The Chanute times. [volume] (Chanute, Kan.) 1897-1913, 1898-12-09

anu Sohiihohuiu6 VI piSoShOo, iSSoiNOu
that he would take care of his fathers
household; but under the swoop Of
yellow fever at Fernandina, Fla, he
suddenly expired. So you know good
men and women who have had enough
troubles, you think, to crush fifty peo-
pie. No worldly philosophy could take
such a trouble and set 1t to music, or
play it on violin or flute, but / dare
to open that dark saying on a gospel
harp.
You wonder that very censecrated
people have trouble? Did you ever
know any very consecrated man or
woman who had not had great trouble?
Never! 1t was through their troubles
sanctified that they were made very
good. If you find anywhere in this
city man who has now, and always
has had, perfect health, and never lost
a child, and has always been popular,
and never had business struggle or
misfortune, who is distinguished for
goodness, pull your wire for a tele-
graph messenger-boy, and send me
word, and | will drop everything and
go right away to look at him. There
never has been a man like that, and
never will be. Who are those AFRO
CANT, self-conceited creatures who
move about without sympathy for
others, and who think more Of a St.
Bernard dog, or an Attorney COW, or
a Southdown sheep, or a Berkshire
pig than of man? They never had
any trouble, or the trouble was never
sanctified. Who are those men who
listen with moist eye as you tell them
OF suffering, and who have a pathos
in their voice, and a kindness in their
manner, and an excuse or an allevia-
ton for those gone astray? They are
the men who have graduated at the
Royal Academy of Trouble, and they
have the diploma written in wrinklcs
on their own countenances. My! my!
What heartaches they had! What
tears they have wept! What injustice
they have suffered! The mightiest in
fluence for publication and salvation
is trouble. No diamond fit for crown
until it is cut No wheat fit for bread
till it is ground. There are only three
things that can break off a chain-a
hammer, file, or a fire; and trouble
is all three of them. The greatest
writer's, orators and reformers get
much of their force from trouble. What
gave to Washington Irving that ex-
quisite tenderness and pathos which
will make his books favorites while
the English language continues to be
written and spoken? An early heart
break, that he never once mentioned;
and when, thirty years after the death
of Matilda Hoffman, who was to have
been his bride, her father picked up
piece of embroidery and said, THAT
is a piece of poor Matilda's workman
ship" Washington Irving sank from
hilarity into silence, and walked away.
Out of that lifetime grief the great
author dipped his pens mightiest rein
forcement. "Calvin's Institutes of Re-
ligion," than which a more wonder
full book was never written by human
hand, was begun by the author at
twenty-five years of age, because of
the persecution by Francis, king of
France. Faraday toiled for all time
on salary of eighty pounds a year
and candles. AS every brick of the
wall of Babylon was stamped with the
letter N, standing for Nebuchadnezzar
so every part of the temple of Chris
tian achievement is stamped with the
letter T, standing for trouble
Interrogation third: Why did the
good God let sin or trouble come into
the world when he might have kept
them out? My reply is, He had a good
reason. He had reasons that he has
never given us. He had reasons which
he could no more make us understand
in our finite state than the father,
starting out on some great and elab-
crate enterprise, could make the two
year-old child in its armed chair COM
prehend it. One was to demonstrate
what grandeur of character may be
achieved on earth by conquering evil.
Had there been no evil to conquer and
no trouble to console, then this uni
verse would never have known an
Abraham, or a Moses, or a Joshua, or
an Ezekiel. or a Paul, or a Christ, or a
or a John Milton, or a
John Howard, and million victories
which have been gained by the conse-
Grated spirits of all ages would never
have been gained Had there been no
hattie. there would have been no vic
tory. Nine-tenths of the anthems of
heaven would never have been sung.
Heaven could never have been a thou
sandth part Of the heaven that it is.
will not say that | am glad that sin
and sorrow did enter, but do say that
| am glad that after God has given all
His reasons to an assembled universe,
He will be more honored than if sin
and sorrow had never entered, and that
he unfallen celestials will be outdone,
and will put down their trumpets to
listen, and it will be in heaven when
hose who have conquered sin and sor-
row shall enter as IL would be in a