Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1897-11-06

the continent is TO cross IL or go 10 the
heart of it. Our standpoint in this
world is defective We are at the wrong
end of the telescope The best way to
study q piece of machinery is not to
stand Oh the doorstep and try to look in,
but to go in with the engineer and take
our place right amid the saws and the
cylinders. We wear our eyes out and
our brain out from the fact that we are
studying under such great disadvantage.
Millions of dollars for obseryatories
to study things about the moon, about
the sun, about the rings Of Saturn,
about transits and OSCILLATIONS and
eclipses, simply because our studio, our
observatory, is poorly situated. We are
down in tho cellar trying to study the
palace of tho universe, while our de-
parted Christian friends have gone up
stairs amid the skylights to study Now,
when ono can sooner get to the center
of things, is he not to be congratulated?
Who wants to DO always in the fresh
man class? We study God i'll this world
by tho Biblical photograph of him, but
VIC all know we can in five minutes Of
interview with a friend get more accu-
rate idea of him than we can by study
ing him so years through pictures or
words. The little child that died last
night knows more of God than all An
dover, and all Princeton, and all New
Brunswick, and all Edinburgh, and all
tho theological institutes in Christen-
DOM Is it not better to go up to the very
headquarters Of knowledge?
At the Center.
Does not our common sense teach US
that it is better to be at the center than
to be clear out on the rim of the wheel,
holding nervously fast to the tire, lest
we be suddenly hurled into light and
eternal felicity? Through all kinds of
optical instruments trying to peer in
through the cracks and the keyholes of
hcaven-afraid that both doors of the
celestial mansion will be swung wide
open before our entranced yision-rush-
ing about among the apothecary shops
of this world, wondering if this is good
for rheumatism and that is good for
neuralgia and something else is good
for bad cough, lest we be suddenly
ushered into land of everlasting health
! where the inhabitant never says, II am
sick. :"
What fools we all are to prefer the
circumference to the center. What q
dreadful thing it would be if we should
be suddenly ushered from this wintry
world into the Maytime orchards of
heaven and if our pauperism of sin and
sorrow should be suddenly broken up by
O presentation of an emperor's castle
surrounded by parks, with springing
fountains and paths up and down which
angels Of God walk two and two We
are like persons standing on the cold
steps of the national picture gallery IN
London under umbrella in the rain,
afraid to go in amid the Turner's and
the Titians and the Raphaels- leone to
them and say. why. don't you go in
side the gallery?' ''Oh, they say,
1--WE don t know whether we can get
in. say. Don't you see the door is
open?" Yes, " they say, "but we have
been so long on these cold steps, we are
SO attached to them, we don't like to
leave" But, say, sit is so much
brighter and more beautiful in the gal
lery; you had better go in. " mo, they
say, I'VE know exactly how it is out
! here, but we don't know exactly how it
is inside. %
So we stick to this world as though
we preferred cold drizzle to warm habi-
tation, discord to cantata sackcloth to
royal purple-as though we preferred a
piano with four or five of the keys out
of tune to an instrument fully attuned,
as though earth and heaven had ex-
changed apparel and earth had taken on
bridal array and heaven had gone into
deep mourning, all its waters stagnant,
all its harps broken, all chalices cracked
Mt the dry wells, all the lawns sloping
to the river plowed with graves, with
dead angels under the furrow. Oh,
want to break up my own infatuation
and | want to break up your infatuation
with this world tell you if we are
ready, and if our work is done, the
sooner we go the better, and if there ire
blessings in longevity want you to
know right well there are also blessings
IN an abbreviated earthly existence.
Fortunate Escapes.
If the spirit of this sermon is true,
how cousoled you ought to feel about
members of your family that went ear
ly. Taken from the evil to come, !"
this book says What fortunate escape
they had flow glad we ought to feel
that they will never have to 60 through
the struggles which we have had to go
through They had just time enough to
get out of the cradle and run up on the
springtime hills of this world and see
how it looked, and then they started for
Il better stepping place. They were like
ships that put i'll at St Helena. staying
there long enough to let passengers go
up and sec tie barracks of Napoleon S
captivity, and then hoist sail for the
port of their own native land. They on
ly took this world i'll transitu. 1t is hard
for US. but it is blessed for them.
And if the spirit of this sermon is
true, then we ought not to go around
signing and groaning when another
year is going, but we ought to go down
Oh one knee by the milestone and see
the letters and thanl, God that we are
965 miles nearer home We ought not
to go aroand with morbid feelings about
our health or about anticipated demise.
We ought to be living lot according to
that old maxim which used to hear in
my boyhood that you must live as
though every day were the last; you
must live as though you were to live
forever, for you will. Do not be nerv-
Gus lest you have to move out OF SHAH
ty into an Alhanbra.
One Christmas day witnessed some
thing very thrilling. We had just dis