Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1902-04-10

MIA and Hippicus, had been going on for
long while, a Roman soldier. mounted
on the shoulder Of another soldier.
hurled into the window Of the temple
a firebrand, and the temple was all
a6ame, and after covering many sacri-
Gees to the holiness Of God the build
ing itself became sacrifice to the
rage Of man. The hunger Of the peo-
pie in that city during the beslege-
ment was so great that rs some out
laws were passing doorway and in
hailed the odors of food they burst
open the door, threatening the mother
of the household with death unless
she gave them some food, and she took
them aside and showed them that It
was her own child she was cooking for
the ghastly repast. Six hundred priests
were destroyed on Mount Zion because,
the temple being gone, there was moth
ing for them to do. Six thousand peo-
ple in one coister were consumed.
There were 100000 dead according
to Josephus. Grotius thinks that this
was the cause Of silence in heaven for
half an hour. IF Mr.. Lord was right,
and this silence was during the Diocle
tan prosecutions. by which $4,000
Christians suffered death from sword
and fire and Punishment and exposure,
Why did not heaven listen throughout
al least one of those awful yearsf No!
Thirty minutes! The fact is that the
celestial programme is so crowded
with spectacle that It can afford only
one recess in all eternity, and that for
short space. While there are great
choruses in which all heaven can john
each soul there has story Of divine
mercy peculiar to itself, and it must
be n solo. How can heaven get
through with all its recitatives, with
all its cantatas, with all its grand
marches, with all its victories? Eter-
nifty is too short to utter all the praise.
In my text heaven spared thirty min
utes, but it will never again spare one
minute In worship in earthly church
es where there are many to take part
we have to counsel brevity, but how
will heaven get on rapidly enough to
let one hundred and forty-four thou
sand get through each with his own
story and then one hundred and forty
four million and then one hundred and
forty-four billion and then one hundred
and forty-four trillion? Not only are
all the triumphs of the past to be COM
memorated, but all the triumphs to
come. Not only what we now know of
God, but what we will know Of him
after everlasting study Of the deitic. If
my text had said there was silC; 70 in
heaven for thirty days, l wc", not
have been startled at the anne fAce'
ment, but 1t indicates thirty minutes
Why, there will be so many friends to
hunt up, so many of the greatly good
and useful that we will want to see, &c
many of the inscrutable things of earth
we will need explained, so many exclt'
ing earthly experiences we Will want
to tall, over, and all the other spirits
and all the ages will want the same
that there will be no more opportunity
for cessation. How busy we will be
kept in having pointed out to us the
heroes and heroines that the worlC
never fully apprcciated-the yellow
fever and cholera doctors who died, moi
flying from their posts; the female
nurses who faced pestilence in the laza
rettos; the railroad engineers who stay
ed at their places in order to save the
train, though they themselves persisted
Hubert Coffin. the master miner. who
landing from the bucket at the bottom
of the mine just as he heard the waters
rush in and when one jerk of the rop'
would have lifted him into safety, pu
in the bucket blind miner who want
ed to 20 to his sick child and jerke(
the rope for him to be pulled up, cry
ing, Tell them the water has burst il
and we are probably lost, but we will
seek refuge at the other end of thu
right gallery" and then giving the com
mand to the other miners till they dig
ged themselves so near out that tn
people from the outside could come T.
their rescue. The multitudes of mel
and women who got no crown on cart
we will want to see when they get thel
crown in heaven. tell you heaven will
have no more half hours TO spare.
Besides that, heaven Is full Of Chi
dren. They are in the vast majority
No child on earth who amounts to any
thing can be kept quiet half an hom
and how are you going to keep five hur
dred million of them quiet half an hour
You know heaven is much more of
place than it was when that recess @
thirty minutes occurred. Its populf
ton has quadrupled, sextupled, Ger
tupled. Heaven has more on HAND
more of rapture, more of knowledge
. moro of INSTRUMENTATION more c
worship. The most thrilling place W
) have ever been in is stupid compare
with that, and, If we now have no tim
to spare, we will then have no eternit
, to spare. Silence in heaven only ha
, an hour!
That Immortal Half Hour.
My subject also impresses mo wit
the immortality of half hour. TIL;
half hour mentioned in my text Is MOI
widely known than any other period
the calendar of heaven. None of II
whole hours of heaven is measure
: off, none of the years, none Of the Gel
turtles. or the millions of ages pa
and the millions Of ages to come N
. one is especially measured Off in Il
Bible. But the half hour Of my text
made immortal. The only part Of etc
uity that was ever measured by cart
" timcDiece was measured by the mi
J ute hand or nv text Oh, the half hour