QUESTIONS.--Into what two cla.s.ses has G.o.d divided people? What does the Bible tell us will happen to a companion of fools?--of wise men? Whom do the charred sticks represent? Who are like the white sticks? If the sticks are rubbed together, what is the result? What happens to good boys who keep bad company? Do the good boys become bad immediately?
What do bad companions do to one"s character? Can a boy wash "burnt cork" from his face? Can he wash the stains from his character? What else besides a bad character is given? Will a few drops of water change the color of a bottle of ink? Will a few drops of ink change the color of a gla.s.s of water?
Who are like the ink-drops? Who are like the water-drops? Why? Whom shall we choose for companions? Who will be our companions in eternity?
[Ill.u.s.tration: The Camp of the Israelites.]
DOGS.
THE DOGS OF ST. BERNARD.
SUGGESTION:--If a real live dog is too diverting, an earthen or bisque dog, or the accompanying picture of the dogs of St. Bernard, may be sufficient.
MY DEAR BOYS AND GIRLS: I want to talk to you to-day about dogs. The dog is what is called a domestic animal, and wherever you find civilized men and women, you will find dogs of some kind. Dogs are not only loved because they are companionable, but because they are also, oftentimes, very serviceable.
In Switzerland there are some very high mountains, and some years ago, when there were no tunnels yet dug under the mountains, as there are to-day, travelers during the winter, when going from Germany to Italy, or returning from Italy to Germany, had to cross over the tops of these mountains. The snow was always deep and the journey was always dangerous, particularly in the winter.
[Ill.u.s.tration: The Dogs of St. Bernard
Copyrighted 1911 by Sylva.n.u.s Stall]
There are several places where the mountains can be crossed, and these places are called "pa.s.ses," such as the Simplon, St. Bernard and St.
Gothard pa.s.ses. Some years ago, in company with a friend, I crossed the St. Gothard pa.s.s on the 20th of June. That year the season was very late, and after we got well up the mountain, we found the snow from five to ten feet deep on the level, and when we arrived on the top of the mountain, the snow was even with the roof of a two-story building which stood there, and the people living in it had tunneled under the snow, around the outside of the building. If this was the way it was on the 20th of June, you can easily imagine what an awfully cold and stormy place it must be to live during the entire winter. It took our horses a long time to take us up the mountain, but when we went down on the Italian side they went quite rapidly, and in one hour and forty minutes from the time we left the Hotel de la Prosa, where the snow was so very deep, we were down in the village of Airolo, where little girls were selling ripe cherries. It seemed as though we had jumped right out of the heart of winter, into the pleasant and fruitful days of summer.
On the top of each of these mountain pa.s.ses, there is built what is called a hospice, which means hospitality, the same word from which we get our word hospital. These buildings are erected for the entertainment of poor travelers, who are compelled to cross the mountains in the winter. There are a number of monks, who live in each of these places of entertainment. On each of these mountain pa.s.ses the monks have some large dogs, which are known as the dogs of St. Bernard. In the winter when it is snowing, and travelers are likely to be exhausted by their efforts to ascend the mountain, and are liable to be lost in the snow-storms which prevail almost every day, these dogs are sent out by the monks with a supply of food and wine suspended from their necks, and they go all over the mountain, barking and making a great noise. When they discover a poor traveler who is perishing in the snow, they allow him to take the food and the wine in order that he may be stimulated and revived, and then these faithful and intelligent dogs lead the way to the place of safety and security.
Oftentimes they find men who have become nearly frozen, who have fallen down in the snow in an unconscious state and are ready to die. If left for a time these men would soon freeze to death beneath the snow that falls very rapidly upon them. These dogs are very intelligent, and immediately they will begin to sc.r.a.pe the snow off the traveler, lick his hands, and if he does not give any indications of life they will then lie down upon his body, that the warmth from their own body may quicken him again into consciousness, that he may drink the wine and eat the food and be stimulated enough to do something toward getting himself on to the place of safety. If the man is not too heavy, the dog might even be able to carry him.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Dogs Rescuing Traveler.]
At the hospice on the St. Bernard pa.s.s they once had a faithful dog which had been successful in thus rescuing sixty-eight persons from freezing to death upon the mountains. The dog was very sagacious, and seemed to know exactly what to do when he found a poor traveler dying in the snow. One day he found a man who had evidently been lying for some time in the snow, which had already quite buried him. The man was entirely unconscious, and when the dog found him he began immediately to sc.r.a.pe away the snow and then lay down upon this dying man, that the warmth of his own body might quicken him again into consciousness. When the man began to revive, and discovered that there was something warm lying upon him, he thought it was a wolf or some wild animal which possibly designed to take his life. He reached into his belt and drew a dagger, which he thrust into the body of the faithful dog that had come to rescue him from freezing to death. The poor dog was fatally wounded.
He started back home, but in a short time after reaching it bled to death. The monks had this dog"s skin stuffed and placed in the hospice, and now he seems constantly to teach an object lesson to all travelers who cross the Alps and stop at the hospice.
The story of this faithful dog and his sad death reminds us of that loving Saviour, who came from heaven to this world, to seek and to save those who were lost. And although He came to redeem and rescue us from death, yet wicked men in this world crucified Him by nailing Him to a cross upon Calvary, and this is what every person is doing to-day who rejects the Lord Jesus Christ. He comes to you and to me, desiring to save us from our sins and from everlasting death; to save not only our bodies, but our souls for all eternity. If we reject Him we are told in the Bible that "we crucify Him afresh, and put Him to an open shame." I am sure no thoughtful boy or girl would be guilty of wilfully stabbing any kind dog that would come to their rescue if they were perishing in the snow, and I trust that none of you will ever reject Jesus and thrust Him away from you, and thus crucify Him for yourself and put Him to an open shame before the world.
This faithful dog should also teach you and me another lesson. If a dog can make himself so useful as to save the lives of sixty-eight people, you and I should ask ourselves the question whether we are doing as much for the blessing and the salvation of men as this faithful dog did on the mountains of Switzerland? But you can do a great deal more than this dog. He could only save the lives of people, but G.o.d can use you to save their souls as well, by the influence of a n.o.ble Christian life, by what you say and do, by your contributions to missions, and in various other ways you may help to save the souls of many who must otherwise perish.
But this faithful dog teaches us a lesson of constant, daily duty. It was no easy thing for this dog to go out in the fierce cold through the deep snow and run about all day to hunt for lost travelers, but it was by keeping constantly at it and working faithfully day after day that he accomplished this grand result. He did not save sixty-eight people all at one time, but saved one at a time, and sometimes worked for days and weeks without finding a single traveler whom he could help. In the same way, if you desire to be useful in this world, you must use every little opportunity which comes to you daily. You must be willing to work hard and keep at it, and even though you cannot succeed in doing any great thing at any one time, remember that you must keep doing little things all the while. I trust that G.o.d may inspire each of you to desire to accomplish grand results in your lives by the constant doing of both little and great things for G.o.d and man.
QUESTIONS.--Are dogs serviceable? What kinds are the most useful? Where do they live? For what and by whom are they used? What do the dogs do to revive a traveler? Tell the story of the dog of the St. Bernard Pa.s.s. Of what does this story remind us? Does Christ try to rescue us? What are we doing when we reject Him? What lesson does this dog teach us? Can we do as much as this dog did?
Why? What can we do which the dog could not do?
What other lesson does this dog teach us? Did the dog save all the sixty-eight people at one time?
Are we able to accomplish G.o.d"s work all at one time? How must we do it?
THE CAMERA.
G.o.d"S PICTURE BOOK.
SUGGESTION:--Objects: A small camera and a small looking gla.s.s.
[Ill.u.s.tration: A Camera.]
WHILE talking to you to-day about pictures, it will not seem strange that I should have a camera as the object with which to ill.u.s.trate the sermon. But my purpose may not be so plain to you when you hear my text, which is taken from the book of Revelation, twentieth chapter, twelfth verse: "And I saw the dead, small and great, stand before G.o.d; and the books were opened: and another book was opened, which is the book of life: and the dead were judged out of those things which were written in the books, according to their works."
[Ill.u.s.tration: "Throwing a Black Cloth Over His Head He Moved About the Camera."]
These words refer to the great Judgment Day. I suppose that you know that we must all die, but possibly you did not know, or have forgotten, that after a time G.o.d will raise up all the dead and will separate the good people from the bad people, the righteous from the wicked. The time when G.o.d will do this is called the great Judgment Day.
It is then that the words which I have read as my text tell us that "the books shall be opened," and then all that we have ever done or said in this life shall be found written in these books.
Now, if G.o.d is keeping a record of all our deeds and words, and even our inmost thoughts, which He also knows; and not only keeping a record of your words and thoughts and mine, but also of those of every man, woman and child--a record of all the fourteen hundred millions now living upon our earth--you might think that millions of angels would be kept very busy writing all these things down in these books. I do not know just _how_ G.o.d is doing this, but I do know two ways in which He could easily accomplish what to us may seem a difficult or impossible task.
I will now try to show you how G.o.d might keep the record of everything we do; and next Sunday I will try to tell you how, with equal ease, G.o.d might secure and keep the record of all we say, of each and every word we speak.
I suppose you have all gone to a photograph gallery and had your pictures taken. When you stood before an instrument, something like this, only perhaps much larger, the artist went behind the big instrument, which was pointed right toward you, and throwing a black cloth over his head, he moved about the camera, told you just how to hold your head, and finally when everything was arranged and he was ready, he pressed a small rubber ball which opened the little slide, just as you would open your eye to look at any object, and in an instant your picture was taken.
That large camera, with which the artist took your picture, was in principle just like the smaller and more simple one which I have shown you, and both are made to imitate, or in a rude way to be like the human eye.
Now, if I point this camera toward you, make it dark back of the camera, either by placing a black cloth over my head or in any other way, your picture will at once appear upon this gla.s.s which is at the back of the camera. Now the reason why I can see your photograph on this ground gla.s.s is because the rays of light which are reflected or come from your face, into this opening in the camera, have your likeness upon them, and when the light falls against this gla.s.s I can see your picture which is photographed upon the rays of light, just the same as your picture is photographed on paper. So every object about us is photographed on the rays of light and the picture becomes visible when we turn our eye, which is a small but perfect camera, so that the rays of light can go straight into our eye and the picture fall upon the back of the eye, which is called the retina, and with which this gla.s.s in the camera corresponds.
An ordinary looking-gla.s.s will demonstrate or show the same thing. This covering on the back of the gla.s.s corresponds to the black cloth with which the photographer shuts out the rays of light which come from the back of the camera. In the same way the ground at the bottom of the pond cuts off the rays from beneath, and on this account you can see the hills, or stars, or clouds reflected in the water; so also in the looking-gla.s.s, as you turn it in different directions you can see the photographs of persons or objects which are pictured upon the rays of light.
You may have thought that you saw the person or objects themselves, but this is not the case. With your eyes you can see nothing in the dark; even the cat and the owl must have some light, although they do not need as much as we, before they can see. The rays of light carry the pictures of the objects, and where there are no rays of light we can see nothing.
Now, while your photograph is being taken from the few rays of light which pa.s.s into a camera, you see that we might place hundreds of cameras one above another, and if they were all pointed at you they might each take a photograph of you at the same instant--the same as one thousand different persons in an audience with their two thousand eyes all look toward the speaker and see him at one and the same instant.
Now, if I have succeeded in making my thought plain, you will readily understand that as we have great books with pictures upon every page, so G.o.d might use these rays of light as the pages of the great book upon which each act of our life instantly records itself, it matters not how rapidly it is done or how many persons and objects there may be in motion or action at the same instant. The fact that the different rays of light carry the pictures of the objects from which they are reflected, is ill.u.s.trated in the wonderful cameras with which "moving pictures" are taken.
To older persons I might add that if you recall the scientific fact that these rays of light, bearing the images or photographs of persons and objects from which they are reflected, dash out into s.p.a.ce at the rate of 192,000 miles in one second, and that they continue to move on indefinitely, you see how the rays of light which were reflected and are now carrying the image of Adam and Eve in the garden of Eden, of Noah coming out of the ark, of the battle of Bunker Hill, and those carrying the pictures of all other objects and actions since the Creation until now, are still sweeping on through s.p.a.ce, and if you and I could be present where these rays of light are now sweeping onward, we could see these things as actually and really as if they were even now taking place in our presence upon the earth. And you will also understand how, as G.o.d is everywhere present, He is also present in s.p.a.ce where these rays of light are at this moment, and so every scene in the entire history of the world is perpetually visible to Him. And so, even with our feeble understanding, you see how the past may always be present to the Infinite and everywhere-present G.o.d.
Now, my dear young friends, remember as we see the acts of each other, so G.o.d sees all that we do, even when no one else is present to see us.
Do not think that G.o.d sees and then forgets. All we do is being constantly photographed, not in a camera like this, but upon the rays of light as upon the pages of a great book, and in the great Judgment Day, G.o.d will judge us out of the things recorded against us in these books.
Our acts record themselves, and in that great day we shall no more be able to deny the correctness of the record than we would be able to deny the personality or ident.i.ty of our own photograph.
QUESTIONS.--What is meant by the great Judgment Day? What will G.o.d do on that day? Of what does G.o.d keep a record? Do we know exactly how He does it? What two ways are there in which He might do it? What brings the person"s image upon the ground gla.s.s of the camera? What have we that is like the camera? Which part of the eye is like the ground gla.s.s of the camera? Why can we not see in the dark? Could G.o.d use the rays of light instead of the pages of a book? Is the image of Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden still existing? Where? Are the images of all other events also pa.s.sing through s.p.a.ce? Can G.o.d see them all at once? Does G.o.d see all of our acts?
[Ill.u.s.tration]
[Ill.u.s.tration]