The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1898-11-24
WONDERS OF NATURE.
The Footprints of the Creator as
They Appear Everywhere.
Mountain and Plain Show Gods Impress;
Rivers and Deserts Show, Also,
the HandiwOrk OF the
Great Creator.

|
among the mighty wonders of the
great west, where he finds everywhere
the footprints of the Creator. The
texts are: Streams in the desert
Isaiah, NNNv., 6; He toucheth the hills
and they smoke.-Psainls, civ, 32.
My first text means irrigation. 1t
means the waters of the Himalaya, or
the pyreHees, or the Sierra Nevadas
poured through canals and aqueducts
for the fertilization of the valleys. 1t
means the process by whiceh the last
mile of American barrenness will be
made an apple orchard, or an orange
grove, or a wheat field, or a cotton
plantation, or vineyard-"stre
in the desert Ny second text means
a volcano like Nesuvius or Cotopaxi
or it means the geysers of Yellow
stone park or Of California. You see
a hill calm and still, and for ages i'm
| movable, but the Lord out of the
it, and from it rise thick and impress
Sive vapors: He toucheth the hills
and they smoke!'
Although my journey across the
| continent this summer was for the
eighth time, more and more am | i'm
pressed with the Divine hand in it's
construction, and with its greatness
and grandeur, and more and more am
| thrilled with the fact that it is all to
be irrigated, gloritied and Edenized.
! What a change from the time when
| Daniel Webster on yonder Captoline
hill said to the American senate in re-
gard to the center of this continent,
and to the regions on the Pacific
coast: what do you want with this
vast, worthless area, this region of
savages and wild beasts, of deserts
and cactus, of shifting sands and
prairie dogs? To what use could we
ever put these great deserts or these
jcovered with eternal snow? What can
we ever hope to do with the western
coast, rock-bound, cheerless and un-
inviting, and not a harbor on it? l
Twill never vote one cent from the pub
lie treasury to place the Pacific coast
one inch nearer Boston than it now
is What mistake the great states
man made when he said that! All
who have crossed the continent realize
that the states ON the Pacific ocean
will have quite as grand opportunities
as the states on the Atlantic, and all
this realm from sea to sea to be the
Lords cultivated possession.
Do you know what in some respects
is the most remarkable between the
Atlantic and Pacific? 1t is the figure
of cross on a mountain in Colorado
1t is called the Mount of the Holy
Cross" A horizontal crevice filled
with perpetual snow, and a perpendic-
the horizontal line and the perpendic-
ular line so marked, so bold, so signifi-
cant, so unmistakable. that all who
pass in the daytime within many miles
are compelled to see it. There are
some figures, some contours, some
mountain appearances that you grad
ually make out after your attention is
called to them. So Il mans face on the
rocks in the White mountains. So a
maiden's form cut in the granite of the
Adirondacks. So city in the moving
clouds. Yet you have to look under
the pointing of your friend or guide
for some time before you can see the
similarity. But the first instant you
glance at this side of the mountain ir
Colorado, you cry out: "a cross! A
cross!" Do you say that this geologi
cal inscription just happens so? No!
That cross on the Colorado mountain
is not a human device, or an accident
of nature. or the freak of an earth
quake The hand of God cut it there
and set it up for the nation to look at
Whether set up in rock before the
cross of wood was set up on the bluff
back of Jerusalem, or set up at some
time since that assassination, l be
lieve the Creator meant it to sugges
the most notable event in all the his
tory of this planet. and He hung i
there over the heart of this continent
to indicate that the only hope for thi:
nation is in the cross on which ou1
| Emmanuel died. The clouds were vo
cal at our S;aviour'S birth, the rocks rem
at His martyrdom, why not the wall:
of Colorado bear the record of the cru
cifixion?
First, consider the immensity o1
this continental possession. If it were
only a small tract of land capable o1
nothing better than sage-brush, ane
with ability only to support prairie
dogs, / should not have much enthu
sasm in wanting Christ to have itadd
ed to His dominion. But its i'm
mensity and atfiuence no one car
imagine, unless, in immigrant wagor
or stage coach, or in rail train of the
Union Pacific or the Northern Pacific
or the Canadian Pacific or the South
ern Pacific, he has traversed it.
1 supposed in my boyhood, from it:
size on the map, that California was ;
few yards across, ridge of land OF