Connecticut western news., 1895-07-04

VIII of England, and will tell you the type of morals or immorals of that age or that year. No exception to it. Modest apparel means righteous peo- pie. Immodest apparel always means contaminated and depraved society. You wonder that the city of Tyre was de- stroyed with such terrible destruction. Have you ever seen the fashion plate of the city of Tyre? will show it to you:
 Moreover, the Lord saith, because the daughters of Zion are naughty and walk with stretched forth necks and wanton eyes, walking and mincing as they go, and making a tinkling with their feet, in that day the Lord will take away the bravery of their tinkling ornaments about their feet, and their cauls, and their round tires like the moon, the rings and nose jewels, the changeable suits of apparel, and the mantles, and the wimples, and the crisp ing pins.
 That is the fashion plate of ancient Tyre. And do you wonder that the Lord God in his indignation plotted out the city, so that fishermen today spread their nets where that city once stood?
 A stupendous Gate.
 Gate the Fourth. Alcoholic beverage. Oh, the wine cup is the patron of inn purity The officers of the law tell us that nearly all the men who go into the shambles of death go in intoxicated, the mental and the spiritual abolished, that the brute may triumph. Tell me that young man drinks, and know the whole story. If he becomes captive of the wine cup, he will become a captive of all other vices. Only give him time. No one ever runs drunkenness alone. That is carrion crow that goes in flock, and when you see that beak ahead you may know the other peaks are coming. In other words, the wine cup unbalances and dethrones ones better judgment, and leaves ono the prey of all the evil appetites that may choose to alight upon his soul. There is not place of any kind of sin in the United States today that does not find it's chief abettor in the chalice of inebriety. There is either a drinking bar before, or one behind, or one above, or one underneath. These people escape legal penalty because they are all licensed to sell liquor. The courts that license the sale of strong drink license gambling houses, license hbertinism, license disease, license death, license all sufferings, all crimes, all despoliations, all disasters, all mur- ders, all woe. It is the courts and the legislature that are swinging wide open this grinding, creaky, stupendous gate of the lost.
 But you say: "You have described these gates of hell and shown us how they swing in to allow the entrance to the doomed Will you not, please, be- fore you get through the sermon, tell us how these gates of hell may swing out to allow the escape of the penitent?" reply, But very few escape. Of the thou sand that go in 999 perish. Suppose one of these wanderers should knock at your door. Would you admit her? Sup pose you knew where she came from. Would you ask her to sit down at your dining table? Would you ask her to be- come the governess of your children? Would you introduce her among your &C., quaintanceships? Would you take the responsibility of pulling on the outside of the gate of hell while the pusher on the inside of the gate is trying to get out? You would not. Not one of a thou sand of you would dare to do SO. You would write beautiful poetry over her sorrows and weep over her misfortunes, but give her practical help you never will But, you say, "Are there no ways by which the wanderer may escape?" Oh, yesl Three or four. The one way is the sewing girls garret, dingy, cold, hunger blasted. But, you say, ''Is there no other way for her to escapeT Oh, yes Another way is the street that leads to the river at midnight, the end of the city dock, the moon shining down on the water making it look so smooth she wonders if it is deep enough. It is. No boatman near enough to hear the plunge. No watchman near enough to pick her out before she sinks the third time. No other way? Yes; by the curve of the railroad at the point where the engineer of the lightning express train cannot see hundred yards ahead to the form that lies across the track. He may whistle "down brakes" but not soon enough to disappoint the one who seeks her death. But, you say, "Isn't God good, and won't he forgive?" Yes, but man will not, woman will not, so- ciety will not. The church of God says it will, but it will not. Our work, then, must be prevention rather than cure.
 A Call to Christians.
 Those gates of hell are to be prostrated just as certainly as God and the Bible are true, but it will not be done until Christian men and women, quitting their prudery and squeamishness in this matter, rally the whole Christian senti- ment of the church and assail these great evils of society. The Bible utters it's de- nunciation in this direction again and again, and yet the piety of the day is such namby pamby sort of thing that you cannot even quote Scripture with out making somebody restless. As long as this holy imbecility reigns in the church of God, sin will laugh you to scorn. do not know but that before the church wakes up matters will get worse and worse, and that there will have to be one lamb sacrificed from each of the most carefully guarded folds, and the
 
 the village church and the top of the cathedral tower.
 Prophets and patriarchs and apostles and evangelists and Christ himself have thundered against these sins as against no other, and yet there are those who think we ought to take, when we speak of these subjects, tone apologetic. put my foot on all the conventional rhet- oric on this subject, and I tell you plainly that unless you give up. that sin your doom is sealed, and world without end you will be chased by the anathemas of an incensed God rally you to a besiegement of the gates of hell. We want in this besieging host no soft sen- timentalists, but men who are willing to take and give hard knocks. The gates of Gaza were carried off, the gates of Thebes were battered down, the gates Of Rahylon were destroved and the patas