Western Kansas world. [volume] (WaKeeney, Kan.) 1885-current, 1901-02-23

while / addressed them. l congratu-
lated rat audience on two advantages
they ha>. over the most of us-the one
that they escaped hearing great
many disa greeabIe things and on the
other fact that they escaped saying
things they were sorry for afterward.
Yet after all the alleviations shack
led tongue is an appalling limitation.
But we are not this morning speaking
of congenial mutes.. We mean those
who are born with all the faculties of
vocalization and vet have been struck
by the evil one mentioned in the text
the dumb devil to whom Christ called.
when he said. Thou dumb and deaf
spirit, 1 charge thee, come out of him."
silence Sometimes Crime.
There has been apotheosization of
silence. Someone has said silence IS
golden, and sometimes the greatest
triumph is to keep your mouth shut.
But sometimes silence is a crime and
the direct result of the baleful inf1u-
ence of the dumb devil of our text.
There is hardly man or woman who
has not been present on some occa-
sion when the Christian religion be-
came target for raillery. Perhaps it
was over in the store some day when
there was not much going on and the
clerks were in a group, or it was in
the factory at the noon spell, or it was
out on the farm under the trees while
you were resting, or it was in the club
room, or it was in a social circle, or
it was in the street on the way hOme
from business, or it was on some occa-
! sion which you remember without my
describing it. Someone got the laugh
on the Bible and caricatured the pro-
! fession of religion as hypocrisy. or
made a pun out of something that
Christ said. The laugh started, and
! you Joined in, and not one word of pro-
test did you utter. What kept you
silent? Modesty? No. Incapacity to
answer? No. Lack of opportunity?
| No. 1t was blow on both your lips
by the wing of the dumb devil If
someone should malign your father or
mother or wife or husband or child,
you would flush up quick and either
with an indignant word or doubled up
| fist make response. And yet here is
our Christian religion which has done
so much for you and SO much for the
world that it will take all eternity to
celebrate it, and yet when it was at
| tackled you did not so much as say:
4 differ. I object. 1 am sorry to hear
YOU say lHdC. uGT0 Is duOIuGT sue
to this You Christian people ought
| in such times as these to go armed,
not with earthly weapons, but with the
sword CT the spirit. You ought to have
! four or five questions with which you
could confound any man who attacks
Christianity. A man 90 years old was
| telling me how he put to flight a scoffer.
My aged friend said to the skeptic,
Sfn Of
! Joseph in the Bible?'' YES" said
I the man. ''it is a fine story and as in
teresting a story as ever read"
We'll, now said my old friend, sup
pose that account of Joseph stopped
half way?" oh said the man, then
! it would not be entertaining" well,
now" said my friend. I'VE have in this
world only half of everything, and do
you not think that when we hear the
last half things may be consistent and
that then we may find that God was
| right?
Silence Gives Consent.
oh, friends, better load up with a
I few Interrogation points, You cannot
afford to be silent when God and the
Bible and the things of eternity are
assailed Your silence gives consent
| to the commandment of your Fathers
| house. You allow a slur to be cast on
your mothers dying pillow. In behalf
/ of the Christ, who for you I, went
through the agonies of assassination
on the rocky bluff back of Jerusalem
you dared not face a sickly joke. Bet
| ter load up with a few questions, so
that next time you will be ready. Say
| to the scoffer: MY dear sir, will you
tell me what makes the difference be-
tween the condition of woman in
| China and the United States? What
mount2 How do you like the golden
rule laid down in the Scriptures? Are
| you in favor of the Ten Command
ments? In your large and extensive
reading have you come across a love-
lier character than Jesus Christi Will
you please to name the triumphant
deathoeds of infidels and atheists?
| How do you account for the fact that
among the out and out believers in
! Christianity were such persons as
BENJAMIN Franklin, John Ruskin
Thomas Carlyle, Darlington Macaulay,
William Penn, Walter Scott, Charles
| Kingsley, Horace Bushnell, James A.
Garfield. Robert Z. Lee, Stonewall
Jackson, Admiral Foote, Admiral Far
! ragut, Ulysses S. Grant, John Milton,
William Shakespeare, Chief Justice
| Marshall, John Adams, Daniel Web
ster, George Washington? How do
you account for their fondness for the
| Christian religion? Among the in