Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1899-12-20

most people enter the next world through
the shadows Of this world. Perhaps God
may have arranged it in that way SO as to
make the contrast the more glorious.
have seen sunshiDy days In this world that
must have been almost like the radiance Of
heaven. But as most people leave the
| Garth bet ween sundown and sunrise they
quit this world at its darkest, and heaven
always bright, will be the brighter for that
contrast. Out Of darkness into irradia-
tton.
But" says some woman, 'there is a
horrid creature that has so injured me
chat rather than make rp with her 1
would die first" Well. sister, you may
take your choice, for one or the other it
will be--your complete pardon of her or
Gods eternal banisnment of You. But"
says some man, "that fellow Who cheated
me out OF those goods, or damaged nv
business credit, or started that lie about
me in the NEWSPAPERS. or by his perlldy
broke up my domestic happin ess, forgive
him 1 cannot, forgive him 1 will noti"
Well. brother, take your choice. You will
never be at peace with God till you at
peace with man. Feeling rs you now do,
you would not get so near the har5or of
heaven as to see the Iightship. Better
leave that man with the God who said:
vengeance is Mine. 1 will repay You
may say: 81 will make him sweat for that
yet. 1 will make him squirm. L mean to
pursue him to the death" But you are
him, and you are making heaven for your
own soul an impossibility. II he will not
be reconciled to you, be reconciled to him.
In five or six hours 1t will be sundown.
The dahlias will bloom against the west
ern sky. Somewhere between this and
that take shovel and bury the old
quarrel at least six feet doep. Let not
the sun 60 down upon your wrath"
Again, We ought not to allow the passage
of the sunset hour before the dismissal of
all our affronts, because we may associate
the sublimest action of the soul with the
sublimest spectacle in nature. 1t Is a most
delightsome thing to have our personal
experiences allied with certain subjects.
There Is a tree or river bank where God
first answered your prayer. You will never
pass that place or think of that place with
out thinking of the glorious communion.
There was some gate or some room or some
garden wall where you were afiianced with
the companion who has been your chief
10; in life. You never speak of that place
yut with smile. Some OF you have pleas
ant memories connected with the evening
star, or the moon in its first quarter, or
with the sunrise, because you saw it just as
you were arriving at harbor after tenn
pestuous voyage. Forever and forever.
1 admit 1t is the most difficult of all
graces to practice, and ut the start you may
make complete failure, but keep on in
the attempt to practice 1t. ShakespeareE
wrote ten plays before he reached "HaIn,.
let" and seventeen plays before he reached
Merchant OF Venice" and twenty eight
plays tefore he reached Macbeth" And
gradually you will come from the easier
graces to the most difficult. Besides that,
1t is not n matter of personal determination
80 much as the laying hold of The al
mighty arm Of God. who will help us to do
anything we ought to do. Remember that
In all personal controversies the one least
to blame will have to take the first step at
pacification IL 1t Is ever effected. The con-
test between Eschines and Aristippus re-
sounds through history. but Aristippus,
who was least to blame, went to Eschines
and said, "Shall we not agree to be friends
before we make ourselves the laughing
stock Of the whole country?" And Eschines
said. .'Tfs far better man than 4.
be eel. -stf:ssr, = - bean
! ssno- ...z-- M hearing he breach.rs Ard they
were always friends afterwards. So let
the one OF you that is least to blame take
the first step toward reconciliation. The
one most in the wrong will never take 1t.
Oh. 1t makes one feel splendid to be able
by Gods help to practice unlimited for
giveness. 1t improves ones body and soul.
My brother 1t will make you measure three
or four more Inches around the chest and
Improve your respiration so that you can
take deeper and longer breath. 1t i'm
proves the countenanceI by scattering tho
gloom and makes You somewhat like God
himself. He is omnipotent, and We cannot
copy that. He Is independent of nil the
creative, and we cannot copy that. He is
ou,nipresent, and we cannot copy that. But
H. forgives with a broad sweep all faults,
AMI all neglects, and all insults, ard all
wrongdoings. and In that we may copy Him
with mighty success. Go harness that sub
lime action Of your soul to the sunset-ths
hour when the gate Of heaven opens to let
the day pass into eternities and some of
the glories escape this way through the
brief opening. We talk about the Italian
4 A..
and sunset amid the cordilleras, but 1 will
tell you how you may see a grander sunset
than any mere lover of nature ever beheld
that is, by flinging into it all your hatreds
and animosities, and let the horses Of fire
trample them, and the chariots of frs roll
over them, and the spearmen of fire stab
them. and the beach of fire consume them,
and the billows Of fire overwhelm them.
Again, we should not let the sun go down
IN our wrath, because 1t is of little i'm
Portance what the world says of you or
does to you when you have the affluent
God OF the sunset as your provider and
defender. People talk as though it were
fixed spectacle Of nature and always tho
same. But no one eser saw two sunsets
alike, and il the world has existed 6OO0
years there have been about 2.190, 900 sun
sets, each of them distinct from all the
other pictures in the gallery of the sky as
Titian's Last Supper" Rubens' Descent
ment" are distinct from each other II
that God OF such infinite resources that
He can put on the wall of the sky each
evening more than the Louvre and Luxem-
bourg galleries all in one is my God and
your God, our provider and protector,
what is the use of our worrying about any
human antagoDism? II we are misinter-
preted, the God of the many colored sun
set can put the right color on our action.
II all the garniture of the western heavens
n pyanfita fc mi of of
the windows Of our future home. what
small business for US to be chasing en-
emiesl Let not this Sabbath sun go down
upon your wrath.
And wish for all OF you beautiful sun
set to your earthly existence. With some
of you 1t has been long day of trouble,
and with others of you it will be far from
calm. When the sun rose at o'clock, 1t
Was the NJ Orning of youth, and a fair day
was prophesied, but by the time the noon
day or middle life had come and the clock
OF your earthly existence had struck twelve
cloud racks gathered and tempest beloved
In the track of tempest. But as the even
ing OF old age approaches pray God the
skies may brighten and the clouds be piled
up into pillars as OF celestial temples to
cohorts come to take you home. And as
you sink out Of signt below the horizon
may there be q radiance of Christian ex-
ample lingering long after you are gone.
and on the heavens be written in letters of
sapphire, and on the waters in letters of
opal, and on the hills in letters of emerald
"Thy sun shall no more go down, neither
shall thy moon withdraw ITSELF for the
Lord shall be thine everlasting light, and
the DAYS of thy mourning shall be ended"
So shall the sunset of earth become the
sunrise OF heaven.
Fate never wounds more deeply the
generous heart than when a block
baad,c ipcplf poiptS tho dart