The Newtown bee., 1895-03-01

This God is our God for ever and ever; He shall be our guide even unto death, 18th
 Psalm, verse 14.
 It matters little what words of Holy Writ are sel lected as our text for to-day, there can be but one subject upper most in our minds. We are thinking of the year that has passed away with it's joys and sorrows and hoping for the best is regard to the one just beginning. It is we'll for us occasionally to pause on our journey through this world and from one of the summits by the way view the road we have travelled. As we look back it is easy to trace the steps we have already taken. It has been up hill work all the way, but not all of the path has been equally steep and arduous. Some times we have had to climb over rough places and up steep grades, so steep our hearts almost tainted within us when
 we were brought face to face with our tasks, but thus far we have surmounted all, yet not all have borne the journey equally well. Some are faint and wea- ", for they have been torn and broken
 by the hardships they have encountered, others that were with us last year at this time have passed on before and ceased their iourneying, but the most of us remain as yet stormy and vigorous and as we look back, it is with comfort and encouragement we view the way
 passed over, no matter whether our jour
 ney be only just begun in the vigor and
 strength of manhood and womanhood at the foot of the mountain, or we be so far on the way that our bodies are about to enter the clouds and mists that ever hover about it's terminus on the summit. But when we attempt to look ahead the strongest eyes and the most
 far seeing can look only little ways.
 God in his mercy has shut out the fu-
 ture from our eyes. Regarding it we can only hope and pray and receive with
 thankful hearts as step by step it is re-
 vealed. For some the time is indeed
 short, for the youngest and strongest
 at the utmost it will be but little while, even three score years and ten fly swift ly by and four score or more lengthen it
 but little and are soon gone. shall ask
 you this morning to
 LOOK BACK WITH ME OVER THE PAST, not the past of our own lives merely but the great past, which covers all time since the creation. What does history tell us about it? At first sight we might imagine that it was story of one mighty triumph, because so much is said about the victors and so little about the van- pushed. In reality it Is story of hu- man woe, with very little bright or pleas ing therein to one who has the very best interests of the race in his heart. Re member every victory was purchased at the cost of thousands of human lives. Every shout of triumph was followed by sad refrain made up from the cries and
 walls of tens of thousands who were made miserable by the calamities of war. For every drop of blood that was split in war, tear was shed in some home to wash it's stain out of the soil. In the worlds happiest moments there is al
 ways vast undercurrent of sorrow of which we know but little. Before Christ came we can scarcely conceive of the sorrow the human heart had to bear. For all but few of the race death was the final parting and when the breath left the body hope also died. How many millions thus passed away we know not and have few data to establish . reckon ing. When we think of it, we are sad. and we are prone to ask why were these things so? Why did not God interfere? Alas we know why not They would not listen to Him and repulsed all His early approaches. They deliberately disobeyed Him and would not abide by his counsel, so he left them alone. Yet amid all this darkness for our comfort and for their welfare, there is one ray of light, one gleam of hope, which though unknown to them, is revealed to us by St Paul in Romans 2: 12, "For as many as have sinned without law shall also finish without law; and as many as have sinned under law shall be judged by law; for hot the hearers of law are just before God, but the doers of law shall be justified; for when Gentiles which have no law do by nature the things of the law, these, having no law, are law unto themselves; in that they show the work of the law written in their hearts, their conscience bearing witness herewith and their thoughts one with another accusing or excusing them, in the day when God shall judge the secrets of men, according to my gos- pei, by Jesus Christ.'' Yet in whatever light we view them, the years of the past, are years full of sadness, when the cup of human woe, for the vast part of the race, was overfiowing with sorrow, when WAR WAS THE CHIEF GLORY OF NATIONS, and their youth generally delighted in it's cruel tastimes and revelled in the sports and i'll gotten gains that it brought them. In those days slavery was every where, moral degradation the rule and not the exception and from countless hill tops the smoke of human sacrifices might be seen curling up toward heaven, and giving offense to Almighty God, while the sound of many instruments of music drowned the cries of the victims, so that they might not be heard by the ears of men, or move the hearts of friends and rela- tives with feelings of pity and shame. Nor was this all, lust was deified and shame substituted for the worship of