St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1900-07-07

/ 10 AOV POOtAy PAOSSs ASNs sA~~
wrong is generally in the opposite d.
rection. You would not have to go
| far to find a wife whose life is per-
| petual martyrdom-someth heav.
ier than the stroke of q fist, unkin.l
words; staggering home at midnight
and constant maltreatment, which
have left her only wreck Of what
she was on that day when in the
midst Of brilliant assemblage the
vows were taken. and full organ played
| the wedding march, and the carriage
| rolled away with the benediction of
| the people. What was the burning
Of Latimer and Ridley at the stake
compared with this? Those men soon
| became unconscious in the fire, but
there is 80 years. martyrdom, so
years putting to death, yet uncom-
| planning. No bitter words when the
rollicking companions at two o'clock
in the morning pitch the husband
dead drunk into the front entry. No
bitter words when wiping from the
swollen brow the blood struck out in
| midnight carousal- Bending over
the battered and bruised form of him
| who when he took her from her
fathers home promised love and kind
ness and protection, yet nothing bu.
sympathy and prayers and forgive
ness before they are asked for. No
bitter words when the family Bible
goes for rum and the pawnbroker's
shop gets the last decent dress. Some
day, desiring to evoke the story of
her sorrows, you say: well. how
are you getting along now?" and,
rallying her trembling voice and
quieting her quivering lip, she says:
pretty well, I thank you; pretty.
WELL" She never will tell you. In the
delirium Of her last sickness she may
tell all the other secrets of her life
time, but she will not tell that. Not
until the books of eternity are opened
on the throne of judgment will ever
be known what she has suffered Oh,
We who are twisting garland for the
victor, put it on that pale brow!
When she is dead the neighbors will
beg linen to make her a shroud. and
she will be carried out in a plain box,
with no silver plate to tell her years,
for she has lived q thousand years of
trial and anguish. The gamblers and
swindlers who destroyed her husband
will not come to the funeral. One car
riage will be enough for that funeral
one carriage to carry the orphans
and the two Christian women who
presided over the obsequies.
But there is fash, and the opening
of Celestial door and shout: Lift
up your head, We everlasting gate. and
let her come in!" And Christ will
step forth and say: "Come in. Ye
suffered for me on earth; be glorified
with me in Heaven" What is the
highest throne in Heaven? You say:
'"The throne Of the Lord God Almighty
and the Lamb" No doubt about it.
What is the next highest throne in
Heaven? While I speak it seems to
me it will be the throne of the drunk
ards wife, If she with cheerful pa
thence endured all her earthly torture.
Heroes and heroines!
I find also in this roll the heroes of
Christian charity. We all admire the
George Peabodys and the James Len
oxes of the earth, who give tens and
hundreds of thousands of dollars to
good objects. But am speaking now
of those who out of their pinched pow
erty help others-of such men as those
Christian missionaries at the west
who proclaim Christ to the people, one
of them, writing to the secretary in
New York, saying: Il thank you for
that $2s. Until yesterday we have
had no meat in our house for three
months. We have suffered terribly.
My children have no shoes this win
ter" And of those people who have
only a half loaf of bread, but give a
piece of it to others who are hungrier,
and of those who have only a scuttle
Of coal, but help others to fuel, and
of those who have only a dollar in
their pocket and give 25 cents to some
body else, and of that father who
wears a shabby coat, and Of that moth
er who wears faded dress, that their
children may be well appareled. You
call them paupers or ragamuffins or
emigrants. l call them heroes and
heroines. You and may not know
where they live or what their name is.
God knows, and they have more angels
lowering over them than you and
have, and they will have higher seat
in Heaven. They may have only
cupful of cold water to give a poor
traveller or may have only picked
splinter from under the nail of
child's finger or have put only two
mites into the treasury, but the Lord
knows them. Considering what they
had, they did more than we have ever
done, and their faded dress will be-
come a white robe, and the small room
will be an eternal mansion, and the
old hat will be exchanged for a coronet
of victory, and all the applause Of
earth and all the shouting OF Heaven
will be drowned out when God rises
up to give His reward to those humble
workers in His Kingdom, and say to
them: "Well done, good and faithful
servant"
You have all seen or heard Of the
ruins of Melrose abbey. I suppose in
some respects they are the most ex-
quisite ruins on earth. And yet, look
ing at it was not so impressed-you
may set it down to bad taste-but I
was not so deeply stirred as was at
a tombstone at the foot Of that abbey,
the tombstone placed by Walter Scott
over the grave of an old man who had
served him for a good many years in
his house-the inscription most insig-
nificant, and defy any man to stand
there and read it without tears COM
ing into his eyes-the epitaph: "Well
done, good and faithful servant" Oh,
when our work is over, will it be found
that, because of anything we have
done for God or the church or suffer
ing humanity, that such an inscrip-
ton il appropriate for us? God grant
it'll
Who are those who were bravest and
deserved the greatest monument, Lord
Claverhouse and his burly soldiers or
Inhn Rrnwn the Edinhur0h carrier