Connecticut western news., 1896-01-30

astical foot soldiers, light horsemen and grenadiers.
 My friends, l propose different style of tactics. Let each one go to the forest of Gods promise and invitation and hew down a branch and put it on his shoulder, and let us all come around these obstinate iniquities, and then with this pile kindled by the fires of holy zeal and tn etlames of consecrated life we will burn them out. What steel can not do, fire may. And announce myself in favor of any plan of religious attack that succeeds--any plan of religious at tack, however radical, however odd, however unpopular, however hostile to all conventionalities of church and state. If one style of prayer does not do the work, let us try another style. If the church music of today does not get the victory, then let us make the assault with backwoods chorus. If prayer meeting at half past in the evening does not succeed, let us have one as early in the moaning as when the angel found wrestling Jacob too much for him. If sermon with three authorized heads does not do the work, then let us have sermon with 20 heads or no heads at all We want more heart in our song, more heart in our almsgiving, more heart in our prayers, more heart in our preaching.
 A Blood Red Fact.
 Oh, for less of Abimelech's sword and more of Abimelech's conflagration I had often heard
 There is a fountain filled with blood sung artistically by four birds perched on their Sunday roost in the gallery un- til I thought of Jenny Lind and Nilsson and Sontag and all the other warblers, but there came not one tear to my eye nor one master emotion to my heart. But one night went down to the Afri- can Methodist meeting house in Phila- delphia, and at the close of the service black woman in the middle of the au- dience began to sing that hymn, and all the audience joined in. and we were floated some three or four miles nearer heaven than have ever been since. saw with my own eyes that fountain filled with blood''-red, agonizing, sac riflcial, redemptive-and l heard the crimson plash of the wave as we all went down under it.
 For sinners plunged beneath that flood
 Lose ell their guilty stains.
 Oh, my friends, the gospel is not a syllogism it is not casuistry; 1t is not polemics, or the science of squabbles. It is blood red fact; iU is warm hearted in- vitation; it is leaping, bounding, flying good news; it is eff1orescent with all light; it is rubescent with all summery glow; it is arborescent with all sweet shade. have seen the sun rise on Mount Washington. and from the Tiptop House, but there vas no beauty in that com pared with the dayspring from on high when Christ gives light to soul I have heard Parepa sing, but there was no music in that compared with the voice of Christ when he said, "Thy sins are forgiven thee; go in peace. Good news Let every one cut down branch of this tree of life and wave it. Let him throw I. down ahd kindle it. Let all the way from Mount Zalmon to Shechem be filled w1tk the tossing joy. Good news l This bonfire of the gospel shall consume the last temple of sin. and will illumine the sky with apocalyptic joy. that Jesus Christ came into the world to save sin ners. Any new plan that makes man quit his sin, and that prostrates wrong, I am as much in favor of as though all the doctors, and the bishops, and the archbishops, and the synods, and the academical gownsmen of Christianity sanctioned it. The temple of Berith must come down, and do not care how it comes.
 The Power of Example.
 Still further I learn from this subject the power of example. If Abimelech had sat down on the grass and told his men to go and get the boughs and go out to the battle, they would never have gone at all, or if they had it would have been without any spirit or effective re- suit, but when Abimelech goes with his own ax and hews down branch and with Abimelech's g arm puts it on Ahim- elech's shoulder and marches on, then, my text says, all the people did the same. How natural that was What made Garibaldi and Stonewall Jackson the most magnetic of this century? They always rode ahead. Oh, the overwhelming power of example Here is father on the wrong road. All his boys go on the wrong road. Here is father who enlists for Christ. His children enlist. I saw in some of the picture galleries of Europe that be- fore many of the great works of the masters, the old masters, there would be sometimes four and five artists taking copies of the pictures. These copies they were going to carry with them, perhaps to distant lands, and I have thought that your life and character are mas- terpiece, and 1t is being copied, and long after you are gone it will bloom or blast in the homes of those who knew you and be a Gorgon or a Madonna. Look out what you say. Look ont what you do. Eternity will hear the echo. The best sermon ever preached is holy life. The best music ever chanted Is a consistent walk. If you want others to serve God, serve him yourself. If you want others to shoulder their duty, shoulder yours. Where Abimelech goes his troops go. Oh, start out for heaven today, and your family will come after you. and your business associates will come after you, and your social friends will join you. With one branch of the tree of life for baton, marshal just as many as you can gather. Oh, the inf nite. the semiomnipotent power of good or bad examplel
 I saw last summer, near the beach, g wrecker's machine. It was a cylinder with some holes at the side, made for the thrusting in of some long poles with strong leverage, and when there is any vessel in trouble or going to pieces in the ofing, the wreckers shoot rope out to the suffering men. They grasp it. and the wreckers turn the cylinder, and the rope winds around the cylinder, and those who are shipwrecked are saved. So at your feet, today, there is an influ- ence with a tremendous leverage. The rope attached to it swings far out into tha hi IlnU future YOur chi ldyeu vour