The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1898-06-17

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hymns of William Cowper, Charles
Wesley and Isaac Watts Suppose now
each person i'll an audience has brought
all the annoyances of the last 365 days.
Fill the room to the ceiling with sacred
song, and you would drown out all
those annoyances of the last 365 days,
and you would drown them out forever.
Organ and cornet are only to marshal
the voice. Let the voice fall into line
and in companies and in battalions by
storm take the obduracy and sin of the
world. If you cannot sing for yourself,
sing for others. By trying to give 9th
ers good cheer, you will bring good
cheer to your own heart.
When Londonderry, Ireland, was be-
sieged many years ago, the people inside
the city were furnishing and vessel
came up with provisions, but the vessel
ran on the river bank and stuck fast.
The enemy went down with laughter
and derision to board the vessel, when
the vessel gave broadside fire against
the enemy and by the shock was turned
back into the stream and all was well.
Oh, ye who are high and dry on the
rocks of melancholy, give broadside
fire of song against your spiritual enc
mics, and by holy rebound you will
come out into the calm waters If we
want to make ourselves happy, we must
make others happy. Mythology tells us
of Amphion, who played his Tyre until
the mountains were moved and the
walls of Thebes arose, but religion has
a mightier story to tell of how Christian
song may build whole temples of eter-
nal joy and lift the round earth into
sympathy with the skies.
A Heavenly Clock.
I tarried many nights in London, and
I used to hear the bells, the small bells
of the city, strike the hour of night,
2, 8, 4-and among them the great st.
Paul's cathedral would come in to mark
the hours, making all the other sounds
seem utterly insignificant as with
mighty tongue it announced the hour of
the night, every stroke an overmaster
ing boom. My friends, it was intended
that all the lesser sounds Of the world
should be drowned out in the mighty
tongue of congregational song beating
against the gates of heaven. Do you
know how they mark the hours in
heaven? They have no clocks, as they
have no candles. but great pendulum
Of halleluiah swinging across heaven
from eternity 70 eternity,
Let those refuse to sing
Who never knew our God,
But children Of the Heavenly King
Should speak their joys abroad.
Again, I remark that sanctuary help
ought to come from the sermon. OF
/, 900 People IN any audience how
many want sympathetic help2 Do you
guess 100? Do you guess 5o6f You have
guessed wr6hg ] will tell yoq just the
proportion. Out of 1. 900 people in any
audience there are just 1, 900 who need
sympathetic help These young people
want it Just as much as the old. The
old people sometimes seem To think they
havs & monopoly of the rheumatism,
and the neuralgias, and the headaches,
and the physical disorders of the world
but tell You there are no worse heart
aches than are felt by some of the young
people. Do you know that much of the
work is done by the young? Raphael
died at 81, Richelieu at 81, Gustavus
Adolphus died at SS, innocent i'll came
to his mightiest influence at 81. Cortes
Mexico at 80, Don John won
Lepanto at 20, GTotius was attorney
general at "a, and ! have noticed amid
I'll classes Of men that some Of the Sc.
verest battles and the toughest work
come before 80. Therefore we must
have our sermons and our exhortations
in prayer meeting all sympathetic With
the young. And SO witn these people
farther on, an life. What do these doc.
Tors and lawyers and merchants and
mechanics care about the distractions
Of religion? What they want is help to
bear the whimsicalities of patients, the
browbeating of legal opponents, the I'M
fairness of customers who have plenty !
of fault finding for every imperfection
of handiwork, but no praise for 20 ex-
cellences. What does the brain racked,
hand blistered man care for Zwingli's
'DOCUr1l6 Oh original OH Ut Angus
tines "Retractions?" You might as
we'll go to a man who has the pleurisy
and put on his side plaster made out
of Dr. PARIS Treatise on Medical Ju-
risprudence
Divine Prescription.
While all of a sermon may not be
helpful alike to all, if it be Christian
sermon, preached by Christian man,
there will be help for every one some
where We go into an apothecary's
store. We see others being waited on
We do not complain because we do not
Immediately get the medicine We know
our turn will come after awhile. And
so while all parts of a sermon may not
be appropriate to our case if we wait
prayerfully before the sermon is
through we shall have the divine pre-
scription. l say to young men who are
going to preach the gospel, we want in
our sermons not more metaphysics, nor
more imagination, nor more logic, nor
more profundity. What we want in
our sermons and Christian exhortations
is more sympathy. When Father Tay-
lor preached in the Sailors Bethel at
Boston, the Jack Tars felt they had help
for their duties among the ratlines and