St. Tammany farmer. [volume] (Covington, La.) 1874-current, 1900-11-17

on them scverest quarantine.
Ny subject also impresses me with
the fact that early impressions ar,
almost ineffaceable. Daniel had q re
ligious bringing up. From the gooi
meaning of his name I know he haG
pious parentage. But as soon as he
comes into the possession of the king
his name is changed, all his sur
roundings are changed, and now, you
say, will begin the decentralization oi
his character. Before his name was
Daniel, which means "God, my
judge" now, his name is to be Bette.
shazzar, which means 'the treasurer
OF the god Bel" Now you expect to
see him overthrown amid all THESE
changed circumstances. Oh, no!
Daniel started right, and he keeps on
right. When 1 find what Daniel is in
Jerusalem, / am not surprised to find
what he is in Babylon. wish could
write upon all parents hearts the
fact that early impressions are we'll
nigh ineffaceable. When 1 see Joseph,
a pious lad in the house of his father
Jacob, am not surprised to see him
acting so nobly down in Egypt. When
find Samuel, pious lad in the house
Of his mother Hannah, am not sur
prised that he gives terrible shifting
to idolatry as soon as he comes to
manhood. David planned the temple
at Jerusalem and gathered the ma
terials for its building, but Solomon,
the son, came and put up the struc-
ture, and that goes in all ages. The
father plans the character of the
child and its destiny for time and
eternity, then the SON completes the
structure. You might as well put
down a foundation ten feet by five
and expect to rear on it great
cathedral as to put down q contracted
character in q child's soul and yet
rear upon it something extensively
grand and extensively useful.
Let me say to those Christian parents
who are doing their best in the educs-
tion of their children: Take good heart;
your sons this morning may be far
away from you and in distant city,
but God, to whom you dedicated them,
will take care of them. The God of
Daniel will take care Of them far away
in Babylon. 'Train up a child in the
way he should go, and when he is old
he will not depart from it." He may
wander away for awhile and fall into
sin and break your heart, but before
he is done with this life, you having
commended him to God, he will come
back again. for put the emphasis in
the right place and on the word "old"
when 1 repeat that passage and say.
''Train up a child in the way he should
go, and when he is old he will not de-
part from it," May you all have the
glorious satisfaction of seeing your
children walk in paths of righteousness
and peace! One with them on earth,
may you be one with them in Heaven!
But ] learn also from this subject
the beauty of Christian sobriety. The
meat. and the wine that were to come
to Daniels table were to come from the
kings table. Well, Daniel had no right
to take that food. The king was a
heather, and, like all the heathens, was
accustomed to ask blessings before he
partook of food, and in that blessing
they always dedicated the food to the
gods. So that if Daniel had taken this
food he would have broken the law
which forbade the taking of food dedi-
Gated to idols. He chose pulse. 1t was
a miracle that he did not dwindle
away. There is nothing in pulse. such
a poor herb, to make man ruddy and
Some people talk as though
that were kind of diet which would
make a man swarthy and competent to
do the duties of this life. That is
not the lesson at all. But for pos
itive miracle Daniel would have dwin-
died away, and when God for his self
denial puts upon him this benediction
He puts a benediction upon all Chris
tian sobriety. / would not have you
class your preacher among those who
would put unnecessary restraint upon
lawful appetites. There are those in
this day who dispute the grant which
God gave to man for animal food, and
they make a religion of their hunger as
the Pharisees expected Heaven for
their fasting. Daniel did not always
live on pulse. He was not a Grahamite;
he was not vegetarian. He went
that self-denial because the
food offered him was idolatrous food.
When l see God filing the earth with
all varieties of food, have not much
in the teaching of those who
would put us on severe regimen. They
are parents who, with wrong theory
in this respect, deny their children all
harmless luxuries and without suffi-
cient inquiry send them out to board
ng schools where their intellects are
cultivated to the disadvantage of their
starved bodies. so that from many a
boarding school a class of 20 will grad
nate, 10 of them ghosts. Now. when
| see the three angels eating the calf
which Abraham slew and when find
Christ eating broiled fish even after His
come to the conclusion
hat the theories of the vegetarian are
not from a religious standpoint well
founded.
But, oh, how many temptations to
1lSS1patlOn. WIN SO many tnlngS 10
tempt the appetite, how many tempta-
lions to gluttony! With SO many spark
ing beverages, how much temptation
o drunkenness! Could / bring before
you this morning the mothers and the
wives and the sisters who have wept |
1t the graves of the inebriate, your
soul would be overpowered with the
spectacle. Could / show you the |
manly forms robbed of their beauty,
he eye fiashings quenched in the wine
up, the ruddy cheek from which rum
las wormed the rose, your soul would |
,ecoil with horror. and you would rise
up and cry: "Begone, thou dream of |
,ell!"
Charles Lamb, who made all the
world laugh at his humor. and then
lfterward made all the world weep at
lis fate. who outwitted everybody
md was at last outwitted of his own
lppetites, wrote thus: "The waters
lave gone over me: but out of the
Iepths, could be heard. would cry
tut to all those who have set foot in
he perilous flood. Could the youth
O whom the favor of the first wine