Greenfield Republican, Greenfield, Hancock County, 13 February 1891 — Page 3

WHITER THAN SNOW.

GREATSNOWSIN WINTER-GREAT HARVESTS IN SUMMER.

Consider th cHills, Not the Clouds, Saj'B the ISible—Every Cloud Has a Silver Liuing— Dr. Talmages Sermon.

Dr. Talmage preached at Brooklyn and New York, Sunday and Sunday night—Text: Job, XXXVIII, 22. He said:

Grossly maligned is the season of winter. The spring and summer and autumn have many admirers, but winter, hoary-headed and whitebearded winter, hath had more enemies ithan friends, Yet without winter the 'human race would be insane and effortless. You might speak of the winter as tho mother of tempests: I take it as the father of a whole family of physical, mental and spiritual energies. Tho most people that I know are strong in proportion to the number of snow-banks they had to climb over, or push through, in childhood, while their fathers drove the sled loaded with logs through the crunching drifts high as the fences. At this season of the year when we are so •familiar with the snow, those frozen vapors, those falling blossoms of the 6ky, those white angels of the atmosphere, those poems of the storms, those Iliads and Odysseys of the wintery (tempest, I turn over the leaves of my Bible and—though most of it was written in a clime where snow seldom or never fell—I find many of these beautiful congelations.

Though the writers may seldom or never have felt the cold touch of the enow-llake on their cheek, they had in bight two mountains, the tops of which vere suggestive. Other kings sometimes take of their crowns, but Lebanon and Mt. Hermon all the year round and through the ages never lift the coronets of crystal from their foreheads. The first time we find a deep tall of snow in the Bible is where Samuel describes a fight between Benaiah and a lion in a pit and though the snow may have crimsoned under the wounds of both man and brute, the shaggy monster rolled over dead and the giant was victor. But the enow is not fully recognized in the Bible until God interrogates Job, the Bcientiet, concerning its wonders, say1ing: "Hast though entered into the treasures of snow?" (Text.)

I rather think that Job may have examined the snowflake with a microscope, for, although it is supposed that the microscope was invented long after Job's time, there had been wonders of glass long before the microscope and telescope of a later day were thought of. So long ago as when the Colis-eum was in its full splendor Nero sat in the Emperor's box of that great theater, which held 100,000 people, and looked at the combatants through a gem in his finger ring, which brought everything close Hp to his eye. Four hundred years before Christ, in the stores at Athens, -were sold powerful glasses called "'burning spheres," and Layard, the explorer, found a magnifying glass amid the ruins of Nineveh and in the palace of Nimrod. Whether through magnifying instrument or with unaided eye 1 can not say, but I am sure that Job somehow went through the galleries of tho snowflake and counted its pillars, and found wonders, raptures, mysteries, theologies, majesties, infinities, walking up and down its, corridors as a result of tho question which the Lord had asked him.

And now I propose for your spiritual and everlasting profit, if you will accept my guidance, to take you through eome of these wonders of crystallization. And notice fiist. God in the littles. Yo'i may take Alpenstock and cross Mer do Glace, the Sea of Ice, and ascend Mont Clanc, which rises into the clouds like a pillar of the Great White Throne, or with Arctic explorer ascend the mountains around •the North Pole and see glaciers 1,000 ifeet high grinding against glaciers (8.000 feet high. But I will take you ion a less pretentious journey and show •you God in the snowflake. There is room enough between its pillars for the great Jehovah to stand. In that one frozen drop on the tip of your linger you may find the throne of the Almighty.

I take up the snow in my hand and 8ee the coursers of celestial dominion

:pawing

these crystal pavements. The

telescope is grand, but I must confess (that I am quite as much interested in (the microscope. The one reveals the universe above us, the other just as great a universe beneath us. Btit the telescope overwhelms me. What we want is a God in littl«s. If we wereseraphic or archangelic in our natures, we would want to study God in the '.great but such small, weak, short-* lived beings as you and I are want to find god in the littles.

When I see the Maker of the universe giving himself to the architecture of a snow flake and making its shafts, lits domes, its curves, its walls, irradiations so perfect, I conclude He will llookafter our insignificant affairs. And •if we are of more value than a sparrow jmost certainly wo are of more value |than an innanimate snowflake. So the jBible would chiefly impress us with I God in the littles. It does not say consider the clouds but "Consider the (lilies." It does not say consider the tempests, but "Behold the fowls," and applauds a cup of cold water and the iwidow's two mites, and says the hairs of your head are all numbered. Do not fear, therefore, that you will be forgotten. Do not think that because you estimate yourself as only one snowflake among a three days1 January •snow storm that you will be forgotten. !The birth and death of a drop of chilled vapor is as certainly regarded |by the Lord as the creation and demolition of a planet, Nothing is big to jGod, and nothing is email. What

makes the honey industries of South Carolina such a source of Livelihood and wealth It is because

God teaches

the lady-bug to make an opening in the rind of the apricot for the bee, which cannot otherwise get at the juice of the fruit. So God sends the la4y-bug ahead to prepare the way for the honey bee. He teaches the ant to bite each grain of corn that she puts in the ground for winter food in order that it may not take root and so ruin the little granary. He teaches the raven in dry weather to throw pebbles into a hollow tree that the water far down and out of reach may come up within the reach of the bird's beak. What a comfort that he is a God in littles!

Behold, also, in the snow the treasure of accumulated power. During a snow storm let an apothecary, accustomed to weigh most delicate quanti-, ties, hold his weighing scales out of the window and let one flake fall on the surface of tho scales and it will not even make it tremble. When you want to express triviality of weight you say, "Light as a feather but a snow Ilake is much lighter. It is just twenty-four times lighter than water. And yet the accumulation of these Hakes broke down, a few days ago, in sight of my house, six telegraph poles made helpless police and fire departments. and halted rail trains with two thundering locomotives. We have already learned so much of the power of electricity that we have become careful how we touch the electric wire, and in many a case a touch has been death. But a few days ago, the snow put its hand on most of these wires and tore them down as though they were cobwebs. The snow said: "You seem afraid of the thunderbold I will catch it and hurl it to tho ground. Your boasted electric lights, adorning your cities with bubbles of fire, I will put out as easily as your ancestors snuffed out a tallow candle." The snow put its finger on the lip of our cities that were talking with each other and they went into silence, uttering not a word. The snow is mightier than the lightning.

In March. 1888, the snow stopped America, It said to Brooklyn: -Stay home!" to New York: "Stay home!" to Philadelphia: "Stay home!" to Washington: "Stay home!" to Richmond: "Stay home!" It put into a white sepulcher most of this nation. Commerce whose wheels never stoppod before, stopped then. What was the matter? Power of accumulated snow flakes on the top of the Appenines one flake falls, and others fall, and they pile up, and they make a mountain of fleece on the top of a mountain of rock, until one day a gust of wind, or even the voice of a mountaineer, sets the frozen vapors into action and by awful descent they sweep every thing in their course —trees, rocks, villages—as when, in 1827, the town of Briel in Yalais in was buried, and in 1624, in Switzerland, 300 soldiers were entombed. These avalanches were made up of single snow flake. What tragedies of the snow have been witnessed by the monks of St. Bernard, who, for ages haye with the dogs been busy in extricating bewildered and overwhelmed travelers in Alpine storms, the dogs with blanket fastened to their backs and flasks of spirits fastened to their neck, to resuscitate the helpless travelers. One of these dogs decorated with a medal for having saved the lives of twenty-two persons, the brave beast himself slain of the snow on that day when accompanying a Piedmontese courier on the way to his anxious household down the mountain,the wife and children of the Piedmontese courier coming up the mountain in 'search of him, an avalanche covered all under pyramids higher than those under which the Egyptian monarchs sleep their sleep of the ages.

Historians do not seem to recognize that the tide in Napoleon's life turned from December lti, 1809, when he banished by hideous divorce his wife Josephine fromtte palace and so challenged the Almighty, and tho Lord charged upon him from the fortresses of the sky which ammunition of crystal. Snowed under! Billions, trillions, quadrillions, quintrillions of flakes did the work. And what a suggestion of accumulative power, and what a rebuke to all of us who get discouraged because we cannot do much, and therefore do nothing. "Oh," says some one,I would like to stop the forces of sin and crime that are marching for the conquest of the nations, but I am nobody* I have neither wealth nor eloquence, nor social power. What can I do?" My brother how much do you weigh, as much as a snow flake? "Oh, yes." Then do your share. It is an aggregation of Bmall influences that will yet put this lost world back into the bosom of a pardoning Lord. Alas! that there are so many men and women who will not use the one talent because they have not ten, and will not give a penny because they cannot give a dollar, and will not speak as well as they can because they are not eloquent, and will not be a snow-flake because they can not be an avalanche.

In earthly wars the Generals get about all the credit, but in the war for God and righteousness and heaven all the private soldiers will get crowns of victory unfailing. When we reach heaven—I do not think we will be able to begin the new song right away because for the surprise we shall feel at the comparative rewards given. As wo are being conducted along the street to|our celestial residence. We will begin to ask where live somo of those who were mighty on earth. We will ask. "Is so-and-so hero?" and tho answer will be "Yes, I think he is in the city, but we don't hear much of him: h® was good and he got in but lie took most of his pay in earthly applause: he had enough grace to get through the gate, but just where he lives I know not. He squeezed through somehow, although I think fthe gates took the skirts of his garments, I think he lives in one of those

back streets in one of the plainer residences. Then we shall see a palace, the doorsteps of gold, and the windows of agate, and the tower like the sun for brilliancy, and chariots before the door, and people who look like princes and princesses going up and down the steps, and we shall say: "What one of the hierarcbs lives here? That must be the residence of a Paul or Milton, or some one whose name resounds through all the planet from which we have just ascended*" "No, no." says our celer1tial dragoman "that is the residence of a soul whom you never heard of. When she gavo a charity her left hand knew not what her right hand did. She was mighty in secret prayer, and no one but God and her own soul knew it. She had more trouble than any body in all the land where she lived, and without complaining she bore it, and though her talents were never great, what she had was all consecrated to God and helping others, and the Lord is making up for her earthly privation by especial raptures here, and the King of this country had that place built especially for her. The walls began to go up when her troubles and privations and consecration began on earth, and it so happened— what a heavenly coincidence—that the last stroke of the trowel of amethyst on those walls was given the hour she entered heaven. You know nothing o!' her. On earth her name was only once in the newspapers, and that among the column of the dead, but she is mighty up here. There she comes now, out of her palace grounds, in her chariot behind those two white horses, for a ride on the banks of the river that flows from under tho throne of God. Let me see. Did you not have in your world below an old classic which says something about "these are they who came out of great tribulation, and they shall reign forever and ever*"

Another treasure of the snow is the suggestion of usefulness of sorrow. Ab sence of snow last winter made all na tions sic-k. That snowless winter has not yet ended its disasters. Within a few weeks it put tens of thousands into the grave and left others in homes and hospitals gradually to go down Called by a trival name, the Russian "grip," it wa9 an international plague. Plenty ot snow means publie health. There is no medicine that so soon cures the world's malarias as these white pellets that the clouds administer. Pellets small enough to be homeopathic, but in such large doses as to be allopathic and melting soon enough to be hydropathic. Like a sponge every llake absorbs unhealthy gases. The tables of mortality in New York anc1 Brooklyn immediately lessened when the snow of last December began to fall. The snow is one of the grandest and best of the worlds doctors.

Yes it is necessary for the land's productiveness. Great snows in winter are generally followed by great harvests next summer. Scientific analysis has shown that snow contains a larger percentage of ammonia than the rain, and hence its greater newer of enrichment. And besides that, it is a white blanket to keep the earth warm. An examination of snow in Siberia showed that it was 100 degrees warmer under the snow than above the snow. AK pine plants perished in the mild winter of England for lack of snow to keep them warm. Snow strikes back the rich gases which otherwise would escape in the air and be lost. Thank God for the snows, and may those of February bo as plentiful as those of December and January have been, high and deep and wide and enriching then the harvest next July will embroider with gold this entire American continent. But who with any analogical faculty can notico that out of such chill as tho snow comes the wheat, without realizing that chilling sorrows produce harvests of grace!

The strongest Christians, without exception, are those who wet-e by bereavements or sickness or poverty or persecution, or all of them together, snowed under, and again and again snowed under. These snow storms of trouble! They kill the maladies of tho soul. They drive us out of worldly dependence to God. Call the roll of all the eminently pious of all the ages and you will find them the sons and daughters of sorrow. The Maronites say that one characteristic of the cedar tree is that when the air is full of snow and it begins to descend, the tree lifts its branches in away better to receive the snow and bear up under it, and 1 know by much observation that the grandest cedars of Christian character lift higher their branches toward God when the snows of troubles are com* ing.

Another treasure of the snow is the suggestion that this mantle covering the earth is like the soul after it is forgiven. "Wash me," said the Psalmist, "and I shall be whiter than enow."

If there be in all this audience one man or woman whose thoughts have always been right, and whose words always right, and whose actions always right, let such a one rise, or, if already standing, lift the right hand. Not one! All we, like sheep, have gone astray. Unclean! unclean! And yet we may be made whiter than snow, whiter than that which, on a cold winter morning. after a night of storm, clothe the tree from bottom of trunk to top of highest branch, whiter than that which this hour makes the Adirondacks and the Sierra Nevada and Mt. Washington heights of pomp and splendor fit to enthroiie an archangel.

In the time of Graham,the essayest, in one mountainous district of Scotland an average of ten shepherds perished in the snow drifts, and so lie proposed that at the distance of every mile a pole fifteen feet high and with two cross pieces be erected, showing the points of the compass, and a bell hung at the top, so that every breeze would ring it, and so the lost one on the mountains would hear the sound And take the'direotion given by this pole

with the cross pieces and get safely home. Whether that proposed plan was adopted or not I do not know, but I declare to all who are in the heavy and binding drifts of sin and sorrow that there is across near by that can direct you to home, and peace, and God ana hear you not the ringing of the Gospel bell hanging to that cross, saying: "This is the way walk yet in it." No wonder that the sacred poet put the Psalmist's thought into rhythm with that ringing chorus we have so often sung

Get that prayer answered, and we will be fit not only for earth, but for the heaven where every thing is sowhite because every thing is so pure. You know that the redeemed in that land wear robes that are white, and the conquers in that land ride horses that are whit.e, and John in vision says of Chris't. "His head and His hairs were white," and the throne on which He sits is a Great White Throne. By the pardoning and sanctifying grace oi God, may we all at last stand amid that radiance!

Novel Creeds.

The young man of the period is full of doubts and problems and question, ings, and tho beilefs of his grandmothers and maiden aunts are but as pap for his soaring intellect, which lie feel-s requires stronger victuals. His self-compaceney is flattered (and the agnosticism now so fashionable is iargely the product of intellectual vanity) by the notion that the old ideas, while good enough for ordinary persons, are unsuitable for men of su» perior mental caliber. Hence it]is that mankind nowadays are ever on the lookout for some new thing in matters spiritual but as most people are incapable of constructing a new creed on their own account, they must turn to some other person to do it for them. You, my dear sir, for whose instruction and benefit these pages are written, will be that person. With you it rest? to satisfy the spiritual cravings anct aspirations of an inquiring age. With you it rests to minister to the disease peculiar to this ninteenth century,that so-called "earnestness" which, too often begot of a morbid and unhealthy egotism daily furishes recruits to the noble and ever-increasing army of prigs. For, as old Teufelsdrockb would have it, "Beneath you hideous coverlet of problems and doubts and earnestness and questionings, what a fermenting vat of briggism lies simmering and hid!" Prigs in trousers galore, and prigs, ah my lackaday! in petticoats too. For the ladies dear things are being drawn into the vortex of rationalism and speculative inquiry. Some of them write novels mildly seasoned with unbelief, and they all read ''Robert Elsmere." The "demon of annosticism"' has invaded all sections of polite society, and he is nowhere more at home than in the gilded saloons of the great. Nor does he now, as formerely, confine himself to the smoking room and the other purlieus o't tfie male sex. but growing bolder,like goosey gander in our childhood's legend, he wanders (where neither of thom have any business to intrude) "in rny ladies chamber," Here his horns and hoots have longsince ceased to terrify, and familiarity with him has bred, not contempt, but a conviction that he is not so disagreeable an imp after all,

By Balloon to the North Poles. Two members of the Paris College of Aeriel Navigation—M, Besancon, aeronaut, and M. Hermite, astronomer —propose seriously to reach the North Pole by means of a balloon, and have explained to their colleagues the means by which they hope to succeed in their object. The balloon in which they are to travel will be made of two thicknesses of Chinese silk, and impenetrable varnish, will hold about 45,000 cubic feet of puro hydrogen gas and carry a weight of over 8,000 pounds. They will also take with them four small pilot balloons, which will be sent up from the North Pole—should they ever reach that much-longedrfor spot—to test tho air currents prevailing there, and four huge bag3 of hydrogen gas, to replenish the large balloon, should waste occur. The car in which the aeronauts will have to live will be coated with thin steel, and will contain in addition to its human occupants and their scientific instruments, eights dogs and a sleigh, a small unskinable canoe, and provisions for a month. In order that the balloon may be kept at a regular distance from the earth, it will be furnished with a heavy rope and anchor, to drag along the surface either of ice or water. The intention is to equip two vessels at a French port and sail to Spitzbergen, There the hydrogen gas will be manufact ured and the great balloon and its satellite inflated, the aeronauts starting on their voyage of discovery with the firstfavorable wind. They expect to be be about ten days in the air, and to be able to take photograph and scientific observations. Where they will descend they have no idea but if all goes well they hope to reach some civilized point either in North America or western Asia. The duration of the expidition from France and back is estimated at six months, and the cost is put down at nearly £215,000, the larger part of which goes for the hire and equipment of the two vessels at Spitzbergen. This will be mainly defrayed by the aeronauts themselves, assisted by subsidies they hope to receive from both English and French scientific societies. This start will not be made untill May, 18:-!2,the interval being devoted to experiments to as«, certain how long it is possible to remain in a balloon without descending. The project is attracting much attena tion in scientific circles.

WANTED A SOFT SNAP.

Kovv the Attractions of a Military Life Were

Dissipated.

Recently, says the Pitsburg Times, a man slightly under the influence of liquor approached the guard standing at the door of the recruiting station of the United States army, Penn avenue, and, addressing the soldiers, said: "Is this the place to enlist in tho army?" '•Yes, sir," replied the uniformed gentleman. "I believe I would like to enlist and go to the Adle^hany Arsenal at Lawrencoville. That is a pretty nice place, and I think the soldiers have a pretty soft snap." "But why do you want to join the army?" asked the soldier. "Are you in trouble and wish to withdraw from the world and drown your sorrow in the quiet life of a soldier, or are you out of employment and disheartened?'' "Neither of these," said tho applicant for army honors. "1 have been a hardworking man all my life, and now I want to take a rest and I know of no softer snap than to be a soldier." "Well, now, just listen one moment and I will explain the matter to you. In the first place the chances ure ten to one that if you enlist you will regret it within three months and then wish you were back in Pittsburg. There is no way of getting back until your time is expired, and if you desert and come back you will be retaken, court-mar-tialed and sentenced to undergo imprisonment at hard labor for five years. None but those of long service can get an opportunity to come to Pittsburg and be stationed at the arsenal or recruiting stations. You would be sent West, and be compelled to do sentinel duty .-it the camp, and be out in all kinds of weather, with no beer or whiskey to drive out dm frost and dampness." "Well," said the applicant with surprise, "if that is the case, I don't believe that I want to become a soldier. I am very much obliged to you for your information. I shall go back to my trade and cut stone. Good-by. If you find me back here again kick me out, will you

With these words he left, but came back again and asked the guard to come out and have a drink. Nothing damps the ardor of applicants for military honors more th:n to describe the realities of soldier life.

T!I: Leaves Wc Tressed.

The zephyrs through "the branches played And kissed ttie leaves of t:o!d, As Maud and I with Cupid strayed

Through forests dim and old. My memory still fondly cleaves To those delightful hours Y\ hen we two sought the autumn leaves

To press the winter flowers. She was a vision of delight, With locks of sunny hue And watching eyes so soft, yet bright.

To match the sk.v's own blue. She pinned a fair autumnal spray Of gold across her breast— Her blushes might the truth display—

The leavos we plucked and pressed.

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