Peninsula enterprise. [volume] (Accomac, Va.) 1881-1965, 1898-10-15

and dwell tearfully over the family rec
ord half way between. We hail them
today, whether in the house of God or
at the homestead. Blessed is that house
hold that has in it Grandmother Lois.
Where she is angels are lowering round,
and God is in the room. May her last
days be like those lovely autumnal days
that we call Indian summer!
Is it not time that you and do two
things swing open picture gallery of
the wrinkled faces and stopped Shout
ders of the past and call down from
their heavenly thrones tho godly grand
mothers, to give them our thanks, and
then to persuade the mothers of today
that. they are living for all time and
that against tho sides Of every cradle in
which Il child is rocked beat the two
eternitics?
CrudIcs Across All Time.
Here we have an untried, undiscussed
and unexplored subject. You often hear
about your influence upon your own
children. am not talking about that
What about your influence upon the
twentieth century, upon the thirtioth
century, upon the fortieth century, up
on the year 1000, upon the year 1000,
if the world lasts so longi The world
stood 4, 600 years before Christ came.
1t is not unreasonable 10 suppose that
it may stand 1000 years after his ar
rival Four thousand years the world
swung off in sin, 4, 600 years it may be
swinging back into righteousness By
the ordinary rate of multiplication of
the worlds population i'll a century
your descendants will be over 300, and
by two centuries over SO, 600, and upon
every one of them you, the mother of
today, will have an influence for good
or evil. And if in four centuries your
descendants shall have with their names
filled scroll of hundreds of thousands
will some angel from heaven. TO whom
is given the capacity to calculate the
number of the 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
world possible continuance? 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 moth
ers of the last century are today, in the
person of their descendants, in the SCH
ates, the parliaments the palaces, the
pulpits, the banking houses, the profess
sional chairs, the prisons, the aims
houses, the company of midnight brig
ands, the cellars, the bitches of this
century. You have been thinking about
the Importance of having the right in
hucnce upon one nursery. You have
been thinking of the importance of get
ting those two little feet on the right
path. You have been thinking of your
child's destiny for the next so years If
it should pass Oh to be Oh octogenarlan.
That ais well, but my subject sweeps
thousand years. a million years, a
quadrillion of years. | cannot stop at
one cradle; am looking at tho cradles
that reach all around tie world and
across all time. am not talking of
Mother Eunice. lam talking of Grand
mother 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
forco.
In estimating maternal 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 OH for centuries, and see
all the good it has done and all the evil
it has accomplished multiplied i'll mag
nifcent or appalling compound interest.
The difference Between that mothers
influence on her children now and the
influence when it 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 little Lake Itasca,
seven miles long and one wide, and its
mouth at the gulf of Mexico, where ma
yies might ride. Between the birth OF
that river and its burial in the sea the
Missouri pours in, and tie Ohio pours
in, and the Arkansas pours in, and the
Red and White and the Yazoo rivers
pour in, and all the states and terrific
ries between the Allegheny and Rocky
mountains make contribution. Now, in
order to test the power of mother s
influence, we need to come in off the
ocean of eternity and sail up toward
the one cradle, and we will find 10, 600
tributaries of influence pouring in and
pouring down. But it is, after all, one
great river of power rolling on and roll
ing forever. Who can fathom it? Who
can bridge it? Who can stop it? Had
not mothers better be intepsiiying their
prayers? Had they not better be elevat-
ing their example? Had they not better
be rousing themselves with the consid-
Grafton that by their faithfulness or
neglect they are starting au influence
which will he stupendous after the last
mountain of earth is fiat, and the last
sea has dried up, and the last flake of
the ashes Of consumed world shall
have been blown away, and all the tele-
scopes of other worlds directed to the
track around which our world once
swung shall discover not so much as
cinder of the burned down and swept
off planet. In Ceylon there is granite
column SO square feet in size, which is
thought by the natives to decide the
worlds continuance. An angel with
robe spun from zephyrs is once cen
fury 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 out of existence before moth
ers' influence will begin to give way.
On the Great Divide.