The semi-weekly messenger. [volume] (Wilmington, N.C.) 1897-1908, 1899-03-17

to think downward until there is no
lower abysm to fathom. Power to think
right, power to think wrong, power to
hin forever, for, once having begun
to think, there shall be no terminus for
that exercise, and eternity itself shall
have no power TO bid it halt. Faculties
to Iove-flial love, conjugal love, pa
ternal love, material love, love of u
try, love Of God. Faculty OF judgment,
with scales so delicate and yet so Nigh
ty they can weigh arguments, weigh
emotions, weigh worlds, weigh heaven
and hell. Faculty Of will, that can
climb mountains or tunnel them, wade
seas or bridge them, accepting eternal
enforcement or choosing everlasting
exile. Oh, what it is to De a man. Oh,
what il is to be a womani Sublime and
infinite bundle Of faculties! The
thought of 1t staggers me, swamps me,
stuns me, bewilders me, overwhelms
me. Oh, what a bundle Of life Abigail
Of my text saw in David and which
we ought to see in every human yet
immortal being,
CAREFULLY WRAPPED UP.
Know also that this bundle of life
was put up with great care. Amy mer-
chant and almost any faithful house
holder will tell you how much depends
on the way a bundle is bound. The cord
or rope must be strong enough to hold.
The mot must be we'll tied. You know
not what rough hands may toss that
bundle. If not properly put together,
though it may leave your hands in
good order and symmetrical, before 1t
reaches it's proper destination it may
be loosened in fragments for the winds
to scatter or the all train to lose.
Now, I have tt tell you that this bum
die of life is we'll put together-the
body, the mind, the soul. Who but the
omnipotent O could bind such a bun
die? Anatomists, psychologists, physi-
cists, logicians, NEUTRALITY-SUSPICIOUS., declare
that we are fearfully and wonderfully
made. That we are a bundle we'll put
together I prove by the amount Of jour-
| neying we can endure without damage.
by the amount of rough handling we
can survive, by the fact that the vast
majority of US go through life without
the loss of an Y or the Gripping Of a
limb or the destruction of a single en-
ergy of body or faculty Of mind. I sub
poena for this trial that man in yonder
view 70 or so years of age, and ask
him to testify that after all the storms
and accidents and vicissitudes Of a
long life he still keeps his five senses
and though all the lighthouses as old
as he is have been reconstructed or
new lanterns put in he has in under
his forehead the same W. lanterns
with which God started him, and
though the locomotives of sixty years
ago were long ago sold for old iron
he has the original powers of locomo-
ton in the limbs with which God start
ed him and though all the electric
wires that carried messages twenty
five years & have been torn down
his nerves bring messages from all
parts of his body as we'll as when God
strung them s~eventy-fve years ago.
Was there ever such a complete bun
! die put together as the human being?
What a factory! What an engine!
What a mill race! What a lighthouse!
What a locomotive! What an electric
battery! What a furnace! What a mas
terpiece of the Lord God Almighty!
Or, to employ the anticlimax and use
the figure of the text, what a bundle!
Know, also, that this bundle of life
is properly directed. Many a bundle
has missed it's way and disappeared
because the address has dropped, and
no n can find by examination for
what city or town or neighborhood it
was intended. All great carrying COM
panies have so many misdirected pack
ages hat they appoint days of VEN
due to dispose of them. All intelligent
| people know the Importance of having
a valuable package plainly directed,
the name of the one to whom it is to
| o. ANAAAA
and expressman ought to know at the
first glance to whom to take it.
A VALUABLE PACKAGE.
This bundle of life that Abigail in
my text speaks Of is plainly addressed
By divine p~enmanship it is directed
h~eavenward. However long ma be
the earthly distance it travels it's des-
tination is the eternal city of God on
high. Every mile it goes away from
AL~4 - I-
Internal fraud practiced against it.
There are those who put it on some
other track, who misplace it in some
wrong conveyance, who send it off or
send it back by some diabolic miscar-
riage. The value of that bundle is so
we'll known all up and down the uni
verse that there are 1000, 900 dishonest
hands which are trying to detain or
divert it or to forever stop it's progress
in the right direction. There are so
many influences abroad to ruin your
body, min and soul hat my wonder
is not that so many are destroyed for
his world and the next, but that there
are not more who go down irremedi-
ably.
Every human being is assailed at the
start. Within an o of the time when
this bundle of life is made up the as
| Sault begins. First of all there are the
~infantile disorders that threaten the
body just launched upon earthly exist
ence. Scarlet fevers and pneumonias
and ~diphtherias and ~inf1uenzas and the
whole pack of epidemics surround the
cradle n threaten it's occupant, and
infant Moses in the ark of bulrushes
was not more imperiled by the monsters
of the Nile than every cradl is imper-
lied by ailments all devouring. In after
years there are foes within and foes
without. Evil appetite joined by out
side allurements. Temptations that
have utterly destroyed more people than
now inhabit the earth. Gambling sa-
looms and rummeries and places where
dissoluteness reigns supreme, enough
in number to go round and round and
round the earth. Discouragements,
jealousies, revenges, Indebtedness, dis
appointments. swindles, arsons, conf1a-
| grations and crueltieS, which make
| continued existence of the human race
a Wonderment. Wa any valuable bun
die ever so imperiled as this bundle Of
life? Oh, look at the address and get