The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1899-10-20


tongue and eyes swimming in death, the
stag leaps from the cliff into Upper Sar-
anac can you realize how much David
had suffered from his troubles and how
much he wanted God when he ex-
! pressed himself in the words: LAS a
hart panteth after the water brooks, so
panteth my soul after Thee, o God"
Well, now, let all those who have COM
| ing after them the lean hounds of pow
erty or the black hounds of persecution
or the spotted hounds of vicissitude, or
the pale hounds of death or who are in
any wise pursued run to the wide, deep,
| glorious lake of Divine solace and res
cue. The most of the men and women
whom / happen 10 kRow at different
| times, if not now, have had troubles
after them, sharp muzzled troubles,
swift troubles, all devouring troubles.
Many of you have made the mistake of
| trying to fight them. Somebody mean
| ly attacked you, and you attacked them.
They deprecated you, and you depre-
ciated them, or they overreached you in
a bargain, and you tried, in Wall street
| parlance, TO get a corner on them. Or
| you have had a bereavement, and, in
stead of being submissive, you are fight
| ing that bereavement. You charge on
| the doctors who have failed to effect a
cure. Or you charge on the careless
ness of the railroad company through
which the railroad accident occurred.
Or you are Il chronic invalid, and you
| fret and worry and scold and wonder
why you cannot be well like other peo-
pie, and you angrily charge on the neu-
ralgia or the laryngitis or the ague or
the sick headache. The fact is you are
a deer at bay. Instead of running to the
waters of Divine consolation and slak-
ing your thirst and cooling your body
and soul in the good cheer of the Gospel
and swimming away into the mighty
deeps of Gods love, you are fighting a
whole kennel of barriers.
Some time ago | saw in the Adiron-
dacks dog lying across the road, and
he seemed unable to get up, and said
to some hunters: what is the matter
with that dog?" They answered: "a
deer hurt him." and l saw he had u
swollen paw and battered head, show
ing where the antlers struck him. And
the probability is that some of you
might give a mighty clip to your pur-
suers. You might damage their busi-
ness, you might worry them into i'll
health, you might hurt them as much
as they hurt you; but, after all, it is not
worth while. You only have hurt a
hound. Better be off for the Upper
Saranac, into which the mountains of
Gods eternal strength look down and
moor their shadows. As for your phys
ical disorders, the worst strychnine you
can take is fretfulness, and the best
medicine is religion. l know people
who were only little disordered, yet
have fretted themselves into complete
valetudinarianism, while others put
their trust in God and came up from the
very shadow of death and have lived
comfortably % years with only one
lung. a man with one lung, but God
with him, is better off than a goddess
man with two lungs. Some of you have
been for a long time sailing around
Cape Fear when you ought to have been
sailing around Cape Good Hope. Do
not turn back, but go ahead. The deer
will accomplish more with its swift feet
than with its horns.
There are whole chains of lakes in the
Adirondacks; and from one height you
can see 80 lakes, and there are said to be
over 500 in the great wilderness. So
near are they to each other that your
mountain guide picks up and carries the
boat from lake to lake, the small dis
tance between them for that reason
called a carry" And the realm of
Gods word is one long chain of bright,
lakes, each promise lake,
a very short carry between them, and, |
though for ages the pursued have been |
out of them, they are full up
to the top of the green banks, and the |
same David describes them, and they |
seem so near together that in three diff |
ferent places he speaks of them as a
continuous river, saying: 'There is q |
river the streams whereof shall make |
glad the city of God; /" "Thou shalt make
them drink of the rivers of Thy pleas
ures;" "Thou greatly enrichest it with
the river of God, which is full of wa
ter"
But many of you have turned your
back on that supply and confront your
trouble, and you are soured with your
and you are fighting
society, and you are fighting a pursu-
ng world, and troubles, instead of
driving you into the cool lake of heav-
enly comfort, have made you stop and
urn round and lower your head, and
t is simply antler against tooth. do
not blame you. Probably under the
ame circumstances l would have done
worse. But you are all wrong. You
iced to do as the reindeer does in Feb
'uary and March--it sheds its horns.
The Rabbinical writer's allude to this
of antlers by the stag when
hey say of a man who ventures his
money in risky enterprises he has hung
t on the stag's horns, and proverb in
he far east tells man who has foolish
y lost his fortune to go and find where
he deer shed his horns. My brother,
Iuit the antagonism of your circum-
tances, quit misanthropy, quit COM
laint, quit pitching into your pursuers. {
'e as wise as next spring will be the {
eer of the Adirondacks. Shed your
orns. {
But very many of you who are
of the world-and if in any as
embly between the Atlantic and Pa
ific oceans it were asked that all who !
ad been badly treated should raise
9th their hands, and full response
hould be made, there would be twice
S many hands lifted as persons present
i say many of you would declare:
We have ALWAYS done the hest we I