History of Presbyterianism

CHAPTER XXIV.

SERMON BY REV. GEORGE SUTHERLAND, D. 1)., IN 1857.

Luke xix241: “And when he was come near he beheld the city and wept over it.”

The sight of the eye affects the heart. Would you have your mind filled with a delightful sense of the beauty and magnificence of God’s creation? Then stay not in the thronged city, tarry not in tabernacles of clay; go stand, as the morning sun pours its bril- liant rays over the earth, on some eminence over- looking the gardens and fields, the valleys and lawns. There your souls may bask in the fra- grance of delight, while scenes of beauty, of peace, of plenty lie spread out before you. Would you know the horrors of war? G0 and walk through the battlefield, see the mangled bodies, the gaping wounds, the distorted features, the desolation and ruin and woe on every side, and hard must be the heart that is not pained to the core at such a sight.

Would you see the dangers of the deep? Rove not upon the sea when its surface is unruffied by winds, when it lies smiling at the close of a sum- mer day; but stand on the beach when the waters of the ocean are lashed by fierce and howling win- try winds; or look on that stranded bark with the living cargo, a throng of agonized, distressed and (lying mortals. No escape is possible; night is com— ing on, the storm thickens; no boat can come or go.

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