Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1898-06-01
SERMONS OF THE DAY
The Subject. "AlleviatioDs of War; Most
Pertinent to the Exciting Times
Through Which We Are Now Passing
Cheer For Those Whose Hearts Are Sad


Cheer For Those Whose Hearts Are Sad
TEXT: Though war should rise against
me, in this will 1 be confident. Psalms
81, iii.
The ring of battle-axes and the clash or
shields, and the tramp of armies are heard
all up and down the Old Testament; and
You find godly soldiers like Moses, and
Joshua, and Caleb, aud Gideon, and
scoundrelly soldiers like Sennacherib and
Shalmaneser, and Nebuchadnezzar. The
High Priest would stand at the head of the
army and say: Hear, o Israel, We ap-
proach this dav unto battle against your
enemies, let not your hearts faint; fear not.
and do not tremble. neither be ye terrified
because of them!" and then the officers
wonld give command to the troops, say
ing: what man is there that hath built
new house and hath not dedicated it? Let
him go and return to his house, lest he die
in the battle and another man dedicate it.
And what man is he that hath planted IA
vineyard and hath not eaten of it? Let him
also go and return unto his house lest he
die in the battle and another man eat of it..
And what man is there that hath betrothed
Il wife and hath not taken her? Let him
20 and return unto his house, lest he die in
battle and another man take her" Great
armies marched and fought. In the time
of Moses and Joshua all the men were sol-
dicrs. When Israel came out of Egypt
there were 600 900 fighting men. Abiiah
800, 900 men, OF whom 500, 900 were slain in
one battle. Some of these wars God ap-
proved, for they were for the rescue of on
pressed nations, aud some of them He
denounced, but in all cases it was iudg4
lnent upon both vfctor5 and vanquiShed.
David knew Just what war was when he's
wrote in the text s'Though war should rise
against me, in this will be confident"
David is here encouraging himself in
stormy times, and before approaching bat
1l1fp pi-tf TO ~, Inf
SO today my theme is the ''Alleviations of
War" War is organized atrocity. 1t is
the science of assassination. 1t is the con-
vocation of all horrors. 1t is butchery
wholesale. 1t is murder glorified. 1t is
death on n throne of human skeletons. 1t
is the coffin in ascendancy. 1t is diabolisfH
at game of skulls. And the time is coming
when war Will ne an impossbility. How
far in. the future L cannot say, but there
will be Il museum of curiOsities in which
father and son will one day he walking,
and the son will say, What Is that sharp,
curved Instrument" and the father will
reply, THAT is a sword" And the SON
will say, what are those round pieces OF
ironT and the father will reply, "Those ard
bullets and cannon balls and bombshells!
Those are the things with which in the
Dark Ages people killed each other" Yet
the father will have hard work to make the
son believe that such things We're ever
used for the destruction of human life.
but tnat time mas mol yet arrived, ana
havidg on other occasions spoken to you
of the "Aggravations of War" now that
war is actually here it is time to speak of
its alleviations.
First, / find an alienation in the fact that
it has consolidated the North and South
after long-continued strained relations. 1t
is thirty-three years since our Civil War
closed, and the violences are all gone and
the severities have been huehed. But ever
and anon, in grafton, in sermon, in news
paper editorial, in magazine article, on
political stump, and In Congressional hall,
the old sectional difference has lifted its
head: and for the first time within my mem
ory, or the memory of any one who hears
or reads these words, the North and the
South are one. 1t was not four years
war, but fifty years war: war of tongue,
war of pen, war of printing press. But by
Il marvellous providence, the family that
led in opposition to our Government thirty
years ago. is represented at the front in
this present war. Nothing else could have,
done the work of unication so suddenly
or so completely rs this conflict. At Tampa
at Chattanooga. at Richmond. and in many
other places the regiments are forming, and
it will be side by side, Massachusetts and
Alabama, New York and Georgia, Illinois
and Louisiana, Maine and South Carolina.
Northern and Southern men will together
unlinber the guns and rush upon the forti-
tcation and charge upon the enemy and
shout the triumph. The voices of military
officers who were under Sidney Johnson
and Joseph Hooker will give the command
on the same side. The old sectional
grudges forever dead. The name of Grant
on the Northern side and of Lee on the
Southern side will be exchanged for the
names of Grant and Lee on the same side
The veterans in Northern and Southern
homes and asylums are stretching theiI
rheumatic limbs to see whether they can
again keep step in Il march, and are testing
their eyesight to find whether they can
again look along the gun-barrel to success
fully take aim and fire. The old war crH
of ''On to Richmondi' and "On to Washt
ingtonl'' has become the war cry of ON
to Havanal'' ''On to Porto Rico!'' "On td
the Philippine Islandsr' The two old rusty
swords that in other days clashed at MUIR
freesboro and South Mountain and Atlantay
are now lifted to strike down Hispanic
denominations.
Another alleviation of the war is the fact
that it Is the most unselfish war of the
ages. While the commercial rights of our
wronged citizens will be vindicated, that
is not the chief idea of this war. 1t IS the
rescue of hundreds of thousands of people
from starvation and multiform maltreat-i
ment. friend who went out under the
flag of the Red Cross two years ago to as
suage suffering in Armenia, and who has
been on the same mission, under the SAND
flag, in Cuba, says that the suiferings in
Armenia were a comedy and q farce com,
I =
At least two hundred thousand graves are
calling to us to come on and remember by
what process their occupants died. 1t Is the
twentieth century crying out to the nine
teenth: 'Doyou mean to pass down to US
the curse with which YOU have been blastedf
Or will you let me begin under new aus
| pices and turn the island of desolation into
an island Edenic?'
| 1t is n war inspired by mercy, which is an
| attribute in man initiative of the same at
Z frii. ..Nfl l...l In, 9TH of hn
| world could such a war have been waged.
| The gospel of kindness needed to be recog
/ nized throughout Christendom in order to
/ make such war possible. The chief rea-
| son why most of the European nations are
| not now banded together against us is be-
cause they dare not take the part of that
| behemoth of cruelty, the Spanish Govern
ment, against the crusade OF mercy which
our nation has started. Had it been on our
| part war of conquest, war OF annexa-
| ton, a war of aggrandizement,t there would
have been by this time enough flying
! squadrons coming to this country across
! the Atlantic to throw into panic every city
| on our American seaboard.
| The wars of the Crusaders were only to
regain an empty sepulchre: the Napoleonic
wars, with their six million slaughtered
men, were projected and carried out to ap-
| pease the ambition of one man; OF the twen-
| ty-6ve million slain in Jewish wars, and of
the sixty million slain in the wars under
Julius Cesar; of the one hundred and eighty
million slain in wars with Turks and Sara
Gems; of the fifty million slain in wars with
Xerxes; of the twenty million slain in wars
of Justinian; and the tbirty-two million
slain in the wars of Genghis Kahn, not one
man was sacrificed for mercy; but in this
| Hispanic- American war every drummer
| boy, or picket, or gunner, or standard
| bearer, or skirmisher, or sharpshooter. or
cavnlryman, or artilleryman, or engineer
who falls, fails in the cause of mercy, and
becomes a martyr for God and his country.
Another alleviatIon of this war is that
it Is for the advancement of the sublime
principle of liberty, which will yet engirdle
the earth. Not only will this war FREQ
Cuba, but finally will free Spain. By what
right does dynasty like that stand, and a
corrupt court dominate a people for CEN
turies taxing them to death, riding in
i Of q