Page:The Relation of the Sunday-school System to our Christian Patriotism.pdf/14

14 We can now send in many important directions, and shall soon in more, the tidings of the day, the voice of warning, the call for help, nay, the newspaper and even the book, with more ease and in less time, a thousand miles, than those of the last generation could a hundred. Every railroad is another sinew of energetic combination, every magnetic wire a new nerve of interchanging sympathy. It cannot be denied that there is reason for fear; but surely there is greater reason for hope; we may “rejoice” though it be “with trembling.”

We are Christians, and if our faith be evangelical, we are moved by the love of Christ, who bought us with his own blood, infinitely more precious than silver and gold; we are sanctified by his Spirit to follow his example of mercy, and have the riches of almighty God as the resources of our charity. Shall we then doubt the duty or the ability of Christian patriots to meet these increasing exigencies? Shall the world’s lust of gain exceed our zeal for souls? Shall war summon willing instruments by tens of thousands, and the gospel of peace ask without success for messengers to bear the tidings of saving grace among our distant brethren? Christians, it is a shame for us to hang our heads like cowards before the future, which Christ has claimed as his own, when we should and can put the Bible into every wagon that winds its way through the deep forest or ocean-wide prairie; pour the Sabbath-light upon every clearing; plant a church and Sunday-school with every settlement; and cast the golden seed of divine truth behind every plough as it furrows the virgin soil. Let our people get beyond the privileges of education or the gospel, and their children will be