The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1907-01-30
Subject: Vision.

W. F1SuueTSOu, pastor, IOOh DIS HIS
text, Ps. 1918: open Thou mine
eyes" He. said:
.Of all the physical gifts which we
have received at the hand and by the
grace of a loyice Father the natural
eyesight is the best. What a blessed
bestowal it is. I fancy Tat most Of
us, had we to give up any of the
senses would %relinquish the sense Of
sight last. Most Of us, I believe,
would lose all our other faculties be-
fore this one. The eyes reveal to US
the animate world. They r the
windows out of which we look upon
the universe of God. With them we
study the handiwork of Jehovah in
nature and in human kind. Through
them we search the wonders Of the
Heavens and view the brilliant beau
ties of the paintings of God in sky
and cloud, in hill and vale, in wood
land, stream, in lake and sea.
The eyes are for use. They grow
strong and acute and increase in
power of discernment by exercise
alone. Visual facility is the result
of visual activity. The mar who
does not, or cannot, use his eyes,
sooner or later loses the faculty of
vision. The poor prisoner in the
donjon keep, with only darkness for
companionship and with no consola-
ton save the slow approaching hand
Of death, after years of dark con1ne-
ment and of torture hideous and
m%addening, loses the power to see.
Seeing Is not looking. Many peo-
pie look who never see They look
upon things, but they rarely see into
things. Their eyes catch visions, but
they rarely pierce beneath the sur
face. Many people look at things,
they cast their eyes upon things, but
they do not see.
Seeing is a discipline. Looking Is
a habit of the lax. To see we must
cultivate the power of perception.
We must school ourselves to look be-
yond the superficial to the eternal I'M
derlying realities. And because they
lack perception, because their eyes
have not been opened, because they
do not possess, through exercise, the
ability to di~fferentiate, to discern, to
perceive clearly, many people really
do not see. 1t was not until the clear
vision of a Ruskin showed to me the
purple haze at sunset that I learned
to know and love the darkening beau
ty Of the hills.
Those who have used their eyes are
the worlds greatest men. las n OF
our wisest teachers has said, the
greatest thing a human soul ever
does in this world, is to see some
thing, and to tell what it saw in a
plain way. Hundreds of people can
talk, for one who can think. But
thousands can think for one who can
see; to see clearly is poetry. prophecy
and religion, all in one. Therefore,
finding the world of literature more
Ipr less divided into thinkers and
)seers, I believe we shall find also,
that the seers are wholly the greater
race of the two" For, as DR.. Hills
has said, greatness is vision" I
fancy that many a man had bathed
In a tub before Archimedes, at his
bath, discovered the eternal fact Of
the displacement Of bodies and for
mulated the truth of displacement
into law. Multitudes Of men I'M
| questionably gazed upward into the
heavenly armament and studied the
movement of the heavenly spheres
before C~opernicus; but it remained
for him, with the seeing eye, to re-
| veal to humanity the underlying prin-
ciples of the celestial galaxies. New
ton was not the first man who had
| watched an apple fall from a leafy
bough; but he was the first n who
really saw the apple fall. Other men
had seen it and had not been by 1t
impressed. Newton used his eyes
and to US was given the law Of gravi-
tation. Columbus was not the first
man who stood upon the shores of
Portugal and watched the ships sail
hull first v e the horizons edge, into
the unknown bosom of the sea; but
In the disappearing vessel Columbus
saw the prophecy of the rotundity
Of the earth. Multitudes of kettles
Of diverse form had steamed on
many a hearth before the days Of
Watts; but only Watts saw the loco
motive in the wasted, superheated
yapor. With a kite and a string
many a boy and many a man had
wiled away the pleasant hours; but
1t was not until Franklin, with a pre-
vision born of application, sent his
frail sky-craft up into the clouds that
the wonder of electricity became re-
allied to men. Darwin, Wallace and
Agassi, delving into the mysteries as
well as the superficialties of natural
life, were not the first to gaze upon
the animal life that Is teeming
round about u.s.; but they were the
first to understand, with insight and
clear vision, the handiwork of God
therein. It is said that Henry lard
| Beecher could see and reveal more
beauty in the top of a head of celery
than the average man is able to dis
Germ in the full-Dloom beauty of the
rose. Yes, greatness is vision"
The world needs discernment. That
Is to say it needs seeing eyes. 1t
needs to cultivate the habit and the
faculty of perception. This is true
in the intellectual, in the civic and
the spiritual world, not to mention
others.
We need vision in the intellectual
life. Too great insistency cannot be
laid upon the need for clear-cut, def
mite. incisive thinking. We cannot
afford as men or as a society to do
less than cultivate powers Of in
tellectual discernment to the full. If
we are to have a theory Of knowl-
edge which shall be valid; If we
are to have a wise statement Of the
underlying principles of life, we must
have men who, with keen intelligence
and with provision extraordinary,
shall be able to analyZe their expert
ences and ours, and give to humanity
a philosophy which shall explain, as
well as be founded upon, the facts
of our human existences. All honor
to the mel in every school, in every
land and in every age, who have
given their best years and their rip