Connecticut western news., 1900-02-15

Inelr money arlSnt and use their lntel- ligence alright. how few men you find aware of the fact that they ought to use their physical organism alright. With every thump of the heart there is something saying: Work, Workr' And lest we should complain that We have no tools to work with, God gives us our hands and feet, with every knuckle and with every joint and with every muscle saying to us, Lay hold and do something"
 But how often it is that men with physical strength do not serve Christ. They are like a ship full manned and full rigged, capable of vast tonnage, yet swinging idly at the docks when these men ought to be crossing and re- crossing the great ocean of human suf- fering and sin with God $ supplies of mercy. How often it is that physical strength is used in doing positive dam age or in luxurious ease, when, with sleeves rolled up and bronzed bosom, ought to be laying hold with all its might and tugging away to lift up this sunken wreck of a world.
 It is a most shameful fact that much of the business of the church and of the world must be done by those com paratively invalid. Richard Baxter. by reason of his diseases, all his days sitting in the door of the tomb. yet writing more than 100 volumes and sending out an influence for God that will endure as long as ''rhe Saints Ev- erlasting Rest;" Edward PaySon, never knowing we'll day, yet how he preach ed and how he wrote, helping thou sands of dying souls like himself to swim in sea of glory! And Robert McCheyne, a walking skeleton. yet you know what he did in Dundee and how he shook Scotland with zeal for God; Philip Doddridge, advised by his friends. because of his illness, not to enter the ministry, yet you know what he did for the Rise and Progress of Religion" in the church and in the world.
 Giants In All Things.
 Wilberforce was told by his doctors that he could not live fortnight. yet at that very time entering upon philan- thropic enterprises that demanded the greatest endurance and persistence; Robert Hall. suffering eXcruciations, so that often in the pulpit while preach ing he would stop and lie down on a sofa. then getting up again to preach about heaven until the glories of the celestial city dropped on the multitude. doing more work, perhaps, than almost any well man in his day.
 Oh, how often it is that men with great physical endurance are not as great in moral and spiritual stature. While there are achievements for those who are bent all their days with sickness - achievements of patience, achievements of Christian endurance call upon men of health, men of mus cle. men of nerve. men of physical pow CT, to devote themselves to the Lord. Giants In body, you ought to be giants in soul
 Behold also. in the story of my text, illustration of the fact of the damage that strength can do if it be misguided. It seems to me that this man spent a great deal of his time in doing evil, this Samson of my text. To pay a bet which he had lost by the guessing of his riddle he robs and kills 80 people. He was not only gigantic in strength. but gigantic in mischief, and a type of those men in all ages of the world who. powerful in body or mind or any facul- @,- -f ;.l bax used their strength for iniquitous pur- poses.
 It is not the small, weak men of the day who do the damage. These small men who go swearing and loafing about your stores and shops and banking houses. assailing Christ and the Bible and the church-they do not do the damage. They have no influence. They are vermin that you crush with your foot. But it is the giants of the day, the misguided giants, giants in physical power, or giants in mental acumen, or giants in social position. CT giants in wealth, who do the damage. The men with sharp pens that stab re- ligion and throw poison all through our literature, the men who use the power of wealth to sanction iniquity and bribe justice and make truth and honor bow to their golden scepter. Mis- guided giants-look out for them, In the middle and latter part of the last century no doubt there were thousands of men in Paris and Edinburgh and London who hated God and blasphem- ed the name of the Almighty. but they did but little mischief-they were small men. insignificant men. Yet there were giants in those days. Who can calcu- late the soul havoc of Rousseau, go- ing on with very enthusiasm of in- iquity. with fiery imagination seizing upon all the impulsive natures of his day? Or David Hume, who employed his life as a spider employs its sum- mer. in spinning out silken webs to trap the unwary? Or Yoltaire, the most learned man of his day, marshall ing great host of skeptics and leading them out in the dark land of infidelityi Or Gibbon, who showed an uncontrol- lable grudge against religion in his his tory of one of the most fascinating pc riods of the worlds existence-the De cline and Fall of the Roman Empire"- a book in which, with all the splendors of his genius, he magnified the errors of Christian disciples, while with a sparseness of notice that never can be forgiven he treated of the Christian heroes of whom the world was not worthy?
 Understand Your Power.
 Oh, men of stout physical health. men of great mental stature, men of high social position, men of great pow CT of any sort, want you to under stand your power, and 1 want you to know that that power devoted to God will be a crown on earth, to you typi- cal of a crown in heaven, but misguid- ed, bedraggled in sin, administrative of evil, God will thunder against you with his condemnation in the day when millionaire and Dauper master