Connecticut western news., 1896-07-02

broke there arc old corselets mich show that the arrow of the English used to go through the breastplate, through the body of the warrior and out through the backplate. What symbol of that gos- pei which is sharper than two edged sword, piercing to the dividing asunder of body and soul, and of the joints and marrow! Would to God we had more faith in that gospell The humblest man. if he had enough faith in it, could bring 100 souls to Jesus-perhaps 300. Just in proportion as this age seems to believe less and less in it, I believe more and more in it. What are men about that they will not accept their own deliverance? There is nothing pro- posed by men that can do anything like this gospel The religion of Ralph Wal do Emerson was the philosophy of ici- cles; the religion of Theodore Parker was sirocco of the desert covering up the soul with dry sand; the religion of Renan was the romance of believing nothing; the religion of tho Huxleys and the Spencers merely pedestal on which human philosophy sits shivering in the night of the soul, looking up to the stars, offering no help to the nations that crouch and groan at the base. Tell me where there is one man who has re- jected that gospel for another who is thoroughly satisfied and helped and con tented in his skepticism, and Twill take the car tomorrow and ride 500 miles to see him. The full power of the gospel has not yet been touched. As sports man throws up his head and catches the ball flying through the air, just so easily will this gospel after awhile catch this round world flying from its orbit and bring 1t back to the heart of Christ. Give it full swing, and it will pardon every sin, heal every wound, cure every trouble, emancipate every slave and ransom every nation.
 Ye Christian men and women who go out this afternoon to do Christian work, as you go into the Sunday schools, the lay preaching stations and the peniten- tiarics and the asylums, want you to feel that you bear in your hand a weapon compared with which the lightning has no speed, and avalanches have no heft, and the thunderbolts of heaven have no power; it is the arrow of the omnipotent gospel Take careful aim. Pull the ar row clear back until the head strikes the bowl Then let it fiyl And may the slain of the Lord be manyl
 Good Hunting Ground.
 Again, if you want to be skillful ill spiritual archery, you must hunt ill un- frequented and secluded places. Why does the hunter go three or four days in the Pennsylvania forests or over Ra- quette lake into the wilds of the Adiron. dacks? It is the only way to do The deer are shy, and one 'bang" of the gun clears the forest From the Cali fornia stage you see, as you go over the plains, here and there, coyote trotting along, almost within range Of the gun sometimes quite within range of it No one cares for that; it is worthless. The good game is hidden and secluded. Ev- cry hunter knows that So many of the souls that will be of most worth for Christ and of most value to the church are secluded. They do not como in your way. You will have to go where they are. Wonder they are down in that eel lar; yonder they are up in that garret, Far away from the door of any church, the gospel arrow has not been pointed at them. The tract distributor and city missionary sometimes catch 8 glimpse of them, as a hunter through the trees get 8 momentary sight of a partridge or a roebuck. The trouble is, we are wait ing for the game to come to us. We are not good hunters We are standing in some street or highway expecting that the timid antelope will come up and eat out of our hands We are expecting that the prairie fowl will light on our church steeple It is not their habit.
 If the church should wait 10. 900, 900 of years for the world to come in and be saved, it will wait ill vain. The world will not come What the church wants now is to lift its feet from dam- ask ottomans and put them in the stir rups. We want a pulpit on wheels The church wants not so much cushions as it wants saddlebags aud arrows. We have got to pat aside the gown and kid gloves and put on the hunting shirt. We have been fishing so long in the brooks that run under the shadow of the church that the fish know us; that they avoid the hook and escape as soon as we come to the bank, while yonder is Cp- per Saranac and Big Tupper's lake, where the first swing of the gospel net would break it for the multitude of the fishes There is outside work to be done. What is that see in the backwoods? It is tent. The hunters have made clearing and camped out What do they care if they have wet feet, or if they have nothing but pine branch fer pillow or for the northeast storm? If a moose in the darkness steps into the lake to drink, they hear it right away. If loon cry in the moonlight, they hear it. So in the service of God we have exposed work. We have got to camp out and rough it We are putting all our care on the people who come to our churches What are we doing for the thousands upon thousands that do not come? Have they no souls? Are they sinless that they need no pardon? Are there no dead in their houses that they need no comfort? Are they cut off from God to go into eternity-no wing to bear them, no light to cheer them, no welcome to greet them? I hear today d groan that comes through our Christian assemblages and through our beautiful churches, and it blots out all this scene from my eyes today, as by the mists of 8 great Niagara, for the dash and the plunge of these great torrents of life d,opping down into the fathomless and laundering abyss of suffering and wee. [ sometimes think that just as God blot ted out the churches of Thyatira and Corinth and Laodicea, because of their sloth and srolidity, he will blot out American and English Christianity and raise on the ruins stalwart, wide awake, missionary church that can take the full meaning of that command, "Go into all the world and preach the gospel to every creature. ''
 spiritual Archers.
 remark, further, if you want to suc- ceed in spiritual archery you must have courage. If the hunter stand with trem-