Connecticut western news., 1901-08-08

monotone. would be glorious inspira- ton, pendulumiug between calm satis- faction and high rapture.
 How any woman keeps house with out the religion of Christ to help her Is a mystery to me. To have to spend the greater part of ones life. as many wo- men do, in planning for the meals. and stitching garments that will soon be rent again, and deploring breakages, and supervising tardy subordinates, and driving off dust that soon again will settle, and doing the same thing day in and day out and year in and year out until the hair silvers, and the back stoops, and the spectacles crawl to the eyes, and the grave breaks open under the thin sole of the shoe-oh, 1t Is a long monotony! But when Christ comes to the drawing room, and comes to the kitchen, and comes to the nurs- cry. and comes to the dwelling, then how cheery becomes all womanly duties. She Is never alone now. Martha gets through fretting and joins Mary at the feet of Jesus. All day long Deborah is happy because she can help Lapidoth: Hannah. because she can make coat for young Samuel; Miriam. because she can watch her infant brother; Rachel, because she can help her father water the stock; the widow of Sarepta. be- cause the cruse of oil Is being replen- lshed. O woman. having in your pam try a nest of boxes containing all kinds of condiments, why have you not tried in your heart and life the spicery of our holy religion? Martha, Martha. thou art careful and troubled about many things, but one thing Is needful. and Mary hath chosen that good part which shall not be taken away from her"
 Joyful Christianity.
 l must confess that great deal of the religion of this day Is utterly in- sipid. There Is nothing plquant or ele- vatiug about it. Men and women go around hunming psalms in a minor key and cultivating melancholy. and their worship has In it more sighs than raptures. We do not doubt their piety. Oh, no, But they are sitting at feast where the cook has forgotten to season the food. Everything Is flat In their experience and in their conversation. Emancipated from sin and death and hell and on their way to magnificent heaven. they act as though they were trudging on toward an everlasting Bot any Bay. Religion does not seem to agree with them. It seems to catch In the windpipe and become tight stran- gulation instead of an exhilaration. All the infidel books that have been written. from Yoltaire down to Her bert Spencer. have not done so much damage to our Christianity as lugubri- ous Christians. Who wants religion woven out of the shadows of the night? ? Why go growling on your way to celes- tial enthronement2 Come out of tbat cave and sit down In the warm light . of the Sun of Righteousness. Away with your odes to melancholy and Her vey's "Meditations Among the Tombs" Then let our songs abound
 And every tear be dry;
 We're marching through Emmanuel's ground To fairer worlds on high
 I have to say also that we need to put more spice and enlivenment in our religious teaching. whether 1t be in the prayer meeting or in the Sunday school or In the church. We ministers need more fresh air and sunshine in our lungs and our heart and our head. Do you wonder that the world is so far from being converted when you find so little vivacity in the pulpit and In the pew? We want. like the Lord. to plant in our sermons and exhortations more lilies of the field. We want fewer rhetorical elaborations and fewer ses- quipedalian words, and when we talk about shadows we do not want to say adumbration. and when we mean queerness we do not want to talk about idiosyncrasies, or If stitch in the back we do not want to talk about lumbago, but. in the plain vernacular of the great masses. preach that gos- pei which proposes to make all men happy, honest. victorious and free. In other words. we want more cinna mon and less gristle. Let this be so in all the different departments of work to which the Lord calls us. Let us be plain. Let us be earnest. Let us be 
 the people In yernacular they can un- derstand, they will be very glad to come and receive the truth we present Would to God that Queen Balkis would | drive her spice laden dromedaries into all our sermons and prayer meeting ex,
 hortations.
 Enliven Christian Work.
 \ ho, ., | and spice in our Christian work. The poor do not want so much to be groaneC | over as sung to. With the bread anC I medicines and garments you give then | ct there be an accompaniment oi
 smiles and brisk encouragement. Do
 not stand and talk to them about tn, | wretchedness of their abode and tn,
 hunger of their looks and the hardnes. of their lot. An, they know 1t bette ! than you can tell them. Show then | the bright side of the thing, If there b,
 any bright side. Tell them good time will come; tell them that for the chil dren of God there is immortal rescue I Wake them up out of their stolidit,
 by an inspiring laugh, and while vol
 send in help. like the queen of Sheba
 also send in the spices. There are tw,
 ways of meeting the poor. One Is t l come into their house with a nose ele
 vated in disgust, as much as to say: ("
 don't see how you live here in thi
 neighborhood. It actually makes m
 sick. There is that bundle. Take Il
 you poor, miserable wretch, and mak I the most of it." Another way Is to q
 into the abode of the poor in a manne
 which seems to say: "The blessed LOT
 sent me. He was poor himself. It 1
 not more for the good I am going t
 try to do you than 1t Is for the goo
 that you can do me" Coming in tha
 spirit, the gift will be as aromatic a
 the spikenard on the feet of Chris
 and all the novels on that alley will b
 fragrant with the spice.
 We need more spice and enlivenmen
 in our church music. Churches sit dis ! shall boya ohnir