The weekly intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1891-1901, 1898-03-26

for a position = little higher than that
which God intended them. The bonds
woman wants To be mistress. llaGar
keeps crowGinr Sarah. The small
wheel OF n watch which beautifully
went treading its golden pathway
wants TO be the balance wheel, and the
sparrow with chagrin drops into the
brook because it cannot, like the eagle,
put u circle under the sun.
In the Lords army we all want to
be b~rigadier generals! The sloop says:
More mast, more tonnage, more can
vas. Oh, that were a topsail schooner.
or n fuIl-rigged brig, or a Cuuard
steamer And so the world is filed
with cries Of discomfort, because we
are not willing to stay in the place
where God put us and intended US to
be. My friends, be not too proud to do
anything God tells you to do; for the
lack of a right disposition in this re-
spect the world is strewu with wan
dering Hagars and Ismaels. God has
given each one of us a work to do. You
carry q scuttle of coal up that dark
alley. You distribute that Christian
tract. You give $40, 900 to the mis-
siouary cause. You for Is years
sit with chronic rheumatism, dis
playing the beauty of Christian
submission. Whatever God calls
you to, whether it win kissing or
huZza; whether to walk under trlum-
phal arch or lift the sot out of the
ditch; whether II be to preach or u
Pentecost or tell some wanderer of the
street of the mercy of the Christ of
Mary Magdalene; whether It be to
weave a garland for a laughing child
on a spring morning and call her a
May Queen, or to comb out the tangled
locks of a waif OF the street, and cut
up one of your old dresses to fit her out
for the sanctuary-do it, and do it
right away. Whether it be a crown or
a yoke, do not f1dget. Everlasting hon
ors upon those who do their work, and
do their whole work, and are contented
in tho sphere in which God has put
them; while there is wandering, and
exile, and desolation, and wilderness
for discontinued Hngar and Ishmael.
Again, l find In this Oriental scene a
lesson of sympathy with woman when
she goes forth trudging In the desert.
What q great change it was for this
Hagar! There was the tent, and all
the surroundings of A%braham's house,
beautiful and luxurious no doubt.
Now she is going out into the hot
sands of the desert. Oh, what a
change it was! And in our day we
often see the wheel of fortune turn.
Here is some one who lived in the very
bright home of her father. She had
everything possible to administer to
her happiness-plenty at the table,
music in the drawing room, welcome
at the door. She is led forth into life
by some one who cannot appreciate
ka. lfaasV.ofnl SA,Nl nArnaa o-6
takes her out in the desert. Cruelties
blot out all the lights of that home
circle. Harsh words wear out her
spirits. The high hope that shone out
over the marriage altar while the ring
was being set and the vows given, and
the benediction pronounced, have all
faded with the orange blossoms, and
there she is to-day brokenhearted,
thinking of the past joys and present
~desolation and coming anguish. Hagar
In the wilderness!
Here is a beautiful home. You can
not think Of anything that can be
added to 1t. For years there q not
been the suggestion of a single trou-
BILE. Bright and happy children I'LL
the house with laughter and song.
Books to read. Pictures to look at.
Lounges to rest on. Cup of domestic
Joy full and running over. Dark night
drops- Pillow hot. Pulses flutter.
Eyes close. And the foot whose we'll
known steps on the door-sill brought
the whole household out at eventide
crying, Fathers coming!" will never
sound on the door.sill again. A long,
deep grief plowed through all that
brightness of domestic life Paradise
lost. Widowhood. Hegar in the will
dernessl
How often is it we see the weak arm
of woman conscripted for this battle
with the rough world. Who Is she,
going down the street in the early
light of the morning, pale with ex-
hausting work, not half slept out with
the slumbers of last night. tragedies
of suffering written all over her face,
h4r lusterless eyes looking far ahead,
as though for the coming of some
other trouble? Her parents called her
Mary, or Bertha, or Agnes, on the
day when they held her up to
the font and the Christian minister
sprlnkied on the infant's face the
washings of q holy baptism Her
name is changed now. I hear it in the
shuttle of the WORKOUT shoes l see 1t
in. the figure of the faded calico. I
find 1t in the lineaments of the woe
BECOME countenance. Not Mary, nor
Bertha, nor Agnes, but Hagar in the
wilderness. May God have mercy on
woman in her tolls, her struggles, her
hardships, her desolation, and may the
great heart of divine sympathy inclose
her foreverl
Again, l find in this Oriental scene
the fact that every mother leads forth
tremendous d~estinies. You say: That
isn't an unusual scene, a mother lead
ing her child by the hand" Who is
that she is lesdingP Ishmael, you say.
Who is Ishmael? A great nation is to
be founded-a nation so strong that 1t
Is to stand for thousands of years
against all the armies of the world.
Egypt and Assyria thunder against it,
but in vain. Gaulus brings up his
army, and his army is smitten. Alex
Gnder decides upon a campaign. brings
mp his hosts, and dies. For a long
while that nation monopolizss the
learning of the world. 1t is the ma
ton of the Arabs. Who founded it?
Ishmael, the lad that Hagar led into
wilderness She had no idea she was
leading forth such destinies. Neither
does any mother. You pass along the
street and see and pass boys and girls
who will yet make the earth quake
with their influence.
Who is that boy at Sutton Pool. Ply,
mouth, England, barefooted, wadinR
down into the slush and slime, until
his bare foot ONE upon a piece of
glass and he lifts 1t. bleeding and
pain-struck? That wound in the foot
that he be sedentary in his
life, decides that he be q student
wound by the glass in the foot
decides that he shall be John Kitto.
shall provide the best religious
encyclopaedia the world has ever had
provided, and with his other writings
as well, throwing q light Upon the
word of God such as has come from
no other man in this century,
o mother, mother, that little
that wanders over your face
may yet be lifted to hurl thunder
bolts OF war or drop benedictionsi
little voice may blaspheme God
in the groR-shop or cry "Forward!' to
the Lords hosts as they go out for
.I-s. - -.