The free press. (Poplarville, Miss.) 1890-19??, 1901-04-25

ANYTHING that is worth keeping. But
what does a man deny himself who qe-
MES himself the religion of Christ! lie
denies himself pardon for sin; he denies
himself peace of conscience; he denies
himself the Joy Of the Holy Ghost; ne
denies himself a comic table death pll-
low; he denies himself the gories OF
heaven Do not talk to me about the self
denials of the Christian life Where there
is one in the Christian life there are
thousa d in tue life OF the world. her
ways are ways of pleasantness.
Again, I find a great deal of religious
sunshine in Christian and divine expana-
ton. To great many people life is an
inexplicable tangle. Things turn out diff
ferently from what was supposed. There
is a useless conan in perfect health;
There is an industrious and eonsecrated
woman complete Invalid. Explain that.
There is a bad man with 100000 of in.
come. There is good man ma with Ssoo OF OF
income Why is that? There is foe OF
society who lives on, doing all the dam
age he can. to seventy-five years of age;
and here is a Christian father, faithful
in every department of life, at thlrty-tlve
years Of age taken away by death, hls
family left helpless. Explain that. Oh,
there is no sentence that oftener drops
from your lips than this, u cannot !; IN
derstand it; | cannot understand it.
Well, now religion comes in just at
that point with it's illumination and it's
explanation There is q business man
who has lost his entire fortune. The
week before he lost his fortune there were
twenty carriages that stopped at the
door of his mansion. The week after ne
could count on one finger. The week
before financial trouble began people all
took off their hats to him, as he, passed
down the street. The week his financial
prospects were under discussion people
Just touched their hats without anywise
bending the rim. The week that he was
pronounced insolvent people just .Jolted
their hats at all, and the week the
sheriff sold him out all his friends were
looking in the store windows as they
went down past him.
Now, while the world goes away from
man while he is in financial distress.
the religion of Christ comes to him and
says you are sick, and your sickness
is to be moral publication You are be-
reaved God wanted in some way to take
gin somewhere, and so He. took the. one
that was most beautiful and was ready to
60" / do not say that religion explains
everything in this life, but | do say it
lays down certain principles which are
grandly consolatory. You know business
men often telegraph in cipher. The mer-
chant in San francisco tesegra1hs to the
merchant in New York certain informa-
ton in cipher which no other man IN
that line of business can understand, but
the merchant in San Francisco has the
key to the cipher and the merchant in
New York has the key to the cipher, and
on that information transmitted there
are enterprises involving. hundreds OF
thousands of dollars. Now, the provi-
! &C c. ~, 70 hn
less rigmarole, mysterious cipher: but
God has a key to that cipher. and the
Christian key to that cipher, and
though he may hardly be able to spell out
the meaning he gets enough OF the mean
ing to understand that it is for the best.
Oh, what an observatory IN which to
study astronomy heaven will be, not by
power of telescope, but by supernatural
vision, and, if there be something doubt
full 100000 miles away, by one stroke OF
the wing you are there, by another stroke
of the wing you are back again, and all IN
less time than l tell you, catching it all
in one fash of eternity.
And geology! What place that will
be to study geology when the world is be-
ing picked to pieces as easily as a school,
girl in botanical lessons pulls the leaf
architecture. amid the thrones and the
palaces and the cathedrals-St. Mark $
and st. Paul's rookeries in comparison.
Sometimes you wish you could make
the tour of the whole earth, going around
as others have gone, but you have not
the time, you have not the means. You
will make the tour yet during one must
these things for the comfort of those peo-
pie who are abridged in their opportuni-
ties-those people to whom life is hum
drum, who toll and work and toll and
work and aspire after knowledge but
have no time to get it and say, IF | had
the opportunities which other people
have, how would fill my mind and soul
with great thoughts" Be not discour-
aged, my friends. You are going to the
university yet. Death will only matricu-
late you into the royal college of the uni
verse.
What sublime thing it was that DR..
Thornwel, of South Carolina, uttered in
his last dying moments! As he looked no
he said, st opens; 1T expands, 1t ex-
pands," Or as Mr.. Toplady, the author
of Crock of Ages" in his last moment or
during his last hours looked up and said,
as though he saw something supernatural,
Light" and then as he can, on nearer
the dying moment, his couutenance more
luminous, he cried, Light! and at the
very moment of his departure lifted both
hands, something supernatural IN his
cOunCendnCe as ne CIlGu lASut- OAy
another name for sunshine.
Besides that, we shall have all the
pleasures of association. We will so
right up in the front of God without any
fright. All our sins gone, there will be
nothing to be frightened about. There
our old Christian friends will troop
around us. just as now one of your sick
friends goes away to Florida, the land of
flowers, or to the south of France, and
you do not see him for long while, and
after awhile you meet MIN, and the hol-
lows under the eyes are all filled, and the
appetite has come back, and the crutch
has been thrown away, and he Is so
changed you hardly know him. You say,
why, never saw you look so well. He
says: Il couldn't help but be well: L
have been sailing these rivers and climb,
ing these mountains, and that's how. |
got this elasticity. l never was so well"
Oh. my friends, your departed loved ones
are only away for their health in bet
ter climate, and when you meet them
they will be so changed you will hardly
know them, they will be so much changed,
and after awhile, when you are assured
that they are your friends, your depart
ed friends, you will say; why, where
is that cough? Where is that paralysis?