The weekly intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1891-1901, 1897-03-27

V Filled with Blood
A& uaM"Do you really be
I8R\ WWNW E lieve there is q
N&A ~S-r I'm literal application
W&@tk AEaAM Mfof the blood of
@Hn""w W"" Christ to the soul?'
REV TALMAGE' My negative reply
then is my negative reply now. The
Bible statement agrees with all physi-
clans, and all Psychologists, and all
scientists, in saying that the blood is
the life, and in the Christian religion
it mean simply that Christ's life was
given for our life. Hence all this talk
of men who say the Bible story of
blood is disgusting, and that they don't
want what they call u "slaughter-
house religion" only shows their in
capacity or unwillingness to look
through the figure of speech toward
the thing signified. The blood that,
on the darkest Friday the world ever
saw, oozed, or trickled, or poured from
the brow, and the side, and the hands,
and the feet of the illustrious sufferer,
back of Jerusalem, in a few hours
coagulated and dried up, and forever
disappeared; and if man had depended
on the application of the literal blood
of Christ, there would not have been a
soul saved for the last Is centuries.
In order to understand this red word
of my text, we only ave to exercise as
much common sense in religion as we
do in everything else. Pang for pang,
hunger for hunger, fatigue for fatigue,
tear for tear, blood for blood, life for
life, we see every day illustrated. The
act of substitution is no novelty, al
though l near men talk as though the
idea of Christ's suffering substituted
for u suffering were something alb
normal. something distressingly odd,
something wildly eccentric, "a solitary
episode in the worlds history; when /
could take you out into this city. and
before shutdown point you to 500 cases
of substitution and voluntary suffering
of one in behalf of another.
At two o'clock tomorrow afternoon
go among the places of business or
toll. 1t will be no difficult thing for
you to find men who, by their looks,
show you that they are overworked.
They are prematurely old. They are
fastening rapidly toward heir decease.
They have rome through crises in bust
ness that shattered their nervous sys-
tenn and pulled on the brain. They
have a shortness of breath and u pain
in the back of the head, and at night
an insomnia that alarms them. Why
are they drudging at business early
and late? For fun? No; it would be
difficult to extract any amusement out
of hat exhaustion. Because they are
avaricious? In many cases no. Be
u their w personal expenses are
lavish? No; q few hundred dollars
would meet all their wants. The SIM
pie fact is, the man is enduring all
hat fatigue and evaporation, and
wear and tear. to keep his home pros
porous. There IS an invisible line
reaching from that store, from
that bank, from that shop, from
that scaffolding, to u quiet scene
a few blocks away, a few miles away,
and there is the secret of that business
endurance. He is simply the cham
pion of n homestead, for which he wins
bread, and wardrobe. and education,
and prosperity, and in such battle TO-
900 men fall. OF ten business men
whom | bury, nine die of Overwork for
others. Some sudden disease finds
them with no power of resistance, and
they are gone. Life for life. Blood
for blood. Substitution!
NJ OIC OClOCh ~ lAAHA AAAOA "a
the hour when slumber is most uninter-
rupted and profound. walk amid the
dwelling-houses of the great city.
Here and there you will find a dim
light, because it is the household GUS
tom to keep "a subdued light burning;
but most of the houses from base to
top are as dark as though uninhabited.
A merciful God has sent forth his arch
---o1 - 1o,o o-l hA n,fc hiS Vrtans
over the city. But yonder is a clear
light burning, and outside on the win
dow sen is a glass or pitcher con-
tanning food for a sick child; the food
is set in the fresh air. This is the
sixth night that mother has sat up
with that sufferer. She has to the last
point obeyed the physicians prescrip-
ton, not giving a drop too much or too
little, or a moment too soon or too late,
She is very anxious. for she has bur-
ried three children with the same dis
ease, and she prays and weeps, each
prayer and sob ending with a kiss OF
the pale cheek. By dint of kindness
she gets the little one through the
ordeal. After it is all over, the moth
err is taken down. Brain OF nervous
sets in, and one day she leaves
Int cOnNdltSCCHJ VI VIZ q AiOth
er's blessing and goes up to join the
three in the kingdom of Heaven. Life
for life, Substitution! The fact is
that there are an H%ncounted pumberof
mothers who, after they have navigated
n large number of children through all
the diseases of infantry. and got them
fairly started up the Towering slope of
bOyhOod and girlhOod, have only
strength enough left to die. They
fade away. Some call it consumption:
some call it nervous prOstrauion; some
call it intermittent or malarial indis-
position; but | call it martyrdom of the
domestic circle. Life for life. Blood
blood. substitution.
Or perhaps the mother fingers long
enough to see a son get on the wrong
and his former kindness becomes
reply when she expresses anxiety
about him, Bpt she goes right on,
looking carefully after his apparel, re
his every birthday with
some memepto, and when he is brought
home worno ont with dissipation, nurses
him till he gets well. and starts him
again, and hopes, and expects.
and prays. and %counsels, and suf-
fers, until her strength gives out and
she fails. h is going, ana attend
ants, bending over her pillow, nsk her
if she has any message to leave. and
she makes great effort to say some
but out of three or o minutes
indistinct utterancc they catch but
three words: MY poor boy" The
simple fact is she died for him. Life
for life. Substitution!
About rs years ego there went forth
from our northern and southern homes
hundreds of thousands of men - Do
battle for their country. All the
poetry OF wal soon vanished, and left
them nothing but the terrible prose,
They waded knee-deep in mud, They
slept in snowbnnks. They marched
till their cut feet tracked the earth.
They were swindled out of their h Onest
rations. and lived on meat not fit or a
dog. They had jaws all fractured, and
distinguished, and limbs shot
away. Thousands of them cried for
- -. Al. a - / L /