The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1898-10-14

children; / am not talking about that
What about your influence upon the
twentieth century, upon the thirtieth
century, upon the fortieth century,
upon the year 5000, upon the year 4O00
II the world lasts so long? The world
stood 1000 years before Christ came; 1t
is not unreasonable to suppose that IL
may stand 1000 years after His arrival
-Four thousand years the world swung
off in sin, 1000 years it may be swing
ing back into righteousness. BY the
ordinary rate of multiplication of the
worlds population in century, your
descendants will be over 300, and by two
centuries over $4,000, and upon every
one of them, you, the mother of to-day,
will have an influence for good or
evil. And IL in four centuries your de-
scendauts shall have with their names
filed a scroll of hundreds of thou
sands with some angel from Heaven,
to whom is given the capacity to cal
culate the number of stars of
Heaven and the sands of the
seashore, step down and tell
us how many descendants you will
have in the four thousandth year of
the worlds possible continuanceP Do
not let the grandmothers any longer
think that they are retired, and sit
clear back out of sight from the world,
feeling that they have no relation to
it. The mothers of the last century
are to-day in the person of their de-
scendants, in the senates, the parlia-
ments, the palaces, the pulpits, the
H.. III. H.. 4.
chairs, the prisons, the almshouses,
the company of midnight brigands, the
cellars, the bitches of the country.
You have been thinking about the inn
portance of having the right influence
upon one nursery. You have been
thinking of the Importance of getting
those two little feet on the right path.
You have been thinking of your child's
destiny for the next 80 years, If it
should pass on to be an octogenarian.
That is well, but my subject sweeps a
thousand years, a million years, a
quadrillion of years. | cannot stop at
one cradle, l am looking at the cradles
that reach all around the world and
across all time. | am not talking of
Mother Eunice. am talking of
Grandmother Lois. The only way you
can tell the force of current is by
sailing up stream; or the force of an
ocean wave by running the ship
against it. Running along with it
we cannot appreciate the force.
In estimating material influence we
generally run along with it down the
stream of time, and so we don't under
stand the full force. Let us come up
to it from the eternity side, after it
has been working on for centuries, and
see all the good it has done and all
the evil it has accomp lished multiplied
in magnificent or appalling compound
interest. The difference between that
mothers influence on her children now
and the influence when il has been
multiplied in hundreds of thousands
of lives, is the difference between the
Mississippi river away up at the top
OF the continent starting from the lit
tie Lake ltasca, seven miles long and
one wide, and its mouth at the Gulf of
Mexico. where navies might ride. Be
tween the birth of that river and it's
burial in the sea the Missouri pours
in, and the Ohio pours in, and the
Arkansas pours in, and the Red and
White and the Yazoo rivers pour in,
and all the states aud territories be
tween the Allegheny and Rocky noun
tains make contribution. Now, in or
der TO test the power of mothers in
luence, we need 10 come in off the
ocean of eternity and sail up toward
the one cradle, and we will find 10, 900
tributaries of influence pouring in and
pouring down. But il is after all one
great river of power rolling on and
rolling forever. Who can fathom it,?
Who can bridge it? Who can stop IT?
Had not mothers better be intensity
ing their prayers? Had they not bet
ter be elevating their example? Had
they not better be rousing themselves
with the consideration that by their
faithfulness or neglect they are start
ing an influence which will be stu
pendous after the last mountain Of
earth is fiat, and the last sea has dried
up, and the last fake of the ashes of a
consumed world shall have been blown
away, and all the telescopes of other
worlds directed to the track around
NllANh Jul WI AA bllAN nN hllI Hllull us
cover not so much AS cinder of the
burned-down and swept-off planetP In
Ceylon there is Il granite column 80
square feet in size, which is thought
by the natives to decide the worlds
continuance. An angel with robe
spun from zephyrs is once century to
descend and sweep the hem of that
robe across the granite, and when by
that attrition the column is worn
away they say time will end. But by
that process that granite column would
be worn ont of existence before
mothers influence will begin to give
way.
If mother tell n child IL he is not
good some bugaboo will come and
catch him, the fear excited may make
the child a coward, and the fact that
he finds that there is no bugaboo may
make him a liar, and the echo of that
false alarm may be heard after fifteen
generations have been born and have
expired. If mother promises a child
a reward for good behavior, and after
the good behavior forgets to give the
reward, the cheat NAV crop out In some