Connecticut western news., 1899-10-26

and that you, taking hold of its potent
 wing, might live and live forever.
 The world has had strong swimmers
 besides the one of the text, perhaps the
 greatest among them Matthew Webb
 of the British mercantile marine serv-
 ice. He leaped from the deck of the
 Russia, the Cunard steamer. to save
 the life of a sailor who had fallen over
 board. No wonder the passengers sub-
 scribed for him large reward and the
 Royal Humane Society of London dec
 orated him with honors. A mighty
 swimmer was he, by the strength of his
 own arm and foot pushing through the
 waters from Blackwall pier to Graves
 end pier, IS miles, and from Dover to
 Calais, 39 miles, where he crossed, yet
 he was drowned at last in our Ni- agara's whirlpool. But the strong
 swimmer of my text put out alone to
 swim a wrathier sea and for yaster
 distance, even from world to world, to
 save us who were swamped in guilt
 and woe, and brought us to the shore
 of safety, although he at last went down into the whirlpool of human and
 satanic rage. "He descended into hellP
 Not a New Invention.
 lJew modes have been invented for
 rescuing a drowning body, but there has been no new invention for rescuing
 a drowning soul. In 17S5 Lionel Lukin,
 a London coach builder, fitted up a
 Norway yawl as a lifeboat and called
 1t the Insubmergible, and that has
 been improved upon until from all the
 coasts of the round world perfect life
 boats are ready to put out for the relief
 of marine disasters. In 16 years the
 French Society For Saving Life From Shipwreck, by their lifeboats and gun apparatus saved 2,129 livos. The Ger | man Association For the Rescue of Life From Shipwreck, the Royal Ma tional Lifeboat institution and our | United States life saving service
 have done a work beyond the power
 of statistics to commemorate. What rocket lines and sling life buoys and tally boards and mortars and ham, mocks and cork mattresses and life saving stations filled with machinery for saving the bodies of the drowningl | But let me here and now make 1t plain
 that there has been no new way in- | vented for the moral and eternal res cue of struggling soul. Five hundred
 attempts at such contrivance have been made, but all of them dead failures. | Hear itl "There Is none other name
 under heaven given among men where | by we must be saved" than the name
 of Jesus. The mighty swimmer of my text comes down off the beach of heav- en and through the breakers, comes | buffeted and bruised, and, reckoning l the waves from his own lacerations, he
 cries: Lay hold of my arml Put your head on my shoulderl Hear the beating | of my loving heartI Be ye saved, for l
 am God, and there Is no otherp
 I want to persuade you to lay hold | of this strong swimmer. ''No," you | say; "it Is always disastrous for a
 drowning man to lay hold of a swim | mer." There Is not a river or lake but ! has a calamity resultant from the fact
 that when 8 strong swimmer went out to save a sinking man the drowning | man clutched him, threw his arms ! around him, pinioned his arms, and they both went down together. When you are saving a man in the water, | you do not want to come up by his ] face. You want to come up by his back. You do not want him to hold
 you while you take hold of him. But,
 blessed be God, Jesus Christ is so strong a swimmer he comes not to our
 back, but to our face, and he asks us
 to throw around him the arms of our
 love and then promises to take us to
 the beach, and he will do It. Do not
 trust that plank of good works. Do not | trust that shivered spar of your own | righteousness. Christ only can give you safe transportation. Turn your face upon him, as the dying martyr ] did in olden times when he cried out: | "None but Christi None but Christp Jesus has taken millions to the land,
 and he Is willing to take you there. | Oh, what hardness to thrust him back
 when he has been swimming all the way from the throne of God, where you are now. and is ready to swim all
 the way back again, taking your re- | deemed spirit!
 | Don't Struggle.
 | I have sometimes thought what a | spectacle the ocean bed will present | when in the last day the water is all | drawn off. It will be line of wrecks | from beach to beach. There is where | the harpooners went down. There Is | where the line of battle ships went down. There Is where the merchant men went down. There Is where the steamers went down. a long line of | wrecks from beach to beach. What a fon.lo i,, %h4 Toe Iar | water Is drawn off! But, oh, how | much more solemn If we had an eye to see the spiritual wrecks and the places where they founderedi You l would find thousands along our roads and streets. Christ came down in their awful catastrophe, putting out for their souls, spreading forth his hands as a swimmer spreadeth forth his hands | to swim," but they thrust him in the sore heart, and they smote his fair | cheek, and the storm and darkness swallowed them up. I ask you to lay hold of this Christ and lay hold of him | now. You will sink without him. From horizon to horizon not one sail
 In sight, only one strong swimmer,
 with head flung back and arms out | spread.
 l hear many saying: Well would | like to be Christian. I am going to | work to become Christian" My
 brother, you begin wrong. When a | man Is drowning and a strong swim
 mer comes out to help him, he says to
 him: "Now, be quiet Put your arm on
 my arm or on my shoulder. but don't
 struggle, don't try to help yourself, and I'll take you ashore. The more you struggle and the more you try to help yourself the more you impede me.
 Now, be quiet and I'll take you | ashore" When Christ, the strong | swimmer, comes out to save a soul,
 the sinner says: That's right. I am glad to see Christ, and I am going to
 help him ia the work of my redemp-
 ton. l am going to pray more, and I