Highland recorder. (Monterey, Highland County, Va.) 1877-1972, 1901-07-05
ton. we nope that the detective VIII soon |

l Gllc Dcicut VI d llic luould uCC pOilSs "hSh
| his heart is ready to stop and who comes
| from an ancestry Enthusiastically short
lived. One act of fraud told Of in big
headlines in the morning papers righttully
arouses the nations wrath. 1t is the In
terest of every good man and good woman
| who reads of the crime to have it exposed
and punished. Let it 90 unscathed, and
you put premium on fraud, you depress
public morals, you induce those who are
on the fence between right and wrong to
go down on the, wrong side, and you put
the business of the world on down grade.
The ,constabulary and penitentiary must
do their work. But while the. merciless
and the goddess cry, Good for him. am
] glad he is within the prison doors' be
it your work to find out if that man is
worth saving and what were the causes
of his moral overthrow. Perhaps he
| started in business life under tricky
firm, who gave him wrong notions of bust
ness integrity; perhaps there was a COM
bination Of circumstances ALMOST unpar-
| alleled for temptation, perhaps there were
alterations, perhaps he was born wrong
and never got over it, perhaps he did not
realize what he was doing, and if you are
merciful man you will think of other
| perhapses which, though they will not ex-
| cuse, will extenuate. Perhaps he has al.
ready repented and is washed in the blood
| you are.
What an opportunity you have now for
| obeying my text! You were angry at the
misdemeanor, but you are hopeful for the
recovery of the recalcitrant. Blessed all
| prison reformers Blessed are those Gov.
ernors and Presidents who are glad when
| they have chance to pardon! Blessed
| the forgving father who welcomes home
| the prodigal! Blessed the dying thief
whom the Lord took with Him to glory,
saying, This day shalt thou be with Me
in paradise"
There is another evil that we ought to
abhor while we try to help the victim, and
that is infdelity. 1t snatches the life pre-
server from the man afoat and affords
not SO much as spar or a plank as sub
| light that has ever been kindled for the
| troubled and the lost Let the spirit Of
| in6delity take hold of fleighborhood,
and in that town the marriage relation is
farce, and good morals give place to all
| styles of immorals. Let it take possession
of this earth, and there would be no viz.
tue left in all the worlds circumference.
/ think if a famous in6del of our time
instead of being taken away. instanta
| and months of illness he would have re-
Il
loved family consultations which they
could not find in obsequies at which not
one word of holy Scripture was read or at
Fresh Pond crematory, where no Chris
| tan benediction was pronounced. ! DO
not positively say that in prolonged i'll.
| ness there would, have been retraction,
| but think there would.
| | say to all young men hoping to achieve
| financial, moral or religious success, con.
L al Of
| or rebuff defeat you. Verdi, the great
musician, applied to become student in
the Conservatory of Music at Milan, and
| he was rejected by the director. who said
| that he could make nothing of the new.
conner, as he showed no disposition for
music. But the criticism did not exasper.
ate or defeat him. The most of those who
have largely succeeded in all departments
were characterized by self control. In
battle they could calmly look at the. bomb
| thrown at their feet, wondering whether
when panics smote the city, these men
were placid, while others were yelling
themselves hoarse at the Stock Exchange.
While others nearly swooned because q
certain stock bad gone 100 points down
they calmly waited until it would get 100
points up. While the opposing attorney
in the courtroom frothed at the. mouth
with rage because of something said on the
other side he of the equipoise put glass
proceeded with the remark, las l was
saving when the gentleman interrupted
me-" Self control! What q glorious
thing! We want it in the doctor feeling
the pulse of one desperately i'll; we want
it in the engineer when the headlight OF
| another train comes round the curve on
| the same track we want it in Christian
| men and women in times when 80 much
| in church and state seems going to demo
liton-self control!
| Surprising all other characters in the
worlds biography stands Jesus Christ,
| wrathful against sin. merciful to the sin
ner. Witness His behavior toward the
| robed rufians who demanded capital pun
| shment for an offending woman-denun
| citation for their sinful hypocrisy, pardon
for her sweet penitence. He did not
speak of Herod as CHS highness' or This
royal highness," but dared to. compare
him to cunning fox, saying, GO We and
| tell that fox" But, alert to the cry of
suffering, He finds ten lepers, and to how
many Of the ten awful invalids did He
give convalescence and health! Ten. Re
buking Pharisaism in the most compressed
sentence in all the vocabulary of ana.
thema: aye serpents! Ye generation of
vipers! How can We escape the damna-
ton of hell?" Yet looking upon Peter
with such tenderness that no word was
spoken, and not word was needed, for
the look spoke louder than words. "And
the Lord looked upon Peter, and Peter
went out and wept bitterly, -.
Defying the mightiest Government Of
the world. the Roman Government. yet
rubbing His hand just below the forehead
of the blind until the optic nerve of him
who was born sightess is created, and
the sunlight has two new paths to tread:
Best illustration the world ever saw of
anger without sin, anger against the abom-
nations which have mauled and blasted
the earth from its deepest cavern to its
| highest cliff. but so much pity for the sin
ming and suffering nations that He allowed
| them to transfx Him upon two pieces of
wood nailed across each other on a day
that was dark as night, the windows Of
| heaven shut because the immortals could
not bear to look down upon the assassin
alton of the loveliest being that ever
walked the shore of the lakes or without
pillow OF blanket slept on the cold mount
| aims.
Like Him, let us hate iniquity with COM
plete hatred, but like Him may we help
| those who are overthrown and be willing
| though at the opening vi this discourse
our text may have seemed to command us
to do an impossible thing, we will at the
| close of this sermon, with a prayer to
God for help, be more rigid and deter
mined than ever before against that which
is wrong, while at the same time We shall
feel so kindly toward all the erring and
work so hard for their rescue that we will
realize that we have scaled the Alpine, the
Himalayan height of my text, which en-
| joins, ''Be We angry and sin not"
Some Greer Names.