
uried our weeping faces in her lap. so
fter awhile, when we get through with
le pleasures and hurts of this life, we
i'll, by the pardoning mercy of Christ,
liter the heavenly home, and among |
le first questions, not the first, but
nong the first, will be the old question
lat we used to ask, the question that
being asked in thousands OF places
this very momeat the question,
Where's mother?" And it will not
Ike long for us to find her or for her
find us, for she will have been watch