Notes of a sermon preached by the Rev. OE. Darweat la Union burch on Sanday evening, October 22.
Text: Rev. IX. 7. Ca their head ere ax it were crowes like gold.'
After giving them " rest for some years, I prepare recommenciog monthly sermon to young men and women, You are starting in the most fascinating of all journeys, the journey of life, Yoa know that if yon are gving on a toar you may visit Cuok's offices i and come out with an smal of pspere, schedules and directions; bat there are people who in spite of all these detailed rections take the wrong train, while snob a faonly for gotting wrong, they take even the wrong steamer.
There is luggage lost o0- ey. Young men are bora aptimiste it is not easy to persuade son that this journey through life is not jast " tour for plossure, bat a campaign, a mach more John saw that, and among tie difficalties that life presented to hin were locusts that he raw rising out of the smoke of a pit, aod the pit is not the "bottomless pit," bat the great Inxarions Roman world in which he lived, a world much like ones in all essential qualities.
And what are the locusts? The proet Joel describes a plszue of riem, They shall ran like w They lok well, s" military Bat thea he saya "the garden of and bebled them a de sul The does not prevent ing utterly ramous. We may thore-fore take it that the locusts represent all those elements and factors in life, in haman natare, in the world, in society that rain men, They stand for the destructive forces of life, which will leave leave each of us naked a8 " desert when we are old if we let them.
And they have crowns on their heads. Crowns are among the fascinations of life, A coronet has cost some people good deal of money. Bat John, who wae an old man, had not lived for years in a gay city like Ephesus with his eyes shat, notices pecolisrity about these yes, but "og it were crowns like gold." They look well, they take the eye; when we are young our eye is easily taken by glitter; they are even imposing but they are a trend "as it were gold,' They are not real; they have no sabstantiality, no permanence; they Here theo is our first thought, the deceptiveness, the illusory character of 80 many of the things that catch our favoy as we start on this wonderfal life journey of ours. It you are carlo or piotare collectors yon know how yon have to watch it that you are not tricked. You know the "Ming vase,"
Yes b'loog Ming," says the guileless native behind the counter, as be points to the name Ta Ming stamped on the vase. Then you laugh and so does he, and you say "no belong Ming." Bat the curio business is nothing like life for trickery. So many things are only "as it were gold." Life is fall of deceits, And the marvellous thing ie that generation after generation of young men start on this journey of life and get taken in by the same old deceits, the same tinsel crowns. The business of dealing in " Old Masters"? of trend as any. have square yards of faked Old ters, bat life beats even that trade, Passions, physical appetites aod Insts tell os that if we will only gratify them, we sh all the fan and none of the pain and misery. They say " why bother about religion, leave that to old fogies who go to charch; enjoy yourself." There is what is called " Life of Pleasure, You know what that means, endless routs, balls, late dinners, gaieties, everything to gratify surface of our natare, nothing to satisfy the mind, the intellect, the deeper self that in all ages and races has refased to be satisfied with anything Jess than the Eternal God, and the higher pleasures which are rooted in life in Him, reverence, teath, purity, love, Bat the whole history of man proves that haman nature was not built to be quite happy in base things. They pall, they ba to create the sat drink has, acd then ly and soul crack the effort to "keep ap the pace" and we have fans of mea of forty-five and fifty who they bad not been taken la by th crowes as it were of gold" would bai lived to be eis If there is anyone here who has 8 letter of introduction to any minister
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.