The Worcester spy. [volume] (Worcester, Mass.) 1898-1904, 1899-06-05
Analog,ies Between
Bicycles and Spirit
ual Life.
THE LAW OF CIRCULARITY.
Whole Universe Is Strung
On the Wheeling
Plan.

A large congregation gathered in
Grace church last night to hear Rev.
James Boyd Brady, D. D., speak on
"Analogies between the wheel and
spiritual life
| AS prelude to the sermon DR.. Brady
referred briefly to the incident which
has interested the whole country dur
ing the past week, the kidnapping and
subsequent recovery of Marion Clark.
After abiding to the feeling in the
hearts of all parents in a case of this
sort, DR.. Brady said:
THE whole land was stirred with in
dignation for the child and pity for the
child's parents; yet this theft is but a
type of what is going on every day on
a much more shocking scale The
stealing of human beings, body and
soul, is going on every hour Sin is
! the decoy and the devil the thief. The
| devils kidnapping is the worst, and on
| the largest plan. 1t is the most des-
perate and deceitful sort. 1t draws
away the young, the fair, the good, the
great, and whelms them together in an
abyss of disaster.
The devil mas many agents, Sunday
dissertation, the saloon, the house of
shame, the dasce, the theatre the pol
lutlng novel, blind infidelity He has
the power of mammon and chief of all,
lmpetuous passions in the human heart.
Like an unbroken horse, they cast their
pleasing nets around millions of human
beings and sweep them into the pit
Of hell together.
But, thank God, this wholesale kid
mapping of human beings has been de-
tected: AS in the case of Baby Clark,
the officers of law, justice and love are
out. They are scanning every city,
town and village and landscape for lost
men, women and children. They have
found, they are finding, millions and
bringing them back to their father and
their God. And oh! what joy there is
when they come!
There was great joy over the home
coming of the little New York child.
Inc country was pulsed with the throb- |
pInsS OF Joy When the news went forth |
that the child was found"
The text of the sermon was taken !
from Ezekiel, i:21-"The spirit of the
living was in the wheels" and Ezekiel |
N;I5-"A AS for the wheels, it was cried |
unto them in my hearing, % Wheel"
After referring to the first chapter of |
EZEKIEL as a piece of gorgeous imagery |
ana briefly reviewing the story con- !
tanned in it, DR.. Brady said: There is
considerable anxiety among thinking
people as to what will be the outcome |
OF wheel life. There has been wheel life
in the manufacture of food and of
clothing and in rapid transportation. |
And now the bicycle has come. This
Kind of transit for the poor has come
TO stay. | do not say this because 1
happen to be wheelman, but because
notice things that are going on in the
universe. Have you not noticed that the
whole universe is strung on the wheel
ing plan? The law of circuIarity pre-
walls everywhere. The eye is a circle;
the brain is a circle; the blood moves
in circles; the atoms that frame the
body are circles; the atoms that con-
stltute the world are circles; human life
itself is a circle.
When man wants to move rapidly, he
falls in with the universal plan, and
adopts the cycle. That cycle is allied to
universal circularjtY. 1t is in unison
with nature. 1t is an expedient reflex
OF the plan of the dominating oversoul.
1t has come to meet a long-felt need.
The thing the initial wheelman does
first is to notice. You keep observing,
and thinking, and your thought grows
INTO desire. You want wheel The
same process you should pursue in re-
gard to what is best IN life. Take a les
son from the initial Wheelman. He gets
a wheel. 1t costs something; but he
wants it enough to pay the cost and he
buys it. And so you who see that there
is better life for you must proceed on
the same principle. You will have to
acquire something on which to pro-
coed. That something is truth-human
truth, divine truth, all truth. This IS
the vehicle on which you can ride cir
cularly upward.
The next thing is to remain mounted
You must learn to balance. Every
Wheelman knows that the way to bal
ance is to lift in the direction you are
falling. When you become a Christian
you need to practice the same principle
II you find yourself falling to the left
by committing sin, lift up the wheel Of
the law; if you find yourself falling to
the right by sore temptation to despon-
dency, lift up the gospel.
Another blessing good wheelmen ap-
preciate is good company. No respect
able wheelman will tolerate drunken,
swearing, uncnaste company. He is not
out to disspate, but renovate. And so
it is with the heavenly pilgrim. He just
will not go with bad company. You can
not make him. He is determined not to.
Here is an important lesson for you, my
hearers.
In closing, DR.. Brady appealed to his
listeners not to use the wheel as a |
means of breaking the Sabbath. ride
to and from church on your wheel if
you care to, but do not make your wheel
the excuse for not keeping the Lords
day.
The gospel wheel was built by God
pairs and finally lands all the faithful