The Newtown bee. (Newtown, Conn.) 1877-current, 1899-07-28

lived out his prayer-meeting talks in his
life. The poet Longfellow was as good
as he was great. He who inspired young
lives To high endeavor by his beautiful
poems Motherhood" and Excelsior"
could lay aside his tasks to tske iaxen-
haired Alice upon his knee and romp
with the children as the night was begiG-
ming to lower. There are exceptions and
we bless God for them but too often the
little foxes spoil great characters, and
you wish you had not known the men the
world counts great so well. You like to
cherish the ideal, and you do not like to
have the ideal smashed before your eyes.
Hence feeling of disappointment often
comes to you after you have read
the biography of some eminent man;
for the true biographer to-day tells all
that he knows about the one of whom he
IL writing; he does not enlarge upon the
good and PASS the bad in silence by. The
Bible gives the true biography of men.
John the Baptist was without peer in the
line of the prophets, yet he doubted the
Messiahship Of Christ. David was the
man after Gods own heart, yet the BIZ
bic does not cloak his awful sin.
Little sins mar great characters, but in
deed there are no little sins. All sin
whether it be lie, whole lie, half
| truth, an innuendo, q mistake, pecca-
dillo, murder, a felony, theft-is sin
and merits the consuming wrath,
Of God. All sin is sin. They were
not sinners above their fellows on
whom the tower in Sloan fell. That
was not place conepicuously bad, out
OF which no good thing could scarcely
come, that, sitting quietly on the banks
of the Conemaugh River in Pennsylvs-
mia, the hum of it's indussries blending
with the joyful shouts of It's children,
l QftnPnn0n in q EyUfn b lfncr ayunFNf
away by the deluging flood. No doubt
some men were greater sinners than 9TH
err men, all were not stained with equal
dye in the time of Noah; yet, save the
family of Noah, the food spared none.
Though fearful wickedness reigned in
ancient Sodom and Gomorrah, the cities
of the plain, there must have been de-
grees of sin, and 1t is hardly possible
that all were drinking of the lowest dregs,
even in those cesspools of sin. You and
need to cry for Gods mercy, we need a
plunge In the fountain filed with blood
to wash all our guilt away, just as much
as the one that cried, "Lord, remember
me when thou CONTEST into Thy kingdom. >
1t is no excuse for sin to call it little
Little sins are especially dangerous be
cause, like the little foxes, they eat the
vines and nobody knows that they are
there. You and have to fight against
the little sins as sedulouSly as we de
against the great ones. Indeed
TEE WHOLE STRUGGLE OF LIFE
is against the little sins; for notorious
liars are rare, murdeerrs are monstrosities
gigantic swindlers come once in o gener-
, alton, and thoroughly depraved men
who have no good spot in their nature
, which can under peculiar circumstances
: be touched, we question il they are evel
seen. That SO much harm IL done by
, little sins 10 conclusive proof to me tina
Satan is in the world. know there Ia
, sun, not so much because see 1t shining
} but because / see the rich foliage and th'
green fields and know that these things
could not be without a sun. / know
! there is a holy Spirit not so much
} because the Bible tells me thai
) / am living in the dispensation of the
J Spirit now, but because when / go Init
] the city see hospitals and dispensariei
: and orphan homes and institutions which
! show what the Holy Spirit has inspires
men TO do. So know there is person
, al Devil, not so much because this is tht
: teaching Of Scripture, but because of the
; unrest and wretchedness and misery tina
: ain Is causing, because of the harm tina
/ little sins do. / know to whom to attri
| butte a good deal that / cannot, and will
D not, lay at the door of good God. w,
. fall too much fall into the habit of plac
I ing large part of our failings to thu
{ charge of the dear Lord.
9 1t is astonishing how much harm littl'