The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1898-08-18
NO.. 25.

bunc!es and everything gone from his
home except the chief curse of it,
pcstlfcrons wife and four garrulous
people pclting him with comfortless
talk While he sits on a heap of ashes
scratching ms scabs with piece of
broken pottery, yet crying ont in tri-
umph: "All the days of my appointed
time will wait till my change comes"
Notwithstanding the Bible is against
this evil. and the aversion which it
creates by the loathsomc and ghastly
spectacle of those who have hurled
themselves out of life, and notwith-
standing Christianity is against it and
the arguments and the useful lives and
the iilustrious deaths of its disciples,
1T IS fact alarmingly patent that
suicide is on the increase. What is the
cause: charge upon intidelity and
agnosticism this whole thing If there
be no hereafter, or if this hereafter be
blissfnl without reference to how
we live and how we die. whv
not move back the folding doors
between this world and the next?
And when our existence here be-
!
over into Elysium? Put this down
amo nT your most solemn reflections.
There has never been a case of suicide
where the operator was not either
dem ented, and therefore irresponsible,
or an in!tel. challenge all the ages,
and challenge the universe There
never has been a case of self-destruc-
ton while in full appreciation Of his
immortality and of the fact that that
Immortality woIld be glorious or
wretched according as he accepted
Jesus Christ or rejected Aim.
You say it is business trouble. or
you say it is electrical current. or it is
this or it is that, or it is the other
thing. Why not go clear back, my
friend. and acknowledge that in every
case it is the abdication of reason or
the teaching of intidelity, which pra:-
tically says: ''lf you don't like this
life get out of it, and you will land
either in annihilation. where there are
no rctes to pay, no prosecutions to
suffer, no gout to torment. or you will
land where there will be everything
glorious and nothing to pay for it."
lntdclity has always been apologize
for rself-immolation After Tom Paine's
Age of Reason" was published and
widely read there was a marked in
crease OF self-slaughter.
Have nothing to do with an infdelity
so cruel, 50 debasing. Come out of that
bad company into the company of those
Who believe the Bible. Benjamin
Franklin wrote: ''Of this Jesus of
Nazareth | have to say that the system
of morals He left and the religion He
has given us are the best things the
world has ever seen or likely to see"
Patrick Henry, the electric champion
of liberty, says: The book worth all
other books put together is the Bible"
Benjamin Rush. the leading physiolo-
gist and anatolnist of his day, the
great medical scicntist-what did he
say" The only true and perfect
religion is Christianity. Isaac New
ton, the leading philosopher of his
timc-what did he say? The sublim-
est philosophy on earth is the philoso-
ply of the Gospel David Brewster,
at the pronunciation of whose name
every scientist the world ever bows his
head: David Brewster, saying: oh
this religion has been a great light to
Inc, a very great light all my days.
President Thlers. the great French
statesman, acknowledging that he
prayed when he said: II invoke the
Lord God, in whom | am glad to be-
lieve.' David Livingstone, able to con-
quer the lion. able to conquer the
panther. able to conquer the savage,
yet conquered by this religion, 50 when
they find him dead they find him on
his knees.
Ah. IuGdcIity, stand up and taso
thy sentence! In the presence of Cod,
angels and men, stand up, thou mon
ster Thy lip blasted with bIasphery,
thy check Scared with uncleanness,
thy breath foul with the corruption of
the ages. Stand up, Satyr, filthy goat,
buzzard of the nations, leper of the
centuries. Stand up, thou monster,
Infidelity. Part man, part panther,
part reptile, part dragon. stand up
and take thy sentence. Thy hands
red with the blood in which
thou hast washed. thy feet Grim
son with the human gore through
which thou hast wadcd stand up and
take Thy sentence: Down with thee to
the pit. and sup on the sobs and groaps
of those thou hast DESTROYED, and let
thy music be the everlasting misererc
of those whom thou hast damned. I
brand the forehead of iniideiity with
all the crimes of self-immolation for
the last century on the part of those
who had their reason.
There is Il sorrowlcss world, and it
| is so radiant1hat the MONDAY sun is
only the lowest doorstep, and the au-
rora that lights up our northern heav-
} ems, confounding astronomers as to
what it can be, is the waving Of the
banners Of the procession come to take
the conquerors home from church mill
tant to church triumphant, and you and
, / have 10, O,O1l reasons for wanting to gO
, | there but we will never get there
t either by self-immolation or impeni-
z | tencv. Ali our sins slain b. Christ
t who came to do that thing, we waEt
: to go in at just the time divinely ar
I ranged. and from couch divine !