Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1902-02-07

p1IlIul spectacle Saul OF IdrSuar the
mighty man, three days led about in
physical as well as spiritual darkness,
he who afterward made Felix tremble
by his eloquence and awed the Atheni-
an philosophers on Mars hill and was
the only cool headed man in the Alex
andria corn ship that went to pieces on
the rocks of Miletus, once the mighty
prosecutor of Saul, afterward the glor-
ious evangelist Paul, for three days
not able to take safe step without
guidance!
Have you ever given thanks for two
eyes-media between the soul inside
and the world outside, media that no
one but the infinite God could create?
The eye, the window of our immortal
nature, the gate through which all
colors march, the picture gallery of
the soul! Without the eye this world
is big dungeon. I fear that many
of us have never given one hearty ex-
preston of gratitude for treasure of
sight, the loss of which is the great
est disaster possible unless it be the
loss of the mind. Those wondrous
seven muscles that turn the eye up
or down, to right or left or around.
No one but God could have created
the retina. If we have ever appreci-
ated what God did when he gave us
two eyes, it was when we saw others
with obliterated vision. Alas, that
only through the privation of others
we came to a realization of our own
blessing! If you had harp in hand
and swept all the strings of graft
tude, you would have struck this,
which is one of the most dulcet of the
ten strings.
Further, there are many who never
recognize how much God gives them
when He gives them sleep. Insomnia
is calamity wider known in our land
than in any other. By midlife vast
multitudes have their nerves so over
wrought that slumber has to be coaxed
and many are the victims of choral
and morphine. Sleeplessness is an
American disorder. If it has not
touched you and you can rest for
seven or eight hours without waking
if for that length of time in every "a
hours you can be free of all care and
worriment and your nerves are re-
turned and your limbs escape from all
fatigue and the rising gun finds you
a new man, body, mind and soul-you
have an advantage that ought to be
put in prayer and song and congrat u-
1atioH The French financier, almost
wealthy enough to purchase a king
dom, but the victim of insomnia wrote:
mo slumber to be bought in any mar
ket." He was right. Sleep is a gra
tuity from Him who never sleeps. Oh,
the felicities of slumber! Let all who
have this real benefaction celebrate it.
That is one of the sweetest strings in
all the instrument of ten strings.
Further, celebrate on the instru-
ment of ten strings our illumined
nights. They spread their tents over
us, and some of US hardly go out to
look at them. During the nights 9TH
er worlds come in sight. The author
of my text chimed the silver bells in
the tower of the midnight heavens,
saying: when I consider the heav-
ems, the work of Thy fingers; the
moon and the stars, which Thou hast
ordained, what is man that Then art
mindful of him?" We thank God for
the day; we ought also to thank Him
for the night. Worlds on worlds in
sight of the naked eye, but more
worlds revealed by telescope. At
least one night in his lifetime every
man ought to go into Astronomical
observatory and see what has been
done by the great World Builder.
Thank God for lunar and stellar IL
lumination!
Another string of this instrument
I now touch-friendships, deep and
abiding, by which 1 refer to those
people who, when good or bad motive
may be ascribed to you, ascribe the
good; those concerning whom you do
not wonder which side-they will take
when you are under discussion; those
who would more gladly serve you
than serve themselves: those to
whom you can tell everything with
out reserve; those who are first in
your home by person or by telegram
when you have trouble. Oh, what a
blessing to have plenty of friends!
Aye, if you have only one good friend,
you are blessed in that glad posses
sion. With one such friend you can
defy the world. But he must be a
tried friend. You cannot tell who are
your real friends till disasters come.
AS long as you collect vast dividends
and have health jocund and popular
ity un bounded you will have crowds
Of seeming friends, but let bank
ruptcy and invalidism and defama-
ton come, and the number of your
friends will be 95 per cent. off. If
you have been through some great
crisis and you have one friend left,
thank God and celebrate it on the
sweetest harpstring.
while all this is So" says some
one. there are so many things that
others have which I have not" re-
ply, it is not what we get, but what