Vernon County censor. [volume] (Viroqua, Wis.) 1865-1955, 1901-01-02
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preciated and failed and made laugh
/ ing stock. Racks altI prisons and whips
and shipwrecks and axes Of beheadment
did their worst, yet the heroes were more
! than conquerors. With such things you
VIII illustrate that word courage" and
they VIII go out from your presence to
start anew and right, challenging all
earth and he'll to the combat.
food morning. How do you do to-
day! said a clergyman in New Haven
many years ago to a stoncmasOn who
was covered with dust and mortar. The
stonemason was sour with the world
and cross and grabbed, but at that salu-
tation Of the clergyman looked up in sur
| use and stopped and asked some one
who as passing who that man was who
spoke to him so kindly and was told he
was the pastor OF a church on that
street The stonemason next Sunday
went to that church to hear its pastor
preach. The stonemason was conv erted
under the sermon and prepared for the
ministry and became one Of the most
useful and brilliant and foremost minis
tiers in the Baptist denomination.
heard him in my boyhood say on the an
iliversary platform in Broadway taber-
raele that that good morning on the
street Of New Haven many years before
saved him for this world and the next.
Words of Comfort.
That word courage" fifty spoken with
compressed lips and stout grip Of the
hand and an intelligent fash Of the eye
well, the finest apples that ever thumped
on the ground in an autunnal orchard
and were placed in the most beautiful
basket of silver network before keen ap-
petites could not be more attractive.
Furthermore, a comforting word fifty
spoken is a beautiful thing No one but
God coull give the inventory Of sick beds
and bereft homes and broken hearts. We
ought not to let day pass without visit
or a letter or a message or a prayer con-
solatory. You could call five minutes on
your way to the factory, you could leave
a half hour eal'ier in the afternoon and
fill mission of solaee. You could bright
en- a sick room with one ehrysanthemum.
You could send your carriage and give an
afternoon airing to an invalid on neigh
boring street You could loan a book with
scme chapters most adapted to some par
ticular misfortune. Go home to-day and
make out list Of things you can do that
will show sympathetic thought .ulness for
the hardly bestead. How rlany dark
places you might illumine. How many
tears you could stop, or, If already start
ed. you could wipe away. How much like
Jesus Christ you might get to be. So
sympathetic was he with beggary, so
helpful was he for the fallen, and so
stirred was he at the sight of dropss, cpl
lepsy, paralysis and ophthalmia that
whether he saw it by the roadside, or at
the sea beach, or at the mineral baths Of
Bethesda, he offered relief. Cultivate
genuine sympathy, Christlike sympathy.
You cannot successfully dramatize it.
False sympathy Alexander Pope sketches
in two lines:
Before her face her handkerchief she
spread
To hide the food of tears she did not
shed.
There are four or FIVE words which,
fifty spoken, might soothe and emanci-
=, tie and rescue. Go to those from whose
ZONES Christ has taken to himself a
loved one and try the word reunion
not under wintry sky, but in everlasting
springtide; not land where they can be
struck with disease, but where the inhab-
liant never says, Il am sick" not a re-
union that can be followed by separa-
ton. but in a place from which they
shall go no more out forever" For ema-
citation and signing, immortal health. Re
union, or, il you like the word better. an
tieipation. There is nothing left for them
in this world Try them with heaven.
With a chapter from the great book
open one Of the twelve gates. Give them
oAe note of seraphie harp, one flash from
the sea Of glass, one elatter of the hoofs
of the horses on which yictors ride. That
word reunion, or anticipation. fifty spok-
en-well, no fruit hea ped up in silver
baskets could equal it. OF the 1000
kinds Of apples that have blessed the
world not one is so mellow or so rich or
so aromatic, but we take the suggestion
of the text and compare that word of
comfort, fifty spoken, to apples of gold
in baskets of silver.
A Word of Warming.
! So also is word Of warning. A ship
| may sail out of harbor when the sea has
not so much as a ripple. but what fool
hardy ship company would they be that
made no provision for high winds and
wrathful seas. However smoothly the
voyage of life may begin we will get
rough weather before we harbor on the
| other side, and we need ever and anon to
| nave some one uttering in most decided
/ tones aud words beware" There are all
| the temptations to make this life every
| thing and to forget that an inch of ground
/ is larger as compared with the whole
! earth than this life as compared with
/ our external existence. There are all the
| temptations of the wine cup and the dem
| john, which have taken down as grand
/ men as this or any other century has
| heard of. There are all the temptations
Of pride and avarice and base indulgence
and ungoyernable temper. There is nc
| word we all need oftener to hear than
the word beware
The trouble is that the warning word
is apt to come too late. We allow ouI
| friends to be overcome in a fight with
some evil habit before we sound an
| alarm. After a man is all on fire with
evil habit your word of warning will
! hare no more effect than would an aid
dress 70 Il house on fire asking it to stoT
| burning. no more use than steam tue
! going out Ia help ship after il has SUM
to tGe bottom Of the ocean. What use il
word Of warning to that inebriate whose
wife was dying from wounds inflicted bS
his own hand? As he held the hand Of his
| dying wife he umdo this VOW Mary,
viii never take another glass of strong