our windows are open toward them!

But Daniel, in the text, kept this port-hole of his domestic fortress
unclosed because Jerusalem was the capital of sacred influences. There
had smoked the sacrifice. There was the Holy of Holies. There was the
Ark of the Covenant. There stood the temple. We are all tempted to
keep our windows open on the opposite side, toward the world, that we
may see and hear and appropriate its advantages. What does the world
say? What does the world think? What does the world do? Worshipers of
the world instead of worshipers of God. Windows open toward Babylon.
Windows open toward Corinth. Windows open toward Athens. Windows open
toward Sodom. Windows open toward the flats, instead of windows open
toward the hills. Sad mistake, for this world as a god is like
something I saw the other day in the museum of Strasburg, Germany--the
figure of a virgin in wood and iron. The victim in olden time was
brought there, and this figure would open its arms to receive him,
and, once infolded, the figure closed with a hundred knives and lances
upon him, and then let him drop one hundred and eighty feet sheer
down. So the world first embraces its idolaters, then closes upon them
with many tortures, and then lets them drop forever down. The highest
honor the world could confer was to make a man Roman emperor; but, out
of sixty-three emperors, it allowed only six to die peacefully in
their beds.

The dominion of this world over multitudes is illustrated by the names
of coins of many countries. They have their pieces of money which they
call sovereigns and half sovereigns, crowns and half crowns, Napoleons
and half Napoleons, Fredericks and double Fredericks, and ducats, and
Isabellinos, all of which names mean not so much usefulness as
dominion. The most of our windows open toward the exchange, toward the