Vilas County news. [volume] (Eagle River, Vilas County, Wis.) 1896-1927, 1898-10-31

among the mlgnCy WONDERS Oh Inc
great west, where he finds everywhere
the footprints of the Creator. The
texts are: Streams in the DESERT
Isaiah, xxxv., 6; He toucheth the hills
and they smoke.-Psalms, CIV, 80.
My first text means irrigation. It
means the waters of the Himalaya, or
the Pyrenees, or the Sierra Nevadas
poured through canals and aqueducts
dor the fertilization of the valleys. 1t
means the process by WHICH the last
mile of American barrenness will be
made an apple orchard, or an orange
plantation, or a vineyard streams
A the desert" My second text means
q volcano like Vesuvius or Cotopaxi,
or it means the geysers of Yellow
stone park or of California. You see
a hill calm and still, and for ages i'm
movable, but the Lord out of the
Heavens puts His finger on the top of
1t, and from it rise thick and impress
sive vapOrs: "He toucheth the hills
and they smoked"
Although my journey across the
continent this summer was for the
eighth time, more and more am L I'M
pressed with the Divine hand in it's
construction, and with it's greatness
and grandeur, and more and more am
allri1led with the fact that it is all to
a* irrigated, glorified and Edenized.
That a change from the time when
rJaniel Webster on yonder Captoline
nn1 "aid to the American senate in re-
gard 10 the center of this continent,
and to the regions on the Pacific
-cC1s1: what do you want with this
vast, worthless area, this region OF
savages and wild beasts, of deserts
and cactus, of shifting sands and
prairie dogs? To what use could we
ever put these great deserts or these
great mountains, impenetrable and
covered with eternal snow? What can
we ever hope to do with the western
coast, rocE-bound, cherries and I'M
inviting, and not a harbOr on it? |
will never vote one cent from the pub
4ic treasury to place the Pacific coast
one inch nearer Boston than it now
is" What a mistake the great states
man made when he said that! All
who have crossed the continent realize
that the states on the Pacific ocean
will have quite as grand opportunities
,as the states on the Atlantic, and all
this realm from sea to sea to be the
Lords cultivated possession.
Do you know what in some respects
is the most remarkable between the
Atlantic and Pacific? 1t is the figure
ot a cross on a mountain in Colorado.
1t is called the Mount of the Holy
Cross" A horizontal crevice filled
with perpetual snow, and perpendic-
,uIar crevice filled with snow, but both
the horizontal line and the perpendic-
rlar line so marked, so bold, so signif-
cant, so unmistakable, that all who
pass in the daytime within many miles
are compelled to see it. There are
some figures, some contours, some
mountain appearances that you grad
uaIly make out after your attention is
called to them. So a mans face on the
rocks in the White mountains. So a
maiden's form cut in the granite of the
Adirondacks. So city in the moving
CLOUDS. Yet you have to look under
the pointing of your friend or guide
for some time before you can see the
similarity. But the first instant you
glance at this side of the mountain in
Colorado, you cry out: GA cross! A
-cross!" Do you say that this geologi-
cal inscription just happens so? No!
That cross on the Colorado mountain
is not a human device, or an accident
OF nature, or the freak of an earth
quake. The hand of God cut it there
and set it up for the nation to look at.
Whether set up in rock before the
cross Of wood was set up on the bluff
back Of Jerusalem, or set up at some
time since that assassination, [ be-
lieye the Creator meant it to suggest
the most notable event in all the his
tory Of this planet, and He hung it
there over the heart of this continent
to indicate that the only hope for this
nation is in the cross on which our
Emmanuel died. The clouds were vo-
cal at our Saviour's birth, the rocks rent
at His martyrdom, why not the walls
OF Colorado bear the record of the cru
cifiNion?
First, consider the immensely of
this continental possession. If it were
only a small tract OF land, capable of
nothing better than sage-brush, and
with ability only to support prairie
dogs, should not have much enthu-
siasm in wanting Christ to have itadd-
ed to His dominion. But its i'm
mensity and alnuence no one can
imagine, unless, in immigrant wagon
or stage coach, OF in rail train of the
Union Pacific or the Northern Pacific
or the Canadian Pacific or the South
ern Pacific, he has traversed it.
1 supposed in my boyhood, from its
size on the map, that California was
few yards across, a ridge Of land on
which one must walk cautiously lest
he hit his head against the Sierra Ne
vada on one side, or slip off into the
Pacific waters on the other-Califor-