The weekly intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1891-1901, 1896-11-14

nome every meEnOer VI ~ ACAO hoAy
thrill, and If they walked into a pray
err meeting the dizziness and stolidity
instantly vanished. One of them would
wake up a whole church. One OF then
would sometimeselectrify n whole city.
But the most wonderful one of that
Characterization the world ever saw or
heard or felt was a peasant in the far
east, wearing a plain blouse k an in
verted wheat sack, with three open
ings, one for the neck, and the other
two for the arms His father was a
wheelvright and householder, and
given to various carpentry. His mother
at first under suspicion because of the
circumstances of his nativity, and he
chased by a Herodic mani out OF
His native land, to live awhile under
the shadows of the sphinx and pyramid
Of Gizeh, afterward confounding the
LII DIS of Jerusalem, then stopping
the paroxysm of tempest and of mad
man. His path strewn with slain drop
sizes and catalepsies and ophthalmias,
TRANSPORTED on n mountain, preach
ing on another mountain, dying on an
other mountain, and ascending from
another mountain-the greatest, the
loveliest, the mightiest, the kindest, the
most self-sacrificing, most beautiful
Being whose feet ever touched the
earth. Tell us, We deserts who heard
our S~aviour's prayer; tell us, ye seas
that drenched Him with your surf;
tell us, ye multitudes who heard Him
preach on deck, on beach, on hillside;
tell us, Golgotha who heard the stroke
of the hammer ON the sp~ikeheads, and
the dying groan in that midnight that
dropped on midnoon, did nnyone like
Jesus have this passion for souls?
But breaking right in upon me is the
question: How can we get something
of this Pauline and Christly longing
for saved immortalities? 1 answer:
BY better approaching the prolonga-
ton of the souls existence compared
with everything physical and material.
How 1 hope that surgeon will sue
cessfully remove the cataract from
hat mans eyel 1t is such q sad thing to
be blind. Let us pray while h doctor
Is busy with the delicate operation But
for how long o time will he be able to
give his patient eyesight? Well, II the
patient be 40 years of age, he will add
to his happiness perhaps so years OF
eyesight, and that will bring the man
to 30 years, and 1t is not probable that
he will live longer than that, or that
he will live so long. But what is good
eyesight for so years more as compared
with clear vision for the soul a billion
of centuries? / hope the effort to drive
back the typhoid fever from yonder
home will be successful. God help the
doatorsl
We will wait in great anxiety until
the fires of that fever are extinguished,
and when the man rises from his pill
low and walks out, with what hearth
ness we will welcome him into the
fresh air and the church and business
circles. He is 30 years of age, and if
he shall live go years more that will
make him 90. But what are go years
more of earthly vigor compared with
the souls health for a quadrillion mil
lenniums-a millennium, as you know,
a Thousand years? This world, since
fitted up for mans residence, has ex-
listed about 5000 years. How much
longer will it exlst2 We will
suppose it shall last as mueh
longer, which is very doubtful. That
will make its existence $4,000 years.
But what are or will be IL, DOC years
compared with the eternity preceding
those years and the eternity following
them? Time, as compared to eternity,
like the drop of the night dew shaken
from the top of the grassblade by the
COWS hoof on its way afeld this morn
ing, as compared with Mediterranean
and Arabian and Atlantic and Pacific
watery dominions.
A stranger desired to purchase a
farm, but the owner would not sell it
hired it by lease for only n crop, but
he sowed acorns and to mature that
crop 500 years were necessary. That
was a practiced deception, but / de.
ceive you not when / tell you that the
crop of the soul takes hold of unending
ages.
1 see the author of my text seated in
the house of Gaius, who entertained
him at Corinth, not far from the over
hanging fortress of Acro-Corinthus,
and meditating oE The longevity of the
soul, and getting more and agi-
tated ABOUT its value and the awful
risk some of his kindred were
running concerning it, and he
writes the letter containing the text
which Chrysostom admired so much he
had it read 10 him twice a week, and
other things, he says those
and startling words of my textI
~ could wish that myself were &C.
cursed from Christ for my brethren,
my kinsmen, according to the flesh"
In this last half Of the las decade of
the 10th century the temperature In
the churches is very low, and most of
the piety would spoil if it were not
kept on ice, n taking things as they
are, ordinary Christians will never
the point where the cutlery of
Paul in the text will not seem like ex-
travagapzar The proprieties in most
Of the churches are SO fixed that all a
is expected to do on Sunday
Is to get up a little later in the morn
ing than usual, put on that which is
next to his best attire-not the very
best, for hat has to be reserved for
The levee-enter the church with state
y step, bow his head, or at any rate
shut his eyes in prayer time, or close
enough to look sleepy, turn to-
ward the pulpit with holy dullness
vhile the preacher speaks, put Q
i~ve-cent piece, or if the times
collection platter, kind of
it down under the other
.oin so that 1t might be, for all that
he usher knows. n SIS gold piece, and
hen, after the benediction, go quietly
to the biggest repast of all the
week. That is all the majority of
are doing for the rectifica-
ion of this planet, and they will do that
until, at the close of life. the pastor
opens a black book at the head of
heir casket, and reads, blessed are
he dead who die in the Lord; they
est from their labors and their works
10 follow them" The sense of the
udicrous is so thoroughly developed
n me that when 1 hear these Scrip
ure words read at the obsequies of one
II the religious do-nothings in the
hurches it is too much for my gravity.
Their works do follow them" What