The L'Anse sentinel. (L'Anse, L.S., Mich.) 18??-current, 1895-06-01

OF grip. lHelr religion ID HI wing,
and no hand. They can fly heaven
ward, but they can not reach out
earthward.
In our time it is the habit to denounce
the cities, and to speak of them as the
perdition of all wiclSedness. Is 1t not
time for some one to tell the other side
of the story and to say that the city is
the heaven OF practical helpfulness?
Look at the uncovered fountains and
parks, where the invalids may
be refreshed; the Bowery mis-
sion, through which annually
over one hundred thousand come
to get bread for this life, and bread
for the life to come, all the pillows of
that institution under the blessing OF
| Him who had not where to lay His
head; the free schools, where the most
impoverished are educated the hos
pitfalls for broken bones; the homes for
the restoration of intellects astray; the
orphan house, father and mother to all
who come under its benediction; the
midnight missions, which pour mid
noon upon the darkened; the prison
reform association; the houses OF
mercy; the infirmaries; the sheltering
arms; the aid societies; the industrial
schools; the sailors snug harbor; the
founding asylums; the free dispen-
saries, where greatest scientific skill
feels the pulse of wan pauper; the am
bulance; the stroke of its bell clear
ing the way to the place of casualty;
and good souls like the mother who
came to the Howard mission, with its
| Of f,.ia ,,inlSa1 N m
from the streets, and saying: If you
have a crippled boy, give him TO me;
my dear boy died with the spinal COM
plaint," and such an one she found
and took home and nursed him till he
was well. 1t would take sermon
three weeks long to do justice
to the mighty things which our
cities are doing for the unfortu-
nate and lost Do not say that
Christianity in our cities is all show,
and talk, and genufexion, and sacred
noise.
There is is also in my subject the
suggestion of rewarded work for God
and righteousness. When the wing
went the hand went. When the wing
assembled the hand assembled; and for
every useful and Christian hand there
will be an elevation celestial and eter-
nal. Expect no human gratitude for
it will not come. That was wise
thing Fenelon wrote TO his friend:
Il am very glad, my dear,
good fellow, that you are pleased
with one of my letters which
has been shown to you. You are right
in saying and believing that l ask lit
tie of men in general. l try to do
much for them and to expect nothing
in return. find decided advantage
in these terms. On these terms defy
them to dsappoint me-" But, my hear
ers, the day cometh when your work,
which perhaps no one has noticed.
or rewarded, or honored, will
rise TO heavenly recognition.
| While l have been telling
you that the hand was under the wing
of the cherubin, l want you to realize
that the wing was over the hand Per-
haps reward may not come to you
right away. Washington lost more
battles than he won, but he triumphed
to the last. Walter Scott, in boyhood,
was called "The Greek Blockhead;"
but what height of renown did he not
afterward tread? And / promise
you victory further on and higher
up; if not in this world,
then in the next Oh, the heav-
emily day when your lifted hand shall
be gloved with what honors, its fingers
enringed with what jewels, its wrist
clasped with what splendors! Come
up and take it, you Christian women,
who served at the washtub. Come up
and take it, you Christian shoemaker,
who pounded the shoe last. Come up
and take it, you professional nurse,
whose compensation never paid for bro
ken nights and the whims and struggles
of delirious sick rooms. Come up and
take it, you tiremep, besweated, far
down amid the greasy machinery of
ocean steamers, and ye conductors and
engineers on railroads, that knew no
Sunday, and whose ringing bells and
loud whistles never warned off your
own anxietics. Come up and take it,
you mothers, who rocked and lullabied
the family brood until they took wing
for other nests, and never appreciated
what you had done and suffered for
them. Your hand was well favored
when, you were young, and it was u
beautiful hand SO well rounded, so
graceful that many admired and eulo-
gized it; but hard work calloused it,
and twisted it, and self-scrifcing toll
for others paled it, and many house
hold griefs thinned it, and the ring
which went on only with a push at
the marriage altar, now is too large,
and falls off, and again and again you
have lost it. Poor hand! Weary hand!
WORKOUT hand! But God will recon-
struct it, reanimate it, readorn it, and
all Heaven will know the story of
that hand. What fallen ones it lifted
up! What tears it wiped away! What
wounds it bandaged! What light
houses it kindled! What storm. tossed
ships it brought into the pearl-beached
harbor! Oh, 1 am SO glad that in the
vision of my text Ezekiel saw the wing
above the hand. Roll, on that everlast-
ing rest for all the toiling, and misun-
derstood, and suffering and weary
children of God, and know right
well that to join your hand, at last
emancipated from the struggle, will
| - Al. IL 4 a.