The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1897-02-05

and he left it i'll ruins that men might
learn what a tickle thing is human ia
vor. "But the mercy Of the Lord il
from everlasting to everlasting to then
that fear him, and his righteousness
, unto the childrens children Of such as
keep his covenant ana to these who re
member his commandments to do them. >
This moment "seok him that maketl
the seven stars and OriCn."
A God of Love.
Again, Amos saw, as we must see,
that the God who made these two bea.
cons of the oriental night sky must be
God of love and kindly warning. The
Pleiades, rising in midsky, said to all the
herdsmen and shepherds and husband.
men, Come out and enjoy the mild
weather and cultivate your gardens and
fields" Orion, coming in winter warn
ed them to prepare for teneDest. All
navigation was regulated by these two
consultations. The one said to shipmas-
ter and CREW, "Hoist sail for the sea
and gather merchandise from other
lands. " But Orion was the storm sig
nal and said REEF sail; make things
snug or put into harbor, for the hurri-
canes are getting their wings out" AS
the Pleiades were the sweet evangels of
the spring, Orion was the warning
prophet of the winter
Oh, now I get the best view of God I
ever had! There are two sermons new
er want to preach-the one that presents
God SO kind, so indulgent, so lenient, so
imbecile that men may do what they
will against him and fracture his every
law and put the pry of their imperti-
nence and rebellion under his throne
and while they are splitting in his face
and stabbing at his heart he takes them
up in his arms and kisses their infuriat-
ed brow and cheek, saying, "Of such is
the kingdom of heaven The other
kind of sermon never want to preach
is the one that represents God as all fire
and torture and thundercloud and with
redhot pitchfork tossing the human
race into paroxysms of infinite agony.
The sermon that l am now preaching be-
lieves in God of loving, kindly warn
ing, the God of spring and winter, the
God of the Pleiades and Orion.
You must remember that the winter is
just as important as the spring. Let one
winter pass without frost to kill vegeta-
ton and ice to bind the rivers and snow to
enrich our fields, and then you will have
to enlarge your hospitals and your GEM
eteries. "A green Christmas makes d
fat graveyard" was the old proverb.
Storms to purify the air. Thermometer
at degrees below zero to tone up the
system. December and January Just as
important as May and June. l tell you,
we need the storms Of life as much as
we do the sunshine. There are more men
ruined by prosperity than by adversely.
If we had our own way in life, before
this we would have been representations
of selfishness and worldliness and dis.
gushing sin and pulled up until we
would have been like julius Caesar, who
was made by sycophants to believe that
he was divine, and the freckles on his
face were said to be as the stars of the
firmament.
The God of Orion.
One of the swiftest transatlantic voy-
ages made one summer by the Etruria
was because she had stormy wind
abaft chasing her from New York to
Liverpool. But to those going in the OPP
posite direction the storm was buffet
ing and hindrance. 1t is bad thing
to have storm ahead, pushing US back,
but if we be Gods children and aiming
toward heaven theStorms of life will
w ,.hocn ,,c tho init
Dor [ am so CAD to believe that the
monsoOns, typhoons and mistrals and
sirOccoS of the land and sea are not I'M
chained maniacs let loose upon the
earth, but are under divine supervision.
l am so glad that the God of the seven
stars is also the God of Orion. 1t was
out of Dante's suffering came the sub
lime "Divina Commedia, and out of
John Millions blindness came Para
disc Lost, " and out of miserable infidel
attack came the ." Bridgewater Treatise"
in favor of Christianity, and out of
David's exile came the songs of conso-
lation, and out of the sufferings of Christ
came the possibility Of the worlds re-
and out of your bereavement,
Jul pclStCutlOllJ yOuI pONeTJleS, your |
may yet come an eternal |
heaven.
Oh, what a mercy it is that in the
text and all up and down the Bible God |
induces us to look out toward other |
worlds! Bible astronomy in Genesis, in
Joshua, in Job, in the Psalms in the |
prophets, major and minor, i'll St
Johns Apocalypse, practically saying:
Worlds, worlds, worlds! Get ready
for themp' We have nice little world
here that we stick to, as though losing
that we lose all. We are afraid of falling
off this little raft of a world. We are
afraid that some meteoric iconoclast
will some night smash it, and we want
everything to 1evolve around it and are
when we find that it re-
wolves around the sun instead of the sun
revolving around it. What a fuss we
make about this little bit of aworld, its
existence only short time between two
spasms, the paroxysm by which it was
hurled from chaos into order, and the
paroxysm of its demolition.
And l am glad that so many texts call
rs to look off to other worlds, many of
-hpnn LARGER and orrander and moro 70