The Alaska citizen., 1916-09-18


 are so seldom alone The noise Of our associations drown the voice of the deep. Nature has word for you, and when you hear that word she has volumes in store. and all tell of a Heavenly Father. Let nature speak to your soul rather than to your body; let her speak 10 your soul first Listen to her si lent voices Let her rest around you like the cloud enveloping the mountain peak, or the voice of the dew drop whispering to the daisy and in that rest you will hear the voices of the deep in a language al most divine
 II Have you heard the voice of God in the Bible? Deep calling unto deep? Most things we read are the shadows calling unto shal- lows within Us The Bible has a message only for the depths of mans soul Doubtless the reason why We do not read it more is be cause We have read it too super ficially We have not heard the call of the gold it contains because We have stopped before we had digscd to bedrock Let men get the gold once and they will dig for gold. Few men know gold until they see gold. We read the Bible far too much for geography, or golden texts. or dry doctrines-little won der it is dull You have heard of men reading it for their prejudices One reads it for baptism; another reads it for the millennium; another for spiritualism. Joseph Smith read it for Mormonism. Everett Hale read it for Unitarianism. Mary Baker Eddy read it for Christian Science Another read it for controversy Nations have gone to war over text Men have been put to death for shade of meaning. Men have been damned in the next world for the misplaced comma, or a translation" No wonder men lose their faith, and say the Bible has lost it's power. For such readers the Bible has no message, and it's pages sem as dry as dust. The Bible is not a book of knowledge it is a book of revelation. It is the language of a Heavenly Father to His children on earth. It is deep calling unto deep. It can be under stood only by the spiritual man. IL was not written to be understood by any others. It can only be read by the heart, for the heart alone understands what it says. It is deep calling unto deep.
 In your fancy picture a man of 70 years Coming to the end of the journey, he delights to tell of the treasures he has accumulated. From the desk he brings forth things both new and old. Here is a letter just read that bears the name of his little grandson; here is one that begins Dear Father" here is one that ends Your Loving Wife, but here is still another. Torn is the paper that bears it's sacred words, and many are the stains and wrin- kles from frequent times it has been unfolded and read The penman- ship is in the hand of woman long since passed beyond; it con tains but few pages and as we read no great interest is manifest. One says, "I notice a great many misspelled words. Here is an "i'' without a dot and that sentence does not begin with capital letter. l fail to SC why you prize it so high I ly"
 Another reads it all over again. q see by the date that this woman lived in the early days of our In dependence She could tell of the wars of the last century. She climb ed the hills with Daniel Boone, and named the flowers with Fremont She has visited with Grant and Lee. and has seen the place where Stone wall Jackson fell, and assisted those who tenderly bore his body to it's rest She mourned with those who 1 felt the shock when Lincoln died, but there is mistake in the date of his death. I do not like what she says about planting potatoes ''in the moon," nor is she reliable in what she says about the world being created in a week. What she tells about love for her chil- dren, and how she cared for them in their innocent and helpless days ! is only sentiment to me. In fact, the whole letter might have been forgery" That is what the micro scopic and critical finds and it is not what is to be emphasized at all,
 At last the old man takes the letter see in his radiant face something between anger and pity, resentment. too, is there. As the tears roll down his cheeks he reads it aloud-it is the sacred thoughts of a woman's life. What cares he if the 'i'' is not dotted or the dates are Wrnnp nr for the history of it