The daily morning journal and courier., 1906-02-09
AN ADDRESS DELIVERED
AT THE RECENT STATE CONVEN-
 TION IN TORRINGTON

man May Learn From the Women of the Past" Following is the very interesting and pertinent address delivered at the re- cent state convention of Women's Aux ccS,liaries held in Torrington, by the Rev. Francis T. Brown, pastor of the First Methodist church of this city. Sub ject, What the Auxiliary Woman May Learn From the Women of the Post:
 A British conundrum which T. ran across the other day queries: Why are the ladies like telegrams?' and re- plies, Because their intelligence is so far in advance of the mails. The Sit uation in America being comparable, to say the least of it, to that in Great Britain, and the universal facility ot woman in transmitting intelligence be- ing recalled, it becomes plain that speech from a mere man at such gathering as this is nothing short ot gratuitous.
 And when it is further remembered that the programme committee has as- signed me the task of being mouthplece for all the women of the post, my pres ent situation will be seen to be not only gratuitous, but impossible. l am ex- pected, as it were, to throw open the folding doors of history upon the Amal- gamated Sewing Society of the Ladies of Long Ago, and from the disclosed confusion of tongues to interpret and condense one inclusive message of thir- ty minutes Were it not for my desire to back up my good friend, your faith full state secretary, I should be inclined to resign my commission with the ques- tion, "Why don't you speak for your selves?"
 But, seriously, my friends, how clear and comprehensive is the message that comes to us rom the story of past Wo- manhood-a message indeed for whose learning by us St. Paul declares the noblest history to have been written.
 It is the message of inspiration to patient hope hope that is not ftful, patience that is not dogged, ,-eager en- durance that under the heat and bur- den of the day bears the freshness and song of morning in the heart. Such message, in the light of our present theme itself in the twofold suggestion of what Christ has done for woman and what woman has done for Christ,
 Cried Libanius, the most distin- guished literary representative of heathenism at the close of the fourth century "Ah, Gods of Greece! What women these Christians have!" The monanhood which was the admiring despair of organism was the unshared glory of Jesus Christ. It was at his pierced hand that the three great evils of the ancient world were doomed-ha- tired of the foreigner, human slavery and the degradation of woman, so that in Him there was neither Jew nor Greek. bond nor free, male nor female If to-day you are Auxiliary Women" not in the degrading sense of essential inferiority, but in the ennobling sense of volunteer service, the difference Is the measure of your debt to the Great Minister in whose new order personal ity is sought and sceptered, and the greatest is the servant of all. The con- fidence that He who hath begun this good work for womanhood will per- feet it in the fuller coming of His king dom may well bring to us the inspira- tion of patient hope.
 And this inspiration comes to us again like heroic music in the story of what woman has wrought for Christ. St. Matthew, telling of the cruciflxion adds And many woen were there, " and in no crisis of His spiritual ministry since that hour has the sympathetic presence of woman failed her Lord. By sacrifcial gifts, by sacriticial death, bS sacrificial life, she has entered into the Kingdom and patience of Jesus Christ. Paula, the blood of Rome's noblest families in her veins, became disciple of the Healer of Galilee, and seeking the Holy Land expends her large for tune in founding the first hospitals of history; the enthusiasm of her exam nle spreads among the wealthy Chris ian women of the Roman world, and far and wide hos 1itals and asylums for every human need spring up. The fountain a womans hand opened, has become to-day a vast river of almost "omniscient charity" and in it's minis try the multiplying gifts of consecrated women are bearing an inestimable part.
 Nor has frail woman shrunk from faithfulness unto death. The inscrip- lions of the Catacombs, the annals of the Albigenses and Huguenots, of the Coyenanters and Puritans, bear abun- band testimony to her unfailing loyal ty under the last great test Perpetna of Carthage, the pleadings of a grey haired father and weeping babe be- sieging her woman's heart, refuses to hreak forth with her Lord and faces tha arenas torture and the headsman' S sword, saying even with joy, Gods will must be done"
 Tn a distant land and age, but united in the same sisterhood of faith and suffering. stand Margaret Wilson and her young sister Agnes tied by the per secutors of James Il. out against the incoming Solway tide. The unpitying waters rise higher and higher about them, but their leal hearts will not re- cant; steadily the tide creeps up; the last look at their earthly home is talk en; they lift their eyes toward a better country. At last the waters print upon their lips that move in prayer, the kiss of death; they have kept the faith. In Strings new cemetery you may see their marble effigies to-day and under meath may read-"Love many waters cannot ouench" !"