The Penn's Grove record., 1894-03-02

have such general doieuiness that they dis
gust young people with religion. We had n
ofthemin one of my churches. When he ex-
orted, he always deplored the low state OF
religion in other people, and when he prayed
it was an attack ofhysteria, and he went into
q paroxysm of obs and abs that SCENE to
demand resuscitation. He went on in that
way until we had to expel him from the
church for stealing the property intrusted to
him as administrator n for other vices
that 1 will not mention, n he wrote me
several letters not at all complimentary from
the West, saying hat he was daily praying
for my everlasting destruction. A man can.
not have hypocrisy in his heart without some
how showing 1t in his face. All intelligent
people who witness 1t know 1t is nothing but
I dramatization.
Oh, the power of the human facei I war
rant that you have known faces so magnetic
md impressive that, though they vanished
long ago. they still hold you with a holy
spell. How long since your child went2
"Well," you say, off she had lived she would
have been ten years old now, or twenty or
| thirty years" But does not that infants
face still have tender supremacy over your
entire nature? Daring many an eyentide
| does IL not look at you2 What a sanctifying,
~hallowing influence it has been in your life /!
You can say In the words of the poet, "Bet-
ter to nave loved and lost than never to
| have loved at ALL" Or it may have
been "a sisters face. Perhaps she was
the invalid of the family. Perhaps she
never went out except on very clear
days, and then she had to be carried
down the stairs to the piazza or for a short
ride, but she was 80 patient and cheerful
| under it all. As that face looks at you
through the years with what an elevated and
heavenly emotion you are filled. Or was 1t.
q fathers face? The storms of life had
somewhat roughened 1t, A good deal OF the
brightness ofthe eye had been qninched, and
the ear was turned with the hand behind it
in order to hear at all But you remember
that face SO wildly that If you were an
artist you could put it on canvas, and it
would mean to yon more than any lace that
Rembrandt ever sketched. That face,
though long ago yelled from human sight,
is as plain in your memory as though you
this moment saw it moving gently forward
| nj backward In the rocking chair by the
stove in the old farmhouse. Or was it your
mothers face2 A good mothers face is never
homely to her boys and girls. 1t is a MA
donna in the picture gallery OF the memory.
What a sympathetic face 1t was! Did you
ever have a joy and that face did not respond
oft? Did you ever have a grief and no tears
trickle down that maternal cheek? Did you
ever do a bad thing and a shadow did not
cross it? oh. it was a sweet facet The spec
.acles with large, round glasses through
which she looked at you, how sacredly they
have been kept in bureau or closet! four
mothers face, your mothers smile, your
mothers tears! What an overpowerins
memory Though you have come on to mid
life or old age, how you would like just once
more to bury your face in her lap IN havea
good cry!
But 1 can tell you of a more sympathetic
and more tender and more loving face than
any of the faces l have mentioned. mo, you
cannot" says some one. l can, and l will.
I a = At 1855. nh, oa IIn NraB an
sarth and is now in heaven. When prepar-
ing my life of Christ, entitled From Man
ger to Throne" l ranSacked the art CALLER
les and portfolios of the world to find a pic
lure OF our Saviour's face that might be most
expressive, and / saw it as francesca Francla
! painted ii in the sixteenth century, and as
The emerald intaglio of the sixth century
presented IT, and as a fresco in the catacombs
near Rome preserved it, and as Leonardo da
vinei showed 1t in "rhe Last Supper" and 1
| looked In the Louvre, and the Luxembourg,
and the Vatican, and the Dresden, and the
Berlin, and Neapolitan and London galleries
for the most inspiring face of Christ, and
many Of the presentations were wonderful
for pathos and majesty and power and exc
cutfon, but although / selected that by AIRY
Schefer as in some respects the most express
siye 1 felt as we all feel-that our Christ has
never vet been presented either in sculpture
or painting, and that we will have to wait
until we rise to the upper palace, where we
shall see Him as He is.
What a gentle face 1t must have been to
induce the babes to struggle out of their
mothers arms int His arms! What an ex-
~pressiye face it must have been when one re-
proving look of 1t threw stalwart Peter into
q fit of tearsi What a pleading face 1t must
have been to lead the psalmist in prayer to
say OF it, Look upon the face OF thine
anlointed r. What a sympathetic face it
.a.,-A hn,,a ham ~ ar.naI p q oa the QIpE woman
who was beyond any help from the doctors
10 touch the hem of His garment What a
suffering face it must have been when sus-
pended on the perpendicular and horizontal
pieces of the wood of martyrdom, and His
antagonists slapped the pallid cheek with
then rough hands and befouled 1t with the
saliva of their blasphemous lips! What a
tremendous face it must have been to lead
st. John to describe 1t in the coming judg-
ment as scattering the universe when he
says, 'fFrom whose face the earth and the
heaven fed away
o Christ ! Once the Nazarene, but now the
CELESTIAL Once Of cross, but now OF throne
Once crowned with singing bramble, but
now c~oroneted with the jewels of ransomed
empires! Turn on Thy pardoning face and
forgive us, Thy sympathetic face and console
us, Thy suffering face and have Thy atone
ment avail for us, Thy omnipotent face n
rescue US. Oh, what n facel SO Scared, 50
lacerated, so Respondent, so oYerWneinlng
ly glorious that the seraphim put wing to
wing and with their ~conjoined pinions keep
off some of the luster that is too mighty even
for eyes cherubic or angelic, and yet this
morning turning upon US with a sheathed
splendor like that with which He ap-
peared when He said to the mothers
bashful about presenting their children,
''suffer them to come" and to the poor
waif of the street, ''Neither do ! condemn
Lbao >" o,,l 20 fha auaa of tha Hind bepQar oil
the wayside, b opened" l think my
brother John, the returned foreign mission,
AIRY, dying summer before last at Bound
Brook, caught q glimpse of that face Of Chris
when in his dying hour my brother said 81
shall be satisfied when I awaken in His like
ness" And now unto Him thai loved us and
washed us from our sins in His own blood
and hath made US kings and priests unto Goo
and His Father, to Him be glory and donin'
ion for ever and ever. Amen amen
Amen n amen!