Norwich bulletin., 1920-01-26
WORLD IS ENRICHED
 RUTAFUCE OF MISERY

WORLD IS ENRICHED
 BUT NFULE OF MISERY
 The world was never so enriched by knowledge and skill and culture and never so full of misery, said Rev. , Samuel H. Howe D. D., in his Sun day morning sermon at Park Congre- : gatfonal church. The text upon which Rev Dr. Howe was For the Former Things Are Passed Away, ? ! Rev. gf:4. In part Rev. Dr. Howe l said:
 Things pass in two senses. First; [ absolutely, permanently. Secondly; i they may be temporarily retired or eclipsed. Co1eridge speaks of bed-rid | den truths, retired, suppressed; kept out of the open. but liable to reap pear. There are ethical Rennaisanc- es as well as literar and artistic. The Dark Ages suppressed art, literature, freedom. The Renaissance recovered them Much Christian truth was sup pressed and abused. but Luther's trumpet recovered them. Justification by faith, an open Bible spiritual free dom came back. Important and basal truths pass in someNages into eclipse and have to be recovered. Our own time is no exception. The doctrine of sin is an instance. Gladstone said the |. decay of the sense of sin. Sir Oliver Lodge said, the modern man was not worrying about his sins. His chief concern was material success. Ians MacLaren said the new man was only concerned about leaving his house. hold a conpetence Renan said sin was a trife and he would abolish 1t. But that was before the war. Belgium and Serbia and Armenia and Lenine's Russia have been in the witness box. We have found it the Nfedusa's head that turns things to stone
 r Of course we have the blooming opt timist who gfids it or claps purple patch of rhetoric upon the running sore and conceals it It is a fall up- ward now, a wrong thing, but rung in the ladder on which to climb. Emerson was uncenvineed when Car lyle showed him the noun taineus heap of vice and misery in the slums of London, and the optimist is stil1 with us and the doubter is with us with his despair There. is no forgiveness Plato tells us. There is no return for these downward steps. Shakespeare kills off his guilty actors on the stage. No way back Lady Macbeth does not wash her hand. Macbeth meets his Malcolm Richard falls by the hand of d ElVdL Ine alHDII1OHS WOtS6y QGeS not recover himself. Sfylock plays a losing game. Bruti1s and Cassius meet their doom But Shakespeare is ty alone offers hope, forgives and re- generates afd feeovets. Yesterday it may be ebscured but it passes out of it's eclipse into the open.
 And suffering may fail of it's true in- terpretation. We may reckon 1t among the inevltables, or bear 1t with stofcal hardihood, or we may essay toI rnedicate it with material remedies. But we find that earthly sources fail. Wealth does not fend it off. Palaces cannot close their gates against it. Civilization does not. defend. The world was never so enriched by know ledge and skill and culture and never 50 full of misery. We are in danger of failing to recognize it's ministries. That all our best literature and our finest hero1snfs. are drendhed wAh these bitter writer's of suffering. Learning in suffering what they teach iii song From Homer to Dante and from Milton to the swallow flights of our modern 1yicists it Is the same story; and experience takes up the old threnodies The best things are learned in this school.
 And there is our world ministry and our world stewardship. There has been much to stimulate it and some thing to dampen it. It is hard to keep our faith in the worth while of this world service. There is much to sup press enthusiasm. Human life seems cheapened. What millions of lives have been flung away! Whole coun tries are hiliocked with the mounds of the slain. Great careers halted in mid sentence. More multitudes in the throe of famine and the grip of death. What is man that we should 1 be mindful!
 Then knowledge widens with the circuit of the siiris. What notes in i the sunbeam are we, or even the little
 world among the stars, a leaf in the 1 tn1measurable forest.
 Then the misery is so unconpassa able, we can't t1ndertake it. How lit- 1 tie we can do! Hence our itnpatie1ce l with these incessarit drives Yet us 1 get away from these strident voices l of appeal we say. And we are get
 ting case hardened and heart -cailous-
 ed,
 But what { lime to live and be en- trusted with this mighty steward ship. To be entrusted with His mighty ] task, such as never came to a single ! generation in history. To be Gods
 dnoners and distributing agents. And then let us remind ourselves that it is the worlds Master and the
 worlds Sufferer that calls and inspires :, the "drives,'' ai1r if we will listen we f may hear the familiar accents of his | word, Inasmuch as ye have. done ! 1t upnto the least of the my brethren ye have done 1t uhtil fne.''