The Canton times. (Canton, Miss.) 1893-1906, 1895-02-01

In all those regions are men and
women with, the cor secration OF Mel
vile b. Cox, who, embarking for the
| missionary work in Africa, said to a
fcllow-student. ''If l die in Africa,
come and write my epitaph. !" What
shall write for your epitaph?' said
the student. write" said he, these
words: Let thousand fall before
Africa be given"
There is another point of the COM
pass that my text includes: "Ihey
shall come from the west" That means
America redeemed. Everything be-
tween Atlantic and Pacific oceans to
be brought within the circle OF holi-
ness and rapture. VIII it be done by
worldly reform, or evangelism? VIII IT
be law, or Gospel? ! am glad that
wave of reform has swept across this
land, and all the cities are feeling the
advantage of the mighty movement.
Let the good work go on until the last
municipal evil is extirpated About
fifteen years ago the distinguished
editor of a New York daily news
paper said to me in his editorial
room: "You ministers talk about evils
of which you know nothing. Why don't
you go with the officers of the law and
explore for yourself, so that when you
preach against sin you can speak from
what you have seen with your own
eyes?" l said 81 will" And in com.
pany with commissioner of police and
captain of police, and two elders OF
my church, explored the dens and
hiding places of all styles of crime in
New York and preached a series Of SER
mons warning young men, and setting
forth the work that must be done lest
the judgments of God whelm this
city with more awful submerg-
ment that the volcanic deluge
that buried Herculaneum and Pompell.
l received as nearly as can remeln Der
several hundred columns of newspaper
abuse for undertaking that explora-
ton. Editorials of denunclation,
double-leaded, and with captions OF
great primer type, entitled 1.-THE Fall
of Talmage," or ''Talmage Makes the
Mistake of His Life" or Down with
Talmage," but I still live and am in
full sympathy with all movements fol-
municipal publication. But move
ment which ends with crime exposed
and law executed stops half way
Nay, it stops long before 1T gets
half way. The law never yet saved
anybody; never yet changed anybody.
Break up all the houses of iniquity in
this city, and you only send the occu.
pants to other cities. Break down all
the policemen in New York, and while
it changes their worldly fortunes, 1T
does not change their heart of life.
The work is not so difficult as many
suppose. You say: ''There are the
foreign populations" Yes; but many
of them are Hollanders, and they were
brought up to love and worship God,
and it will take but little to persuade
the Hollanders to adopt the religion
of their forefathers Then there are
among these foreigners so many OF the
Scotch. They or their ancestors heard
Thomas Chalmers thunder, and Rob-
ert McCheyne pray. The breath OF
God so often swept through the heath
er of the Highlands, and the voice OF
God has so often sounded through the
Trossachs, and they all know how to
sing Dundee; so that they will not have
often to be invited to accept the God
of John Knox and Boutwell,.
Then there are among these foreign
ers so many of the English. They in.
herited the same language as we in
herited-the English in which Shake
speare dramatized, and Milton chimed
his cantos, and Henry Melville gospel
lied, and Oliver Cromwell prorogued
parliament, and Wellington command
ed his eager hosts. Among these for
eigners are the Swiss, and they were
rocked in a cradle under the shadow OF
the Alps, that the cathedral of the
Almighty in which all the elements,
snow, and hail, and tempest, and
hurricane worship. Among these for
aigners are a vast host of Germans,
and they feel centuries afterward the
power of that unparaled spirit who
shook the earth when he trod it, and
the heavens when he prayed-Martin
Luther From all nations our
foreign populations have come, and
they are homesick, far away
from the place of their childhood,
and the graves of their ancestors,
and our glorious religion presented to
them Alright will meet their needs, and
fill their souls, and kindle their enthu-
siasm. They shall come from amid the
wheat sheaves of Dakota, and from the
ore beds of Wyoming, and from the sill
Yer mines of Nevada. and from the