The Breathings of the Pit; or, Robert Jugersoll on his Perilous Journey.

ou

A SERMON

PREACHED BY Justin D. Fulton, D.D.

Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks: walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks that ye have kindled. This shall ye have of my hand: ye shall lie down in sorrow.-Is. 1:11.

The inspired man of God, standing on his mount of vision, described in language which cannot be misunderstood the perilous journey and the certain doom of the infidel. Over and against him is the man who fears God. He has comfort in reviewing his life. With rejoicing he can declare, "The Lord God hath given me the tongue of the learned, that I should know how to speak a word in season to him that is weary; He wakeneth morning by morning; He wakeneth mine ear to hear as the learned. The Lord God hath opened mine ear, and I was not rebellious, neither turned away my back. I gave my back to the smiters and my cheeks to them that plucked off the hair. I hid not my face from shame and spitting. For the Lord God will help me, therefore shall I not be confounded; therefore have I set my face like a flint, and I know that I shall not be ashamed." These words are full of meaning. They embody the experience of every true believer. They enable him to ask with absolute confidence, "Who is among you that feareth the Lord, that obeyeth the voice of His servant, that walketh in darkness and hath no light? Let him trust in the name of the Lord, and stay upon his God."

THERE IS ANOTHER SIDE.

There are those who make light of a faith in God. They treat it as superstition, and speak of it as if it were a relic of the dark ages. They scorn the fountain filled with blood drawn from Immanuel's veins, and prefer to hew out for themselves cisterns, which they name reservoirs of hope. They refuse to sacrifice "a real world that they have, for one they know not of." They call believing in Christ enslavement, and refer to the light of Christianity as "the darkness of barbarism," which filled the future with heavens and with hells, with "the shining peaks of selfish joy, and the lurid abysses of flame." To such God says: "Behold, all ye that kindle a fire, that compass yourselves about with sparks; walk in the light of your fire, and in the sparks ye have kindled." The opposer, the rebellious, the despiser, may go on. The fire kindled is

short-lived. The sparks by which he surrounds himself shall yield but a momentary glow, and "this shall ye have at my hand ye shall lie down in sorrow."

An indescribable anguish has possession of many hearts. The fires are being kindled, and the young, the intellectual, the enterprising are surrounding themselves with sparks. They are in peril. They believe it not. For weeks and months literature, the newspapers, the speech of men, of households and of society have been full of the breathings of the pit which have distinguished the utterances of a man who suddenly sprang into national recognition, won fame as an orator, attained in fluence in the nation, and then revealed a hatred toward God and religion which shocked the moral sense of the community. Never since Absalom broke away from restraint and led Israel in a wild revolt against parental rule has society been more surprised. The man seems bent on ruin. That cry of David, "O my son Absalom, my son, my son Absalom; would God I had died for thee, O Absalom, my son, my son,' expresses the sentiment that claims attention whenever thought is turned towards Robert G. Ingersoll, the son of a Presbyterian minister, who was reared with the greatest care, and in the midst of the mighty manifestations of God's power in the home, in the church where he worshiped, and in the community where he resided. This man is now playing the rôle of the prodigal son. He has not yet come to himself. His way leadeth to destruction. He is casting contempt upon the fame of his father, and upon the mother who carried him to the throne of grace day after day in the arms of believing faith. His father was a man of power. He preached as an evangelist in various portions of the country, and served churches as pastor. It is related of him that he preached a sermon from the text "God is love," and that as a result one hundred souls were born into the kingdom. The prayers of these parents are registered in heaven. Let not Christians despair. Ingersoll's blasphemy and vileness are products of sin. He refuses to honor his father, but says instead, "I have no respect for any human being who believes in hell. I have no respect for any man who preaches it." Well did David say: "Why boastest thou thyself in mischief, O mighty man? The goodness of God endureth continually. Thy tongue deviseth mischiefs, like a sharp razor working deceitfully. Thou lovest evil more than good, and lying rather than to speak righteousness. God shall likewise destroy thee for ever; He shall take thee away, and pluck thee out of thy dwelling-place, and root thee out of the land of the living." The righteous also shall see and fear, and shall say of him: "Lo! this is the man that made not God his strength, but trusted in the abundance of his riches, and strengthened himself in his wickedness."

THE SECRETS OF THIS LIFE

we may not know. Would that I could feel that the Church was not in any wise to blame. The boy was reared amid the briers of Brierwood Parish. He saw poverty as only ministers' children see it, and drank from the cup of sorrow as only ministers' children drink from it. Something has hardened and maddened him. His chastening has not yet yielded the peaceable fruits of righteousness. At times, as I have read his words, which reveal so much of bitter hatred towards God, it has seemed to me I could hear the voice that sounded in the ear of another strong hater: "Why persecutest thou me? It is hard for thee to kick against the goad." Submission to God's will and rule brings peace. Opposition, irreconciliation brings want, disquiet and discomfort. Gladly were it proper would I express the hope that ever and anon arises in my heart, which brings me into sympathy with a Saviour's love, and perhaps with a Saviour's expectation. Imagine our Lord's happiness when Saul cried out, "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" No matter how this poor man reviles and attacks the faith that gave cheer and comfort to those who bore him, our Lord and Saviour Jesus Christ loves him. Would that it were mine to reach the ear of his soul, and touch the heart so steeled against God. I would turn the face toward him who died for him, and who looks on his attempt to stifle conviction with supreme pity, still crying, "Father, forgive him, for he knows not what he is doing." He sees not the pit-falls in the way, nor the perils which thicken in the air; he breathes out hate when love should inspire him; he has the scent of the vulture and the appetite of the hyena, and prowls among the dead and damned, finding there companionship and subjects of admiration. It is impossible to contemplate such a ruin without experiencing emotions of sorrow which baffle the powers of description. Let the grace of God be welcomed, and this man, rushing blindly on to the thick bosses of Jehovah's buckler would be changed. The might of wing which distinguishes the eagle as he battles with the storm-cloud and rides triumphantly on despite the tempest would be used to carry tidings of salvation to the lost. The terrible nature that challenges public opinion and tramples on all the finer feelings of the Christian heart would be converted to the uses of religion. This is not idle dreaming. It is history. There are better uses for man on earth than to contend against God and uproot and destroy all the tendrils of love, of service, of beneficence. There are better uses for men in the next world than to consign them to eternal woe. Do you want proof of it? Then look to Calvary. What signifies those three crosses on the hillside? Two are for malefactors. One is for the innocent Christ. Why is He there? That is His place. He came to

stand among the lost, to live among them, to die among them, as well as to die for them. He is here beside this terrible blasphemer. He loves him with an eternal love. Do you want proof of the might of Divine grace and of its mission? Look toward Damascus. There goes a man as much worse than Ingersoll as he is mightier in philosophy, more skilled in learning and wilder in fanaticism. He, too, hates our Lord, and has no respect for any human being that loves Him. He is notorious in Jerusalem, and is the dread of the followers of the Nazarene. He gazes on Stephen as his face shines in the light of the throne. He hears his prayer. He marks the words, "Lay not this sin to their charge." They were a new revelation to him. They resembled the ship on which Columbus rode when first seen by the red man of the forest. They told of an unexplored sea-an unexplored sea of love. They told of a land beyond the present, that rose in dim outline before the vision of the martyr, that impressed the man of Tarsus with a new conviction. The arrow had pierced the heart of the king's enemy. It rankled there. The light of God shone round about him. He fell prostrate before the Crucified, and cried: "Lord, what wilt thou have me to do?" Then God spoke peace to him. The machinery of an immortal soul was reversed. The man pushing on to ruin turned toward the possibilities of a higher life, and became the apostle to the Gentiles.

Adoniram Judson was at one time apparently lost to hope. He, too, was the son of a minister. Prayers and tears were apparently wasted on him. He was in a hotel. Beyond the thin partition was a sinner dying. All night long the moans and death-throes disturbed his sleep. The next morning, on inquiry, he found that the young man was dead. He followed his lost spirit on its terrible journey. He was convicted and converted, and became the pioneer missionary to Burmah, winning the distinction of being Jesus Christ's man.

HOPE ON.

It has been remarked how near each other in their original fountains are the streams of belief and unbelief; like rivers whose sources are seen by one poised condor, and whose mouths are divided by a continent. One man receives Jesus Christ as Saviour and as Ruler, and is saved. Another as favorably situated rejects Him, and is lost. They walk the same paths, attend oftentimes the same church, live under the same roof. One believes in Christ, and comes into the fellowship of eternal love; his path grows brighter and brighter as the years run on, and, like the day star that precedes the day, is changed into the brightness of the morning and so lost from sight. The other disbelieves, and goes blindly and madly down the steep places

of impiety. Could we uncover Ingersoll's past, we should see him at a family altar, his hand held in his mother's grasp, while his father wrestled like Jacob of old. He stood by the line dividing heaven and hell. He might have crossed. He stops. Satan takes possession, and the boy becomes this crazed blasphemer. Give him not up. Augustine was worse than he, and yet his mother clung to him, and was permitted to wear her son's soul as a star in the crown of her rejoicing. Well do I remember the early career of James Inglis, one of the saintliest of men afterward. He came to the town where his classmate was preaching a terribly dissipated infidel. Prayers went up for him. Never can I forget his looks and the looks of his companions when the proud reviler bowed at the foot of the throne and called on Jesus Christ in the Holy Spirit to take possession of his immortal soul. Nothing is too hard for God. Jesus said, "I am the light of the world: he that followeth me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life."

No longer can we continue to delight ourselves with the radiance of hope. Our duty compels us to describe the perilous journey that lies before this man of sin.

More than twenty-five centuries have gone since Isaiah portrayed his doom. Opposition to God is as old as sin. It began before Adam, before Eden, when Satan lead off his revolt in heaven and compelled God to locate hell as the prison-house of the damned. There is nothing new in Ingersoll's impeachment of God. This opposition has assumed different forms, but it has been characterized by the same purpose. In the days of the apostles fire and sword served as arguments. A century passes, and then men began to wield the pen in defense of heathenism. The carnal heart at enmity with God loved sin, and lavished upon its debasing forms of wickedness its wildest admiration. At the foot of the cross Cæsar was preferred to Christ. Cæsar was as bad in morals and in life as Thomas Paine. In him there was nothing lovable. His face was hideous-it was covered with ulcers. His entire life was so great a disgrace that Rome kept him hidden from the popular gaze; and yet such is the tendency of sin that Ingersoll found his counterpart in those who cried, "Crucify Him: we have no king but Cæsar."

Julian, one of the most talented men of any age, attempted by pen and sword to banish Christ. He lived a wretched life and died a miserable death, and his name is covered with infamy. The words of the prophet describe the condition of the class, among whom are poets and artists, geniuses of high rank and mental powers of the most remarkable brilliancy. They kindled their fires, they surrounded themselves with sparks, they made light of God's mercy and of the sinner's doom, and they have found their "bed of sorrow."