The Washington weekly post., 1899-11-14

YOU down Is the dominant wish OF most OF
/ those who are not as high as you are
/ They viii spend hours and days and years
/ 10 entrap you. They will hover around
I Newspaper Offices TO get one mean line
/ printed deprecisting you Your heaven Is
/ their hell.
"A dying President OF the United States
/ said many years ago. ia regard 70 his life
I time Of experience. II doesn't pay. The
/ leading statesmen of America. In letters
OK advice. warn young men to keep out o.
politics. Many Of the most successful
/ nave uiei in vain 10 drown their trouble
I IN strong drink on the other hand. there
are millions OF people who on departing
/ this life VIII have nothing 10 leave but 2
good name and a life insurance. whose II
I lum!ned faces are indices Of illumined
I souls. They wish everybody well. " hen
/ the fire bell rings they do not 20 to the
/ WINDOW at midnight TO see IL IL is thei
store that Is on fire. for they never owned
a store; and when the September equinox
Is abroad they do not worry lest their
ships founder in gale, for they never
owned snip; and when the nominations
are made for high political office they are
not fearful that their name will be over
lOoked, Tor they ~eVer applied for o.fice.
There is so much heartiness and freedom
from care in their Taught er that when you
hear II you are compelled 10 laugh in S m
pathy. although you know not what they
are laughing about.
The World "A SchooI-house.
Which the children of that family as
semble in the sitting room of the old
homestead to hear the fathers VII read
they are not fearful of being cut off wi h
million and half dollars, for the old
man never owned anything more than the
farm Of seventy-five acres. which yielded
I only enonDh rafa fr,lxr to, ha
hold. They have more happiness in one
I month than many have in a whole life
! time. Would TO God / had the capacity
to explain to you on how little man can
be happy and on how much he may be
wretched! Get your heart right and all is
| right Keep your heart wrong and all is
wrong. That is a principle settled in
! heaven.
Another thing decided in that high
place is that this world is a schoolhouse
or college for splendid or disgraceful
graduation. We begin in the freshman
class OF good or evil, and then pass into
the sophomore, and then into the junior,
and then into the senior, and from that
we graduate angels or devils. In many
colleges there is an elective course
where the student selects what he Will
study-mathematics, or the Languages, or
chemistry, or philosophy; and it is an
elective course We all take in the school
Rouse or university of this world We
may study sin until we are saturated with
IL, or righteousness until we are exem-
plifications Of il. Graduate we all must
but we decide for ourselves the style of
graduation. 1t is an elective course. We
can study generosity until our every word
and every act and every contribution of
money or time viii make the world better,
or we may study meanness until our soul
shall shrink up 10 a smallness unimag-
Unable. We may, under God, educate our
selves into self-control that nothing
can anger or into an irascibility that will
ever and anon keep our face flushed with
wrath and every nerve aquiver Great
old sshoolhouse of a world, in which we
are all being educated for glory or perdi-
ton,
Some have wondered why graduation
day in college is called commencement
day, when il is the last day of college
exercises but graduation days are prop
erly called commencement day. To all
the graduated il Is the commencement of
active life, and our graduation day from
earth will be to US commencement of our
chief life, our larger life, our more tre-
mendous life. our eternal life But what
day commencement day on earth isl
L llt Sluutul never sees any CAV Ike IL
at any rate, j never did. Old Niblo's The
ater in New York comes back to me- The
gOWned and taSsel-hatted professors be-
hind US, and our kindred and friends be-
fore us and above US, and the air redo
lent with Earlands TO be thrown Us What
a commencement day IL was for all of
US about to graduate! But mightier day
VIII II be when we graduate from this
world. VIII ii be Kisses of condemnation
or handclapping of approval? vii there
no 70 M nr H.
be resounding Come or a reverberating
Depart
Death a Commencement.
'In the real college, before graduation
and commencement comes examination
cay, and before our graduation and COM
mencement will come examination. II
Will be asked what we have been doing
what we have learned under the tutelage
of years Of joy and sorrow. and under the
teaching of the Holy Ghost are we edu-
Gated for heaven. Have we done our best
with the curriculum Of study put before
every mortal and immortal? Oh! this
world is not the terminus OF a journey.
1t is not a theater on whose stage we are
enacting the tragic or comic. 1t is a
schoolhouse for splendid or disgracefuI
graduation, and death is commencement.
All that is settled in heaven
Another thing decided in the high
places of the universe is that thi. world
with or without us, will be made over
into a scene of arborescence and purity
Do not think that such a consummation
depends upon our personal fidelity 1t
will be done anyhow. Gods cause does not
go a-begging If all the soldiers Of Jesus
Christ now living should become desert
ers gnd go over 10 the enemy, that would
not defeat the cause. A large part of the
Bible is taken up with telling US what
the world will be. There is a large army.
human and angelic, now in the field, but
Gods reserve forces are more numerous
and more mighty than those now at the
front And il He could in Gideon's time
rout the Mi6ianites with a crash of crock
erv, and if He could in Shamgar's time
overcome a host with anfox-goad, and il
in Samson's time He could defeat an army
with a bleached jawbone, and If the walls
of Jericho went down under a blast of
perforated rams horn, and If in Christs
daV blind eyes were cured by ointment OF
spi.tle. then God can do anything He says
He will do. AS yet, He has taken only one
sword out of whole armory Of weapons.
DO not get nervous. as IL the Lord We're
going 10 be defeated. The redemption of
these hemispheres was settled in heaven.
and Isaiah and Ezekiel and Habakkuk
and Malachi and St. John only reported
what the Lord God Almighty had decided
upon. My only fear is that our regiment
will not get into the fight 10 do some
thing worthy Of the Christ who redeemed
US. and we be left in lazy encampment at
Tampa. when We ought to have been at
Santiago.
"Oh. that coming day of the worlds
The earth will be so changed
that the sermonology VIII be Changed.
There will be no more calls to repentance.
for all will have repented. No more gath
eTing of aims for the poor Tor the poor
viii have been enriched. No hospital Sun
day Cor disiolnted bones will have been
set and the wounds all healed, and the in
durable diseases Of other times viii have
been overcome by materla Redica and
pharmacy and dentistry Fand thera-
peutics that have conquered everything
that afflicted nerve or lung or tooth or
eye or limb. Healthology complete ana
The pOultice and the ointment
and the panEcea and the catholicon and
the surgeons knife and the dentists for