The Newtown bee. (Newtown, Conn.) 1877-current, 1902-12-26

nights IN play houses and brOthelS,
whose passions flame at the sight of a
Wanton face, Nature says: will take
the rose from your check and put in
its place the faded leaf of dissipation.
l will take the strength and supple
ness out of your body. and put in their
place the withered leaf of enervation.
Not the leaf that nature tints and
beauties, but the leaf scorched and
Shriveled by the fires of passion. Ma
ture says to the drunkard: If you drink
alcohol, will take the pink glow of
health out of your cheeks and in it's place
the crimson leaf, scorched and wither-,
ed by alcoholic fires.
Nature will collect the debts which
she has against those who have con-
tracted them. They who disobey ma
lures laws must pay the penalty. If
we SOW to the flesh, we shall of the
principle of spiritual husbandry. just
as it is principle Of natural husband
dry that that the nature of the har-
vest reaped wi4l-he- according to the
nature Of the seed sown.
The deceitful and bloody man shall
not live out half his days: that is if a
man sow blood and deceit he shall reap
less than half harvest of years.
Now it is different with those who
obey natures laws. Beecher says, a
man who is twenty years old has more
chances of life than a boy who is only
10 years old, man at 30 has more
chances of life than a man at 20, man
OF 40 has more chances of life than
man at 80. The Interpretation of this
fact is that God gives premium to
men for the observation Of the great
laws of nature, augmenting the chances
of long life in this world in the cases of
such as obey God from whom nature
emanateS.
God says of the saint, whose love and
obedience have come up before him,
because he has set his love upon me,
therefore will deliver him; will set
him on high, because he hath known
my name" He shall call upon me and
in trouble, l will deliver him and hon.
our him. With long life will satisfy
Him and show him my salvation. F."
Such man fades naturally. Some
days as he did to Moses, God will come
and kiss away his spirit into peace,
whether old, young or middle-aged,
such one is ripe for glory when God
calls him. Such compose that great
multitude that no man can number.
They stand forth in the kingdom of
God as cOnquerorS and are clad in robes
of Immortality. When the leaf fades
it falls; it is better so, have seen the
withered, dried up leaf cling to it's
stem on the shrub oak, smitten by the
frost, and shaken by the bleak winters
wind, and still it chung as if it's only
hope was in it's not being torn from it's
hold. Such have no beauty and nobody
appreciates them. No one wants to
sit beneath their shade on bleak De-
cember day. The thing for the faded
leaf to do is to fall and decay and then,
In the spring time to be resurrected,
and transformed into the new sweet
life of the snowdrop, the anemone and
the trailing arbutus. The beauty of
the Christian religion is that it ripens
it's possessor for glory and when God
say, swell done, enter thou into the
thejoy of thy Lord" he is not afraid to
loosen his hold upon mortality, for
he knows in whom he has believed and
is pursuaded that henceforth there is
laid up for him crown of righteOu-
ness which the Lord the righteous
Judge will give him in that day.
1.-THE LEAF FADES GRADUALLY.
The autumnalItinta appears but faint
ly at first, beginning at theedges and then
working gradually to the body of the
leaf. Each day increases the color I'M
till the crimson hue is obtained and
the leaf is finely painted by the brush
of nature as no artist could paint it.
Age comes to us gradually. Mrs
Sangster says: perhaps the keenest
pang woman ever feels is in the day
that she realizes that her
youth is gone. There is al
ways some external sign by which
this knowledge is reached. 1t may
| he Slivht at first. There NAV annear a
few threads of silver woven into her
luxurious raven tresses. A few
wrinkles at the corners of the eye,
dimness of vision; she has to confess
that it is more difficult to thread her
needle by lamp-light than it used to
be. The cares and labor of the day
weigh more heavily upon her now than
they did ten years ago. The limbs are
not so elastic and the step not quite as
light as in days gone by, and that
"tired feeling" is now an everyday
experience. All, my friend, you are
growing old Don't try to throw off
one, two or three of the accumulated
years Old Time has put them upon
you to stay. You will never grow
young again until you breathe the I'M
tainted air of heaven, and your foot
steps ring upon the golden streets. It
is well to fade gracefully. Be cheer
full to-day and trustful tomorrow.
The falling leaf does not affect the life
OF the tree; the tree is just as full of
life and vigor in its winter nudity as
When the June birds sang and nestled
in its branches.
The outward man may fade, the
physical energies become exhausted,
and he may be stripped Of youth and