Connecticut western news., 1897-04-29

spread out their color in the morning hourl But they are always asleep when the sun is going down. Job had plenty in Uz, but when his property went and the trials came then there were none so much that pestered as Eliphaz the Te- mantle, and Bildad the Shuhite, and Zophar the Naamathite.
 Life often seems to be mere game, where the successful player pulls down all the other men into his own lap Let suspicious arise about mans charac- ter. and he becomes like bank in him and break down in a day that character which in due time would have had strength to defend itself. There are reputations that have been half 0 century in building which go down under one push, as vast temple is con stunned by the touch of sulphurous match. A hog can uproot century plant.
 In this world, so full of heartlessness and hypocrisy, how thrilling it is to find some friend as faithful in days of adversity as in days of prosperity? Da- vid had such friend in Hushai; the Jews had such friend in Mordecai, who never forgot their cause; Paul had such friend in Onesiphorus, who vis- ited him in jail; Christ had such in the Marys, who adhered to him on the cross; Noalni had such a one in Ruth, who cried out: "Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from following after thee, for whither thou goest I will go, and whither thou lodgest will lodge. Thy people shall be my people, and thy God my God Where thou diest will die, and there will be buried. The Lord do SO to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me.
 After storm. Sunshine.
 Again, I learn from this subject that paths which open in hardship and dark ness often come out in places of joy. When Ruth started from Moab toward Jerusalem to go along with her mother in-law, suppose the people said: "Oh, what foolish creature to go away from her fathers house; to go of with poor old woman toward the land of Judahl They won't live to get across the desert They will be drowned in the sea, or the jackals of the wilderness will destroy them." It was a very dark morning when Ruth started of with Naomi. But behold her in my text in the harvest field of Boaz, to be aff1anced to one of the lords of the land and become one of the grandmothers of Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. And so it often is that path which often starts very darkly ends very brightly.
 When you started out for heaven, oh, how dark was the hour of conviction; how Sinai thundered and devils tor mented and the darkness thickenedl All the sins of your life bounced upon you and it was the darkest hour you ever saw when you first found out your sins. After awhile you went into the harvest field of Gods mercy. You began to glean in the fields of divine promise and you had more sheaves than you could carry as the voice of God addressed you saying, Blessed is the man whose trans gression are forgiven and whose sins are covered" A very dark starting in con- viction, very bright ending in the par don and the hope and the triumph of the gospeli
 So, very often in our worldly business or in our spiritual career we start of on a very dark path. We must go. The flesh may shrink back, but there is voice within, or voice from above, saying, "You must go." And we have to drink the gall, and we have to carry the cross, and we have to traverse the desert, and we are pounded and failed of misrepresentation and abuse, and we have to urge our way through 10000 obstacles that have been slain by our own right arm. We have to ford the river, we have to climb the mountain, we have to storm the castle, but, blessed be God, the day of rest and reward will come. On the tip top of the captured battlements we will shout the victory; if not in this world, then in that world where there is no gall to drink, no bur dens to carry, no battles to fight How do know it? Know itl I know 1t be- cause God says so: 'They shall hunger no more, neither thirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat, for the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall lead them to living foun tains of water, and God shall wipe all tears from their eyes."
 It was very hard for Noah to endure the scoffing of the people in his day, while he was trying to build the ark and was every morning quizzed about his old boat that would never be of any practical use; but when the deluge came and the tops of the mountains dis appeared like the backs of sea monsters, and the elements, lashed up in fury, clapped their hands over a drowned world, then Noah in the ark rejoiced in his own safety and in the safety of his family and looked out on the wreck of a ruiEed earth.
 Christ, bounded of prosecutors, de- nied a pillow, worse maltreated than the thieves on either side of the cross, human hate smacking its lips in satis- faction after it had been draining its last drop of blood, the sheeted dead bursting from the sepulchers at his cru cifixion! Tell me, O Gethsemane and Golgotha, were there ever darker times than those? Like the booming of the midnight sea against the rock, the surges of Christ's anguish beat against the gates of eternity, to be echoed back by all the thrones of heaven and all the dungeons of hell. But the day of re- ward comes for Christ. All the pomp and dominion of this world are to be hung on his throne, crowned heads are to bow before him on whose head are many crowns, and all the celestial wor- ship is to come up at his feet, like the humming of the forest, like the. rushing of the waters, like the laundering of the seas, while all heaven, rising on their thrones, beat time with their scepters,
 'Halleluiah, for the Lord God omnipo- tent reigneth.
 That song of love- now low and far,
 Ere long shall swell from star to star;
 That light, the breaking day which tips
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