The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-09-02
THE REV. DR. FERRIS HOME
OCCUPIED HIS PULPIT CALVARY

of Ills Trip Abroad Some of the Many
 Places He Visited With Mrs. Ferris-
 Wedding Ceremony After the servie'
 Hast Night.
 The Rev. George H. Ferris, pastor oi l the Calvary Baptist church, occupied 1 the pulpit yesterday in that church fo1 | the first time in ten weeks, and he was greeted by large congregation. Rev and Mrs. Ferris returned home last l Tuesday from a ten weeks trip in Eu- rope, and they had most delightful
 time. They spent most of their time in l Sicily and Switzerland. Rev. pr. Fer | ris said that the most interesting part l of the stay abroad was the visit to the \ ruins in Sicily, where they spent a good l deal of time. Mt. Etna was visited and many other historic places were | included in the trip. Another feature of the trip abroad was the crossing over from Italy to Switzerland on the famous Theodule pass, one of the grandest on the continent. It is at a
 height of over 11,000 feet above the sea.
 and while crossing on it Rev and Mrs. Ferris had to be tied to the guides
 that directed them. It is one of the
 most perilous trips taken by American visitors, but the journey was made without an accident. Mrs. Ferris stood the hard journey almost as well as her
 husband, and was delighted at the
 magnificent scenery during the pro-
 gress of their march,
 When Rev. and Mrs. Ferris were on
 the bay of Naples Professor Beach of
 Yale came up to them and introduced himself. Their meeting was greatly enjoyed especially as Professor Beach was the only New Haven person they met while in Europe. Returning on the same steamer with Rev. and Mrs Fer ris were Dr. Cushing, principal of the Hillhouse High school and his wife, making the trip across the ocean much more pleasant than if they were alone.
 The sermon preached by Rev. Dr. Ferris yesterday morning was very interesting one and touched somewhat on his trip abroad. Last evening after the regular service Rev. Dr. Ferris per- formed a marriage ceremony in which Harry c. Groff and Dorothy l.. Beck were united in marriage. A few friends and relatives of the couple were there, and the wedding was very quiet one.
 The text for the morning sermon was from Romans 1, 1, and the sermon was in part as follows:
 Paul, a servant" So he often be- gins his eplstles. Though he has moulded the life of mankind for eigh- teen hundred years, in his own day he gloried in the fact that he was "Christ's slave" As passed down the shore of Sicily this summer, amid the ruins of that great civilization that once made this island the treasure house and pleasure ground of the world, over bleak and barren fields where we are told the hounds once lost their scent amid the perfume of the roses, I thought of that ancient journey when the great apostle was borne along those shores like piece of driftwood swept onward by the powerful current of Roman iurispru- dence. And landing at Syracuse" he says, i've tarried there three days" Of all the sad sights have ever seen none exceeds that of Syracuse, That city, which Cicero described as "the largest and most beautiful of all the Greek cities" has suffered from the ravages of war, the vicissitudes of time and the ignominy of her own in until for centuries she has been but a wretched, filthy, forsaken town, the home of malaria and beggars. As one wanders along the barren ledge of rock, over which for miles and miles there once stretched this great metrop- olis of a million inhabitants, where now the scalped stones furnish enough for a few rowing goats, he what has become of Syracuse. | Nothing is left but those awful gloomy ,aves called the "Latomia de Cappucci- | 1i," where seven thousand Greeks | starved and languished, while digging l put stone to build those great monu- | nents that once formed the delight and l 1Gnor of those who here ruled the | world. Nature has covered the ruins l # other cities with her green garment | if vegetation; but Syracuse she has | eft naked field of rock, The very ,tones that once formed her buildings lave crumbled. Beggars infest the de- i
  Oionysius have dropped into the sea. The great altar where Hleru II sacri- iced 450 oxen yearly to commemorate ! victory is reduced to a pile of stones overed with lichens. Amid all these cenes of ruined hopes and lost splendor ne can scarcely help thinking of him vho said Love never faileth." Paul, , bondservant of Jesus Christ" Was e not far happier and infinitely great r than Dionysius the tyrant? Do you ancy the dingy hut in the humble lane where he passed those three days in yracuse was any less beautiful to the ngels than the great Fort Euryalus f the massive walls built by the ty- ant out on the tableland? And all own through his journey, when the ,aves of persecution and prejudice beat yer him in the uproar at Ephesus, iheu he langushed two years in the ungeon of the tirnid and mercenary 'elix, when he pleaded the cause of before Epicureans and toics in cultured and restless Athens, ,hen he stood a drenched and ship -recked prisoner by bonfire on the sland of Malta, when he faced the | ulgar life and brutal impulses of the i ebauched and sensuous population of nperial Rome, was he not far less a ave of circumstance, and far more ruler of earth, than those proud poten- stes who held the sceptre and wore le purple and received the homage ol | len? From that first experience in | ystra, whither he was followed by