radium, which actually seems as tho it were a hot fragment struck off from God's great white throne, so amazing is its radiant energy.
It operates, not merely by setting "waves" in motion, but it throws off a stream of actual particles which move with an inconceivable velocity (at the rate, some physicists allege, of 200,000 miles a second), and without—and here is the miracle—without any apparent diminution in the morsel of radium itself. It can hurl these particles literally through six inches of armor plate. It can and does send them right through your own head while you are looking at them, just as if your brain were a loose sieve, as perhaps is is, or a grove of trees quite wide apart, and a bright, flashing bird, all crimson and gold, were flying right through the trees, without even hitting his wings.
Now, what I want to say is that the modern discovery of such marvels as these, as being real, actual, objective, demonstrated facts, stretches the mind out into a thrilling series of undreamed-of possibilities, and this is a preparation for faith. This is the first step. This is the first lamp on the modern road to faith.—Albert J. Lyman.
(1044)
FAITH, STEDFAST
Unanswered prayers are no reason for abandoning our faith in God. This is the lesson Ella Wheeler Wilcox teaches in this verse:
I will not doubt, tho all my prayers return
Unanswered from the still, white realm above;
I shall believe it is an all-wise love
Which has refused those things for which I yearn;
And tho at times I can not keep from grieving,
Yet the pure ardor of my fixt believing
Undimmed shall burn.
(1045)
FAITH TAUGHT BY NATURE
Faith bids us be of good cheer. Long
ago, that old Greek studied the mental operations
of a bee, with brain not as large as a
pin-head. Here is a little bee, that organizes
a city, that builds ten thousand cells for
honey, twelve thousand cells for larvæ, a
holy of holies for the mother queen; a little
bee that observes the increasing heat and
when the wax may melt and the honey be
lost, organizes the swarm into squads, puts
sentinels at the entrances, glues the feet
down, and then with flying wings, creates a
system of ventilation to cool the honey, that
makes an electric fan seem tawdry—a little
honey-bee that will include twenty square
miles in the field over whose flowers it has
oversight. But if a tiny brain in a bee performs
such wonders providential, who are
you, that you should question the guidance
of God? Lift up your eyes, and behold the
hand that supports these stars, without pillars,
the God who guides the planets without
collision. Away with fear! (Text.)—N. D.
Hillis.
(1046)
FAITH WITHOUT WORKS
A story is told of three prisoners who
were captured by pirates. One of them was
put in a boat without oars and pushed out
into deep water. The boat sped along
safely at first, but when a storm broke overhead,
the frail craft was tossed upon a rock
and the man was drowned. The second man
was placed in a boat with one oar, but he
made no progress. Finally, he drifted into
a whirlpool and was never seen again. The
third man was given a boat with two oars
and he safely crossed to the other side, where
he was received by friends.
We are all sailors on the ocean of life bound for a harbor of safety whether we arrive in port or not. The unbeliever is the man in the boat without oars. The person who thinks that his faith without works will save him is the man in the boat with only one oar. But the man who believes in God, and works out his salvation with fear and trembling, is the man in the boat with two oars. (Text.)
(1047)
FAITHFULNESS
To the coolness and devotion to duty of
John Binns, operator of the "wireless," and
one of the actors in the shipwreck of the
Republic, was due the prompt assistance accorded
the stricken passenger-steamer by
sister liners. As he himself exprest it by
wireless, Binns was "on the job" from the
time the Florida crashed into the Republic
amidships until the last passenger had been
transferred to the colliding vessel.
It was a stretch of thirty hours, and every minute of that time the telephone receivers, which are part of the wireless apparatus, were strapped to his eager and listening ears. Seldom has there been a more shining example of that calm courage that goes hand in hand with a sound sense of business duty.
Almost until the Republic went down Binns kept his ship in touch with Siasconset
