Orleans County monitor. [volume] (Barton, Vt.) 1872-1953, 1899-01-16

and blood, rolling through all lands
and all ages, bearing the wreck of fam
lilies, and of communities, and of en-
pires, foaming, writhing, boiling with
the agonies of 5000 years. Etna, Coto-
paxi and Vesuvius have been described,
but who has ever sketched the volcano
of suffering retching up from its depths
the lava and scoria, and pouring them
down the sides to whelm the nations?
Oh if | could gather all the heart
strings, the broken heartstrings, into a
harp would play on it d1rge such as
was never sounded MythOlogists tell
us of gorgon and centaur and Titan,
and biologists tell us of extinct species
of monsters, but greater than gorgOn
or megatherium, and not belonging to
the realm of fable, and not of an extinct
species, monster with an iron jaw and
hundred iron hoofs has walked across
the nations, and history and poetry and
sculpture, in their attempt to sketch it
and describe it, have seemed to sweat
great drops of blood. But, thank God,
there are those who can conquer as this
woman of the text conquered, and say:
+'It is we'll Though my property be
gone, though my children be gone,
though my home be broken up, though
my health be sacrificed, it is we'll; it is
welll'' There is no storm on the sea but
Christ is ready to rise in the hinder
part of the ship and hush it. There is
no darkness but the constellation OF
Gods eternal love can illumine, and,
though the winter comes out of the
northern sky, you have sometimes seen
that northern sky all ablaze with auroras
which seem to say: ''COme up this
way. Up this way are thrones of light
and seas of sapphire and the splendOr
of an eternal heaven Come up this
way"
We may, like the ships, by tempest be tossed
On perilous deeps, but cannot be lost.
Though satan enrage the wind and the tide,
The promise assures us the Lord will provide
Home Duties.
Again, this woman of my text was
great in her application to domestic
duties. Every picture is home picture,
whether she is entertaining an Elisha
or whether she is giving careful atten-
ton to her sick boy or whether she is
appealing for the restoration of her
property Every picture in her case is
one of domesticity. Those are not disci-
pies of this Shunemite woman who,
going out to attend to outside charities,
neglect the duty of home-the duty OF
wife. of mother, of daughter. No faith
fulness in public benefaction can ever
atone for domestic negligence. There
has been many a mother who by indie
fatigable toll has reared a large family
of children. equipping them for the du
ties of life with good manners and large
int arH (thri n Tlln
starting them out, who has done more
for the world than many a woman
whose name has sounded through all
the lands and through the centuries. /
remember when Kossuth was in this
country there were some ladies who got
honorable regulations by presenting
him very gracefully with bouquets Of
flowers on public occasions, but what
was all that compared with the plain
Hungarian mother who gave to truth
and civilization and the cause of uni
versal liberty Kossuth? Yes, this wo-
man of my text was great in her sim
plicity. When this prophet wanted to
reward her for her hospitality by ask
ing some preferment from the king
what did she say? She declined it. She
said, 81 dwell among my own people,
as much as to say, 81 am satisfied with
my lot all I want is my family and
my friends around me; I dwell among
my own people"
Oh, what rebuke to the strife for
precedence in all ages How many there
are who want to get great architecture
and homes furnished with all art, all
painting, all statuary, who have not
enough taste to distinguish between
Gothic and Byzantine and who could
not tell figure in plaster of paris from
Palmer's ''White Captive" and would
not know q boys penciling from Bier
stadt's yosemite. Men who buy
large libraries by the square foot, buy
ing these libraries when they have
scarcely enough education to pick out
the day of the month in the almanacl
Oh, how many there are striving to
have things as well as their neighbors
or better than their neighbors, and in
the struggle vast fortunes are exhausted
and business firms thrown into bank
ruptcy and men Of reputed honesty
rush into astounding forgeriesl Of
course, I say nothing against refine
ment or culture. Splendor of abode,
sumptuousness of diet, lavishness in
art, neatness in apparel-there is moth
ing against them in the Bible or out of
the Bible. God does not want us tc
prefer mud howell to English cottage or
untanned sheepskin to French broad
cloth or husks to pineapple or the clum-
siness of boor to the manners of
gentleman God, who strung the beach
with tinted shell and the grass Of the
field with the dews of the night and
hath exquisitely tinged morning cloud
and robin redbreast, wants us to keep
our eye open to all beautiful sights and