Rockingham post-dispatch. [volume] (Rockingham, N.C.) 1917-1965, 1922-08-03

n world and preach the gospel to ever,
J. creature
/, Young converts, if you make soul
winning the main business of YOU
= life, YOU will live when time is
r story and this old world, a cinder
8 When this country is like spill
wheel on the highway of eternit!
e and suns faint and stars go out likt
( sparks Before blacksmith's anvil
! your soul Will be out-shining thu
sun in that world of light. Let M
l plead with you people who have
walked down this aisle, taken my
hand and accepted the Lord Jesus
Christ as your Savior, to avoid baC
people. You can not arm and glove
with a lot of your old associates
and keep the smiles OF heaven upon
you. There are people in this coun.
ty who are so low that if an arch.
angel were 10 leave the Celestial
! Courts of God and come here and
associate with them for one month,
before he could be permitted TO go
bacR through the gates of pearl and
enter that world of light, he would
have to submit to baptism of for.
maldehyde.
| Watch the literature you read;
one OF the curses of the land today
is the books that we read. One
reason that our people have such
low moral standards is the damna.
BILE trash they gulp down. People
reflect the literature they read.
There arc books that have raised
the ideals and materially influenced
the entire nation. Cotton Mathers
essay TO Do Good" influenced the
whole career of Benjamin Franklin.
Let me advise you to do like Car
lysle did, divide books into sheep
and goats. 1t is possible that the
career of the majority of criminals
i'll our prisons today might have
been vastly different if the character
OF their reading during youth had
been different, had it been uplifting
and wholesome instead of degrading.
Listen, young converts, light flashy
stories with no purpose in them,
seriously iniure the minds of thous-
ands of brilliant ment and women.
Like the drug fiend whose brain
become stupefied they have become
completely demoralized by constant
mental dissipation. Remember that
familiarity with the bad ruins the
taste for the good. Nothing else
will more quickly injure a good
mind than familiarity with the friv-
olous and the superficial, the read
ing of books which are not true to |
life, which carry home no great les
son, teach no healthful or sane phil |
osophy, but written merely to excite
passion and to stimulate morbid |
curiosity, Such books viii ruin the
best of minds in a short time and
destroy the taste for all good read |
ing. Any book or paper is bad for
you. the reading of which takes
away your desire for better one.
No man can handle. smut without
defilement. We may choose our
books but we can not choose their
effects. There is a snake in MANY
a book that has changed the char
acter of a boy through its moral
poison so he was never quite the
same again.
Converts, want to warn you
about bad thoughts. Cultivate the
habit of right thinking. The Bible
says, Let the wicked forsake his
ways and the righteous forsake his
thoughts" You say, rs a man re-
sponsible for his thoughts?" Ese
certainly is. You SOW evil thoughts
and you reap an EVIL desire. You
sow an evil desire and you reap an
evil character; and character for.
ever settles destiny. A man thinks
and then he acts. Acts are simply
thoughts put into practice. | know
what you have been thinking when
see you act. know what you are
BY what you do, and I know what ,
you thought by what you do, for {
lets are simply thoughts gone to /
'eed. Listen, q man becomes a II
criminal by his acts, but he becomes /
/ sinner by his thoughts. No mat {
er howAnuch you think against the /
avs of this State, you are not a
but when you put your {
thoughts into actions and those ac- 4
ions are contrary to the code of i
he State, you become a criminal. G
fou become a criminal only by your /
cts, and you become a sinner by s
our thoughts. The Book says, Re /
list the devil and he will flee from +
'ou." | can't keep the birds from +
lying over my head, but as long as
have ten good fingers have my +
Crious doubts about their being able /,
D build nest in this wool of mine. h
'emptation is the devil looking +
through a key-hole; we submit d
then we open the door and invite q
i'm in. Suppose, when finish my 8
ermon and start for my hotel, 4
ome fellow would call me to one Il
ide and saw. "Mack. I hnve some :