Rensselaer Republican, Volume 26, Number 26, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 22 February 1894 — LIGHTS OF THE SEA [ARTICLE]

LIGHTS OF THE SEA

Undying Influence of Maui’s Most T ri vial Acts. I'be Journey of'Life an<l the Ph<>«[>hnrr«-cem-e of Good Dt-cd* That 21 »y Be Left Behind—l»r. Sermon. 1 Dr. Talmagc preached at Brooklyn last Sunday. Subject: “Lightning of the Sea." Text: Job xii, 22—“ He maketh a path to shine at- | terhifn.” He said: If for the next thousand years min- | isters of religion should prea h from - this bible, there will vet be texts; unexpounded and unexplained and i unappreciated. What little has been said concerning this chapter in Job from which mv text is taken bears on the controversy as to what was really the leviathan described as disturbing the sea.. What creature it was I know not. Some say it was a whale. Some say it. was a crocodile. Mv own opinion is it was a sea inonst tr now extinct. No creature now floating in Mediterranean or Atlantic waters corresponds to Job’s description. What most interests me is that as it moved through the deep it left the waters flashing and resplendent. In the words of the text, “He maketh a path to shine after him." What was that iliumined path. It was phosphorescence. You find it In the wake of a ship in the night, especially after rough weather. Phosphorescence is the lightning of the sea. That his figure of speech is correct in describing its appearance I am certified by an incident. After crossing the Atlantic the first time and writing from Basle, Switzerlagd, to an American magazine an account of my voyage, in which nothing more fascinated me than the phosphorescence in the ship's wake, I called it the lightning of the sea. I Returning to rn.v hotel, I found a i book of John Riiskin, and the first sentence my eyes fell upon was his description of phosphorence, in which he called it “the lightning of the sea.” Down to the postoffice I hastened to get the manuscript, and with great labor and some expense got possession of the magazine article and put quotation marks around that one sentence, although it was original with me as with John Ruskin. This phosphorescence is the appearance of myriads of the animal kingdom rising, falling, playing, flashing, living, dying. These luminous animalcules for nearly 151) years have been the study of naturalists and the fascination ar.d solemnization of all who have brain enough to think. Now, God. who puts in His Bible nothing trivial or useless, calls the attention of Job. The greatest scientist of his day. to this phosphorescence, and as the leviathan of the deep sweeps past points out the fact that “he maketh a path to shine after him.” What influence will we leave in this world after we have gone through it? “None,’’ answer hrtn-dreds~of~voiees;-‘.‘w(> are not one.ciL tfreimmortafe Fifty years after we are out of the world it wiil be just as though we had never inhabited it.’’ You are wrong in saying that. I pass down through this audience and up through these galleries and I am looking for some one whom I cam it find. -r I am looking for-one who will have no influence in this world 109 years from now. But I have found the man who has the least influence, and I inquire into his history, and I find that by a ves or no he decided some one’s eternity, In time of temptation he gave an affirmative or a negative to some temptation which another, hearing of, was induced to decide in the same wav. Clear on the other side of the next million years may be the first you will hear of the long-reaching influence of that yes or no, but hear of it you will. Will that father make a path to shine after him? Will that mother make a path to shine after her? You will bewalkingalongrthe.se streets, or along that country road, 200 years from now in the character of your descendants. Better look out what bad influence you start, for you may not be able to stsp it. It does not require very great force to ruin others. Why was it that, many years ago, a great flood nearly destroyed New Orleans? A crawfish had burrowed into the banks of the river until the ground was saturated, and the banks weakened until the flood burst. But I find here a man who starts out in life with the determination, that he will never see suffering but he will try to alleviate it. and never see discouragement but he will try to cheer it, and never meet with anybody but he will try to do him good. Getting his strength from God, he starts from home with the high purpose of doing all the good he can possibly do in one dav. - Whether standing behind the counter, or talking in the business office with a pep behind his ear. or making a bargain with* a fellow trader, or out in the fields d iscussing with his next neighbor the wisest rotation of crops, or in the shoemaker’s shop pounding the sole leather, there is something in his face, and in his phraseology, and in | liis manner that demonstrates the j grace of God in his heart. For fifty or sixty years ite leads | that kind of a life and then gets t through with it and goes into heaven ! a ransomed soul. But I am not going to describe the port into which ; that ship has entered. I am not 1 going to describe the Pilot who met him outside at the “light ship.” T am not going t/> grv a-i-thing about the crowds of friends who met him on the obrystalhuo wuarveu, up

which he goes on steps of chrysoprases. For Godin His word calls me W?look at the path of foam in the wake of the Ship, and I tell you it is util agleam with splendors of kindnesses done and rolling with illumined tears that were wiped away-and adash with congratulations, and clear cut to the horizon in ad directions is the sparkling, flashing, billowing phosphorescence of a Christian life. “He maketh a path to shine after him?" Have you any arithmetic capable of estimating the influence of our good and gracious friend who a few days ago went up to rest —George W. Childs, of Philadelphia? Prom a newspaper that was printed for thirty years without one word of defamation or scurrility or scandal and putting chief emphasis on virtue and charity and clean intelligence he reapeid a fortune for himself and then distributed a vast amount of it among the poor and struggling, putting his invalid an i aged reporters on pensions,until his name stands everywhere for large heartiness and syrnpat'iv and help and highest style of Christian gentleman. In an era which had in the chairs of its journalism a Horace Greely, and a Henry J. Raymond, and a James Gordon Bennett, and an Erastus Brooks, and a George William Curtis, and an Irenaeus Prime, none of them will be longer remembered than George W. Childs. Staying away from the unveiling of the monument he had reared at a large expense in our Greenwood in memory of Prof. Proctor, the astronomer, lest I should say something in praise of the man who had paid for the monument. By all acknowledged a representative of the highest American journalism. If you would calculate his influence for good, you must count how many sheets of his newspapers have been published in the last quarter of a century, and haw many people have read them, and the effect not only upon those readers, but upon all whom they shall influence for all time, while you add to all that the work of the churches he helped build, and of the institutions of mercy h i helped found. Better give up before you start the measuring of the phos' phorescence in the wake of that ship of the Celestial line.

But I cannot look upon that luminosity that follows ships without realizing how fond the Lord is oi life. That fire of the deep is life, myriads of creatures all aswimand aplay and aromp in parks of marine beauty laid out and parterred and roseate:! and blossomed by omnipo tence. What is the use of those creatures called by the naturalists “crustaceans" and “copepods," not more than one out of hundreds of billions of which are ever seen by human eye? -God created them forthe same- reason that He creates flowers in places where no human foot ever makes them tremble, anno human nostril ever inhales thei redolence, and no human eye evei sees their charm. In the botanical world they prove that God loves aaEfflmcJ&lft the. marine world the •• play, life in brilliancy of gladness, life iu exuberance. Can you do as much as one of the phosphor! in the middle of the At lantic ocean, creatures smaller than . the point of a sharp pin? “Oh, yes,’ you say. Then do that’ Shine' Stand before the looking-glass and experiment to see if you • caiiuol get that scowl off your forehead, that peevish look out of you; lips. Have at least one bright ribbon in your bonnet. Embroider at least one white cord somewhere in the midnight of your apparel. Do not any longer impersonate a funeral. Shine! Do say something cheerful about society and about the world. Put a few drops of heaven into your disposition. Once in a wtiile substitute a sweet orange for a sour lemon. Remember that pessimism is blasphemy, and that optimism is Christianity. Throw some light on the night ocean. If you cannot be a lantern swinging in the rigging, be one of the tiny phosphori back of the keel. Shine! “Let your light so shine before men that others, seeing good works, may glorify your Father, whith is in heaven.” Shine! You know of a family with a bad boy who has run away from home. Go before night and tell that father and mother the parable of the prodigal son, and that j some of the illustrious and useful I men now in church and State had a j silly passage in their lives and ran j away from home. Shine! You know j of a family that has lest a child andj the silence of the nursery glooms tho whole house from cellar to garret. Go before night and tell them how much that child has happily escapeJ. since the most prosperous life on earth is’ a struggle. Shine! You know of some invalid who is dying for lack of appetite. She cannot get well because she cannot eat. Broil a chicken and take to her* before night and cheat her poor appetite into a keen relish. Shine!* You know of some one who likes you" and you like him, and he ought to be a Christian. Go tell him what religion has done for you, and ask him if you can pray for him. Shine! Oh, for a disposition so charged with sweetness and light that we cannot help but shine! Renumber that if you cannot be a leviathan lashing the ocean into fluyr you can bo one of the phosphori, doing your part toward making a path of phosorescence. Then I will tell you what impression you will leave as you pass tnrough this life and after you are gone. I will tell it to your face and not leave it for the minister who officiates at your obsequies. - I