With the Children on Sunday Part 19

THE EYE

THE SMALLEST CAMERA, THE MOST VALUABLE PICTURES.

SUGGESTION:--The object used is a small camera of any kind.

I AM going to address you again to-day as LITTLE MILLIONAIRES. Last week I showed you how your eyes were more valuable than the most costly telescopes, and to-day I want to show you how, in another way, you are little millionaires.

Very wealthy people sometimes travel in different countries, and gather very rare and beautiful paintings and pictures, oftentimes paying a thousand dollars, ten thousand dollars, and sometimes very much more for a single painting. Then they bring these paintings all together in their own homes and hang them on the walls, and as the result of the expenditure of many thousands, and sometimes of hundreds of thousands of dollars, they have a very beautiful and rare collection. But G.o.d has made you and me the possessors of a vast number of pictures, more beautiful, of greater variety, and infinitely more valuable, than all the paintings that were ever hung upon the walls of any art gallery in the world.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Camera.]

To ill.u.s.trate my thought, I have to-day brought a camera. Sometimes such a camera as this is called a Kodak or Snap-shot. As the finest telescopes have been modeled after the human eye, so the camera is only a very imperfect imitation of the human eye. As the spy-gla.s.s and telescope have lenses, so does this camera have a lens, which you see here in the front. Just back of this lens is the dark chamber in the camera, and back of it is a ground gla.s.s, as you will see here. Now whatever is directly in front of the camera is shown on the ground gla.s.s, as you will observe, but in an inverted or up-side-down position.

So the eye has its various parts, and as the rays of light pa.s.s through this lens and reflect the picture on this ground gla.s.s, so rays of light coming from any object pa.s.s first through the small opening of the eye, to the retina, where the picture is inverted just the same as upon the ground gla.s.s. When this picture is thrown upon the rear wall of the eye, which is called the retina, the seeing nerve, which is called the optic nerve and is connected with the eye, conveys the impression to the brain, and the result is what we call seeing.

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Human Eye.]

What I have told you is correct, and can easily be proven by a simple experiment with the eye of some animal. If you take the eye of a dead rabbit, and cleanse the back portion of it from the fat and muscles and then hold a candle in front of it, you can see the image of the candle formed upon the retina. If you take the eye of an ox and carefully pare off from the back portion, so as to leave it very thin, and place the eye in front of (or against) a small hole made in a box; then cover your head to shut out the light you will see through the box the picture of any object which is directly in front of this eye of the ox. In both instances they will be in the inverted form. This experiment would fully demonstrate to you that the camera is only an imitation, and a very poor one too, of the human eye.

Now when pictures are taken by means of the camera, the negative can not be exposed to the light, but must be taken into a dark room, and be carefully developed by the use of necessary chemicals or liquids. Then specially prepared paper must be used for printing the photographs. This paper must also be kept in the dark until it has been thoroughly washed and cleansed. But, with the pictures which are taken upon the retina of the eye, no such delay and labor is necessary before you can look at them. The moment the eye is turned in any direction, instantly the picture is photographed upon the retina of the eye, and then stamped indelibly upon the memory and becomes a part of ourselves.

There is no cost for chemicals, no delay in adjusting the instrument with which the picture is taken, no necessity for carrying around a large camera.

The camera has many disadvantages which are not found in the human eye.

The camera must be adjusted to objects near or far, and different cameras have to be used for pictures of different sizes and for different cla.s.ses of pictures. These cameras are costly to purchase, a great deal of time is consumed in securing a few pictures, they are always attended with expense; and when pictures are to be removed from one place to another, the owner is subjected to much trouble and annoyance. Then, the camera also does not give us the colors of the different objects which are before it. That is the reason why, in the beginning, I spoke of these millionaires purchasing such costly paintings, because in the paintings different colors are represented.

Now, in the hundreds of pictures which are constantly being taken by your eyes, there are no delays, no expenses, no inconvenience when the pictures have once been taken. Different shades and colors are all clearly represented. And even though you were to stand on a high mountain, where you could look off over one or two hundred square miles of beautiful landscape, all that beautiful scenery would be pictured on the retina of your eye; and the picture, complete and perfect, would not be larger than one-half inch square. What would real wealthy people be willing to give for a perfect picture only one-half inch square, in which the artist had clearly defined every field and tree, the rivers, houses, roads, railways and all the beautiful landscape contained in a vast area of many square miles?

Our eyes are wonderful cameras, which G.o.d has given us so that we can be constantly taking these beautiful pictures as we pa.s.s through life, and look at them not only for the instant, but that we may treasure the pictures up in our memories and make them the rich treasures and joyous heritage of coming years.

The older we grow, the more we appreciate these memory pictures of the past--memories of our childhood days, beautiful landscapes, foreign travel, lovely sunsets, the glorious sunrise, green fields and orchards of golden fruit. As you grow old, I suppose the richest treasures in your picture gallery of the past will be the memories of your childhood home, of mother and father, brother and sister. Possibly when you have grown old, you will remember how one day your heart was almost broken, when for the first time you were leaving home; how mother's eyes filled with tears when she kissed you good-bye, and, following you to the gate, how she stood and waved her handkerchief, while home faded from your view as you rounded the turn in the road and realized for the first time that you were launching out into real life for long years of struggle.

Just as the hearts of the parents go out in great tenderness toward their son, who is leaving the Christian influences of his home to begin service in a distant city, surrounded by evil influences, and oftentimes by wicked people; so the heart of our Heavenly Father goes out in great tenderness towards you and me, while we are separated from the great eternal mansion of the skies. G.o.d's heart yearns over us in great tenderness, and while we live in the midst of the evil of this world we are constantly to remember that G.o.d has made us millionaires; not only in the possession of the eyes, and other faculties with which He has endowed us for use here upon the earth, but we are to remember that we are children of the King of Heaven, and that we are heirs of everlasting life and of everlasting glory. We are heirs of G.o.d and joint heirs with Jesus Christ, to an inheritance which is incorruptible, undefiled and that "fadeth not away." We are not simply millionaires, but we are heirs of everlasting glory.

QUESTIONS.--What instrument for taking pictures is like the human eye? Which can take pictures quicker, the eye or the camera? What is lacking in pictures taken by the camera? Do our eyes show the colors of the objects? Of what is the camera an imitation? Is it expensive to take many pictures with the camera? Why do people pay large sums for oil paintings? Was there ever a picture painted by an artist or photographed with a camera so beautiful as the small pictures taken by the eye?

For size, color, variety and convenience, which are the finest pictures in the world? Which pictures are most treasured in old age?

FROGS.

THE PLAGUES IN EGYPT.

SUGGESTION:--Objects: Some paper frogs, which can be purchased at any j.a.panese store for about five cents each. They are often found also in toy stores.

MY DEAR YOUNG FRIENDS: I am sure you will all be able to tell me what this object is which I hold in my hand (voices: "Frogs, bullfrogs").

Well, it looks exactly like a bullfrog, and was made to imitate a bullfrog. The bullfrogs I have here are made of paper, and were made in j.a.pan. I bought them that I might show them to you and preach you an object sermon on the subject of the "Ten Plagues in Egypt."

[Ill.u.s.tration]

You all remember how Joseph was sold by his brethren into bondage in Egypt, how he was cast into prison and afterward taken out and made prime minister over all that land; how during the seven years of plenty he laid up corn for the seven years of famine which followed, and afterward his father and his brethren--in all the seventy persons who const.i.tuted Jacob's family--came down into Egypt to be fed. After two hundred and fifty years this family had increased until it numbered nearly two millions of people. Pharaoh had made slaves of them, and compelled them to work in the brickyards of Egypt. The task-masters were very cruel. They beat them with whips, and demanded excessive labor from them. These people were the chosen people of G.o.d, and their voice was lifted to G.o.d their Father for deliverance from all the wrongs which they suffered. G.o.d heard their prayer, and raised up Moses to deliver them out of Egyptian bondage.

When Moses and Aaron went to Pharaoh to request him to let the Children of Israel go from Egypt to the land of Canaan, which G.o.d had promised to Abraham and to his seed after him, Pharaoh would not consent to let them go. He was a proud, wicked king, and G.o.d sent ten great plagues upon him and his country, to humble him and cause him to do as G.o.d desired that he should do.

In the first plague the rivers were turned into blood. This plague lasted seven days, and at the end of that time Moses stretched forth his rod, and all the rivers and ponds and lakes of water brought forth great frogs throughout all the land. They came, not by hundreds, but by thousands and millions, until the frogs covered all that land. They were in the houses of all the people. The king's servants were busy sweeping and carrying them out of the palace, and yet they stole into the rooms, and at night when the king would go to lie down he would find these frogs in his bed-chamber and upon his bed. When his bakers went to make bread for the king, they would find them in the bread-troughs in which they kneaded or mixed the bread, and in the ovens where they baked the bread. The frogs were everywhere in the palace and in the huts of the common people; upon the streets and in the roads; wherever the people walked they stepped upon them, and the king's carriage could not be driven through the streets without crushing thousands of them. The plague was so great that Pharaoh sent for Moses and Aaron, and entreated them to call upon their G.o.d that He would remove the frogs; and when G.o.d heard the prayer of Moses and Aaron He caused the frogs to die. The people gathered them up in great heaps and these dead and putrefying frogs in the streets and the water of the river caused the air to be loaded with a great stench that filled the nostrils of all the people.

After this plague of frogs came the plague of lice, when all the dust of the country was turned into lice, and after that the plague of the flies; and so on through to the last plague, which was the slaying of the first-born, of which I will tell you in another sermon.

I wish you would at your earliest opportunity turn to the second book in the Old Testament, the Book of Exodus, and in the early chapters read about these various plagues of Egypt. When you read the account of the various plagues, you will see how after each affliction Pharaoh's heart seemed to relent. He would consent for a time that the Children of Israel might be liberated from their bondage, and depart from Egypt and start on their journey to the land of Canaan. When he was in affliction he would make good promises, but as soon as G.o.d had removed the plague, and the sorrow of his people seemed to be ended for a time he again hardened his heart against G.o.d, and refused to do what he had promised.

Again and again the king refused to do that which he had agreed, and caused the unhappy Children of Israel to continue in their bondage.

We may think that we are not wicked like Pharaoh was. We may not be wicked in the same degree, but we are wicked after the same nature and kind; and so G.o.d brings upon us various providences, some of which are not very pleasant. G.o.d is seeking to educate us by the trials and sorrows and disappointments and afflictions which He permits to come upon us, so that we will be more obedient, and more faithful, and more Christlike. But I suppose you have seen people who were just like Pharaoh. When they were sick they would promise to become Christians, and live good and right lives, and join the Church and be faithful followers of Christ all the rest of their lives. And yet when G.o.d would raise them up from their beds of sickness they would forget all their promises, and generally, as it always was in the case of Pharaoh, their hearts became harder and harder. Instead of being better after G.o.d had raised them up and made them strong and well, or removed some trial or affliction, they became worse than before.

Have you not found something of this also in your own experience? When you have desired something which you have asked your father or mother to secure for you, you have promised that you would run all the errands they asked, or that you would go to school and study your lessons very faithfully, or that you would go to bed cheerfully at night without complaining, or you have made your parents some other promises; and yet, after you have received the object you asked for, you have failed to keep your promise.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Moses Leading the Children of Israel Through the Red Sea.]

Or, to go a step further, has it not been so with what you have promised G.o.d that you would do? You may have entered into covenant with Him, made certain promises, and then afterward forgot to fulfill those promises.

Let us always remember when we make promises to G.o.d, or to our parents, that we are not to be like Pharaoh. After G.o.d has answered our prayers we should not forget to be obedient to Him and to keep our promises.

Pharaoh was a great covenant-breaker, but when at last he gave the Children of Israel permission to leave Egypt, and then broke his promise and followed them with his army that he might destroy them, G.o.d opened up the waters of the Red Sea and the Children of Israel fled from before Pharaoh. When this wicked king and covenant-breaker saw them, he pursued after them with his horses, his chariots and his army; and when they were all in the midst of the sea, G.o.d took away His restraining power from the water which stood piled up on both sides of the way along which the Children of Israel had marched safely, and the water came down in great torrents and buried this wicked king and all his horses and his chariots and his men. So G.o.d destroyed this great covenant-breaking king, because after all of the judgments and wonderful miracles which He had wrought before Pharaoh, in order to teach him that Jehovah was G.o.d, Pharaoh's repentances were all mere shams.

This was a great object sermon which G.o.d did before the eyes of all these thousands of the Children of Israel, and it should teach you and me that we are to be honest in all our covenants with G.o.d, and be obedient to the will of G.o.d in all that we do and say.

QUESTIONS.--Upon what king of Egypt did G.o.d send the plague of frogs? How many plagues were there?

What effect did each plague have upon Pharaoh? Was he honest when he repented? What did he do each time after the plague was removed? What was the last plague? After the death of the first-born, did he allow the Children of Israel to go? After they started, what did he do? How did G.o.d enable the Children of Israel to cross the Red Sea? When Pharaoh followed into the sea after them, what occurred? Should we always keep our covenants, both with G.o.d and men? If we do not keep our covenants, whom are we like? Will we also be punished?

BLOOD.

THE FEAST OF THE Pa.s.sOVER.

SUGGESTION:--The object used is a bottle of red ink to represent blood.

CHILDREN OF THE COVENANT-KEEPING KING: Last Sunday I talked to you about Pharaoh, as the great covenant-breaking king. I showed you some paper frogs, and told you how after all of G.o.d's long-suffering with Pharaoh, He eventually destroyed him and his army in the midst of the Red Sea.

Now, to-day I have this bottle, which has this deep red colored fluid in it. This is red ink. But I have brought it not to talk to you about ink, but to talk about something else which is of the same color; namely, of blood.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Preparing for the Pa.s.sing Over of the Angel of Death