Like a planet out of its orbit he moves when he leaps his rail:
Hold him and guide him, O rider! thy purpose he will not fail;
But loose him, and man lies groaning, and women and children wail.
O mighty creature of commerce! That bringest the world its bread,
And bearest the journeying peoples with limbs of thunder and dread,
To thee my life is committed, and safely let me be sped!
Thou steed of fire and of iron, that bearest me on my way,
Is life or death in thy destined course, is rapture or sorrow—say?
O Christ of God, hold the driving-rod, and mount this steed to-day!
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Power from God—See Springs from God.
POWER IN SELF-REPRESSION
Says a recent journal:
Many years ago, in the lecture-room of
President Woolsey, of Yale University, a
young man who did not know his lesson
ventured to make a mock recitation and to
give an impertinent answer. The president
was a man of fiery temper, tho it had been
curbed and subdued by the discipline of
years. On this occasion his face turned
white; he bowed his head upon the desk before
him. There was a half-minute's silence
of death; he raised his head, called upon
another man, and the recitation went on. He
knew that if he spoke to the offender he
would speak too much, so he said nothing.
The students of that class knew well what a lava-flood was penned up there. Self-repression did not seem to them a sign of weakness—it was the greatest evidence of power.
Shall we call it a sign of weakness in God that he bears with the sins of men? When God humbles himself to behold and to forbear, shall we not see in this voluntary self-limitation one of the proofs of his greatness? (Text.)
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POWER, SUSPENDED
In the early spring of 1848 occurred a
natural phenomenon so strange, so sudden,
and so stupendous that the older inhabitants
of western New York still speak of it with
awe and wonder. This phenomenon was
nothing less than the running dry of Niagara
Falls.
The winter of 1847 and 1848 had been one of extreme severity. Ice of such thickness had never been known as formed on Lake Erie that season. When the break-up came, toward the end of March, a strong northeast wind was blowing, which piled the great fields of ice in floes, and then in banks as high as miniature icebergs. Toward night on March 30 the wind suddenly changed to the opposite direction and increased to a terrific gale, which hurled back the piled-up ice and drove it into the entrance of Niagara River with such force that a huge and almost impenetrable dam was formed. For a whole day the source of the river was stopt up, and the stream was drained of its supply. By the morning of the 31st the river was practically dry, and thus for twenty-four hours the roar of Niagara Falls was stilled. Then in the early morning of April 1, the ice-pack gave way under the tremendous pressure from above, and the long-restrained volume of water rushed down and reclaimed its own.
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POWER THROUGH UNION WITH GOD
It is only when we link ourselves with the power that lifts that we can accomplish results which are beyond our strength.
A great weight was to be lifted a little
way out from the shore. Vain efforts had
been made to bring it to the surface. Great
chains had been wrapt about the mass and
stout steam-tugs had puffed and strained
without avail, and engines from the shore
had exerted all their power with no result.
A young man offered to raise the weight
and he was told to try. A great flat barge
was towed out over the sunken hulk, about
which chains had been passed, and these
were fastened to the barge. When the tide
was out, the chains were wrapt still closer;
then the young man sat down and waited.
In the night the tide came in and the barge
rose steadily with the incoming tide, bringing
with it the burden to which it was
chained. Higher and higher it rose, till at
last it was out of the mud and mire. The
seemingly impossible had been accomplished
by linking the obstacle to the power of the
tide. (Text.)
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