Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1897-09-25


you find the worlds in family circles
Brothers and sisters, they take hold Of
each Others hands and dance in groups
Orion in q group The Pleiades i'll a
group. The solar system is only COM
pany of children, with bright faces,
gathered around one great fireplace
The worlds do not struggle off. They
90 in squadrons and fleets, sailing
through immensely. So Christian work
ers in heaven will dwell in neighbor-
hoods and clusters.
am sure that some people | will
like in heaven q great deal better than
others Yonder is a constellation of
stately Christians They lived on earth
by rigid rule They never laughed
They walked every hour, anxious lest
they should lose their dignity But they
loved God, and yonder they shine in
brilliant constellation Yet shall not
long to get into that particular group
Yonder is q constellation of small heart
ed hristians-asteroids in the eternal
astronomy While some souls go up
from Christian battle and blaze like
Mars these asteroids dart q feeble ray
like Vesta Yonder is a constellation of
martyrs, of apostles, of patriarchs. Our
souls as they go up to heaven Will seek
out the most congenial society
Yonder is Il constellation almost
merry with the play of light On earth
they were full of sympathies and songs
and tears and rapturcs and congatula-
tons When they prayed, their words
took fire; when they sang, the tune
could not hold them; when they wept
over worlds woes, they sobbed as if
hcartbrolien; when they worked for
Christ, they famed with enthusiasm
Ycnder they arc-circle of light, con-
stellation of JOY, galaxy Of fire. Oh,
that you and |, by that grace which can
: transform the worst into the best. might
at last sail i'll the wake of that fleet and
wheel i'll that glorious group as the
stars forever and cver
Again, Christian workers will shine
like the stars in swiftness of motion
The worlds do not stop to shine. There
are no fixed stars, save as to relative
position. The star apparently most thor
oughly fixed flies thousands of miles a
minute The astronomer, using his tele-
scope for an alpenstock, leaps from
world crag to world crag and finds no
star standing still The chamois hunter
has to fly to catch his prey, but not so
swift is his game as that which the sci
enlist tries to shoot through the tower
of observatory Like petrels midatlan-
tic, that seem to come from no shore,
and be bound to no landing place, fly
ing, flying so these great fioclls Of
worlds rest not as they go, wing and
wing, ago after age. forever and ever
The eagle hastcs to its prey, but we
shall in speed beat the eagles You have
noticed the velocity of the swift horse
under whose feet the miles slip like a
smooth ribbon, and as he passes the
fonr hoofs strike the earth in such quick
beat your pulses take the same vibra-
ton, but all these things are not swift
in comparison with the motion of which
speak The moon moves 81, 900 miles
il IL day Yonder Neptune flashes on
1000 miles in an hour Yonder Mer-
curry goes 100, 900 miles in an hour. So
like the stars the Christian shall shine
in swiftness of motion
With the Speed of Star.
You hear now of father or mother Or
child sick 1000 miles away, and it
takes you two days to get to them You
hear of some case of suffering that de-
mands your immediate attention, but it
takes you an hour to get there. Oh, the
JOY when you shall, in fulfllment of
the text, take starry speed and be equal
to 100, 600 miles an hourl Having on
earth got used to Christian work. you
will not quit when death strikes you
You will only take on more velocity.
There is dying child in London, and
it's spirit must be taken up to God. You
are there in an instant to do it. There
is young man in New York to be ar
rested from going into that gate of sin
You are there in all instant to arrest
him Whether with spring Of foot or
stroke OF wing. or by the force of some
new law that shall hurl you to the spot
where you would go, | know not, but
my text suggests velocity. All space
open before you, with nothing to him
der you in mission of light and love
and JOY, you shall shine in swiftness OF
motion as the stars forever and ever
Again, Christian workers, like the
stars, shine in magnitude. The most il
literate man knows that these things in
the sky, looking like gilt buttons are
great masses of matter To weigh
them one would think that it would re-
quiro scales with pillar hundreds Of
thousands of miles high and chains hun
dreds of thousands of miles long, and
at the bottom of the chains basins ON