Connecticut western news., 1895-09-19


 if you live to threescore years and ten you will see none so fair. Behold him, ye aged ones, for he only can shine through the dimness of your failing eye sight. Behold him, earth. Behold him, heaven. What moment when all the nations of the saved shall gather around Christ All faces that way. All thrones that way, gazing on Jesus.
 His worth if all the nations knew
 Sure the whole earth would love him too.
 Stoned by the World.
 l pass on now and look at Stephen stoned The world has always wanted to get rid of good men. Their very life is an assault upon wickedness. Out with Stephen through the gates of the city. Down with him over the preci pices. Let every man come up and drop stone upon his head. But these men did not so much kill Stephen as they killed themselves. Every stone re- bounded upon them. While these mur- derers are transfixed by the scorn of all good men Stephen lives in the ad- miration of all Christendom. Stephen stoned, but Stephen alive. So all good men must be pelted. "All who will live godly in Christ Jesus must suffer persecution. It is no eulo9y of man to say that everyb body likes him Show me any one who is doing all his duty to state or church, and I will show you scores of men who utterly abhor him.
 If all men speak. well of you, it is because you are either Q laggard or a dolt. If steamer makes rapid progress through the waves, the water will boil and foam all around it. Brave soldiers of Jesus Christ will hear the carbines click. When I see a man with voice and money and influence all on the right side, and some caricature him, and some sheer at him, and some de- nounce him, and men who pretend to be actuated by right motives conspire to cripple him, to cast him out, to de- stroy him, say, Stephen stoned"
 When I see man in some great moral or religioussi reform battling against grogshops, exposing wickedness in high places, by active means trying to purify the church and better the worlds estate, and find that the news papers anathematize him, and men, even good men, oppose him and de- nounce him because, though he does good, he does not do it in their way, say, "Stephen stoned" But you notice, my friends, that while they assaulted Stephen they did not succeed really in killing him. You may assault good man, but you cannot kill him. On the day of his death Stephen spoke before few people in the sanhedrin. This Sabbath morning he addresses Christen- dom. Paul, the apostle, stood on Mars hill addressing a handful of philoso- phers who knew not so much about science as modern schoolgirl. Today he talks to all the millions of Christen- dom about the wonders of justification and the glories ofnr John Wesley was howled down by the mob to whom he preached, land they threw bricks at him, and they denounced him, and they jostled him, and they spat upon him, and yet today, in all lands, he is admitted to be the great father of Methodism. Booths bullet vacated the presidential chair, but from that spot of coagulated blood on the floor in the box of Ford's theater there sprang up the new life of nation. Stephen stoned, but Stephen alive. tss
 A Dying Prayer.
 Pass on now and see Stephen in his dying prayer. His first thought was not how the stones hurt his head, nor what would become of his body. His first thought was about his spirit. "Lord Jesus receive my spirit. {" The murderer standing on the trapdoor, the black cap being drawn over his head before the execution, may grimace about the fu- ture, but you and I have no shame in confessing some anxiety about where we are going to come out. You are not all body There is within you soul. see it gleam from, your eyes today, and see it irradiating your couAtenance. Some times 1 am abashed before an audience, not because come under your physical eyesight, but because realize the truth that I stand before so many immortal spirits. The probability is that your body will at last find sepulcher in some of the cemeteries that surround this city. There is no doubt that your obsequies will be decent and re- spectful, and you will be able to pillow your head under the maple, or the Nor way spruce, or the cypress, or the blos- soming fir, but this spirit about which Stephen prayed, what direction will that take? What guide will escort it? What gate will open to receive it? What cloud will be cleft for its pathway? Aft CT it has got beyond the light of our sun will there be torches lighted for it the rest of the way?
 Will the soul have to travel through long deserts before it reaches the good
 land? If we should lose our pathway will there be a castle at whose gate W,
 may ask the way to the city? Oh, thi mysterious spirit within us It has tw'
 wings, but it is in a cage now. It i locked fast to keep it, but let the doc of this cage open the least, and tha | soul is off. Eag le's wing could not catcl l it. The lightnings are not swift enougl 1 to come up with it. When the soul leave
 the body it takes 50 worlds at bound And have no anxiety about itP Hay you no anxiety about it?
 do not care what you do with m,
 body when my soul is gone, or whethe you believe in cremation or inhumation
 l shall sleep just as we'll in a wrappin
 of sackcloth as in satin lined wit
 eagles down. But my soul-before
 close this discourse I will find ou
 where it will land. Thank God for tn
 intimation of my text that when we di | Jesus takes uS That answers all uues
 tions for me. What though there wer
 massive bars between here and the Git
 of Light, Jesus could remove them
 What though there were great Sahara
 of darkness, Jesus could illume them
 What though get weary on the way
 Christ could lift me on his omnipoten
 shoulder. What though there wer
 chasms to cross, his hand could trans
 port me. Then let Stephens prayer b
 my dying litany, "Lord Jesus, receiv
 my spirit. It may be in that hour W | will ho tOp foob1o fo cou 1o,<, y,ropo,