When a country is invaded by some foreign foe, when the armies of the aggressor have overspread the land, when a blighted surface marks the progress of their ravages, when the chains of unoffending victims display the relentless cruelty of their revenge, when the active movements of hostile squadrons are discerned, and the voice of the trumpet that hitherto has sounded the certain note of battle and defeat is heard from the watchtowers of the fortress, that forms the last and lingering hope of a once flourishing, but now greatly diminished power; when it is dreaded that within are many faithless men, whose treacherous machinations are concealed under the mask of friendship, and who only await the critical moment of disaster or despair, to strengthen the hands of those who have laid bare many an altar, and left many a city smoking in its ruins—shall he be hailed as a patriot citizen, who whispers in softest accents that danger is far distant; who circulates and foments the ruinous suggestion to relax those efforts that might yet render resistance successful, and, turning the tide of conquest, lay prostrate the insulting foe; who encourages the thousands around him to banish idle cares and silence unfounded alarms, and speedily betake themselves to gay and luxurious delights, and loll in the lap of voluptuous ease, and run the round of lawless revelry? No. He is pronounced a traitor to his country’s cause; to him is awarded a traitor’s doom; and over his remains are raised the insignia of a traitor’s grave.
A common engraving on seventeenth century gravestones depicts an hourglass with wings. The image conveys a clear message to even the illiterate bystander: time flies. Outside of cemeteries, a barrage of subtle reminders pelt men with the truth that “time is short and eternity is long.” The natural propensity of men, however, tends to suppress and ignore this inescapable reality.
We are all in a state of trial and probation, for a permanent and eternal existence in another world. The space in which we move is but short at best, and by several circumstances very much contracted; but short and contracted as it is, scenes of the most weighty and important nature are transacted upon it. Man in his present fallen condition is truly forlorn. He is appointed to endure many severe afflictions, which he can neither foresee nor prevent. In the distribution of afflictions there is no doubt but the unerring wisdom acts, nor can chance have any place in His vast dominions, where even a sparrow falleth not to the ground without Him.
In Brown of Wamphray’s ministrations, we have not obtruded on our famishing souls that oily sentimentalism, or that iced intellectualism, which so abound in this epicurean age of the Church; but we have the true bread, just as it has been gathered—wholesome and nutritious. O that, amidst the multitude of our popular and evangelical preachers and writers, we had but a phalanx of godly and spiritual men like him—men of heart, men of business—who would in right earnest negotiate between the Prince of life and dying men, and not merely transact between a dead doctrine and a blind intellect—men who will not ever be substituting the vague idea of ‘religion’ for the living person of the Son of God, or ‘moral influence’ for the personal operation of the Holy Ghost.
