{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_14139/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_14139","id":"gutenberg_14139","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/14139","summary":null,"tags":["Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Christianity","Presbyterian Church -- Sermons","Sermons, American"],"text":"NEW TABERNACLE SERMONS\nBY\nT. DE WITT TALMAGE, D.D.\n\nAUTHOR OF\n\"_CRUMBS SWEPT UP_,\" \"_THE ABOMINATIONS OF MODERN SOCIETY_,\" etc.\n\nDelivered in the Brooklyn Tabernacle.\n\nVOL. I\n\nNEW YORK:\nGEORGE MUNRO, PUBLISHER,\n17 TO 27 VANDEWATER STREET.\n1886.\n\n\n\n\n[Illustration: T. De Witt Talmage]\n\n\n    _Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1885, by_\n    GEORGE MUNRO, _in the Office of the Librarian of Congress,\n    Washington, D.C._\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS.\n\n                                               PAGE\n    BRAWN AND MUSCLE                             7\n    THE PLEIADES AND ORION                      21\n    THE QUEEN'S VISIT                           34\n    VICARIOUS SUFFERING                         45\n    POSTHUMOUS OPPORTUNITY                      59\n    THE LORD'S RAZOR                            72\n    WINDOWS TOWARD JERUSALEM                    83\n    STORMED AND TAKEN                           95\n    ALL THE WORLD AKIN                         108\n    A MOMENTOUS QUEST                          119\n    THE GREAT ASSIZE                           134\n    THE ROAD TO THE CITY                       147\n    THE RANSOMLESS                             158\n    THE THREE GROUPS                           171\n    THE INSIGNIFICANT                          184\n    THE THREE RINGS                            197\n    HOW HE CAME TO SAY IT                      209\n    CASTLE JESUS                               221\n    STRIPPING THE SLAIN                        233\n    SOLD OUT                                   246\n    SUMMER TEMPTATIONS                         259\n    THE BANISHED QUEEN                         274\n    THE DAY WE LIVE IN                         285\n    CAPITAL AND LABOR                          297\n    DESPOTISM OF THE NEEDLE                    311\n    TOBACCO AND OPIUM                          325\n    WHY ARE SATAN AND SIN PERMITTED?           339\n\n\n\n\nBRAWN AND MUSCLE.\n\n    \"And Samson went down to Timnath.\"--JUDGES xiv: 1.\n\n\nThere are two sides to the character of Samson. The one phase of his\nlife, if followed into the particulars, would administer to the\ngrotesque and the mirthful; but there is a phase of his character\nfraught with lessons of solemn and eternal import. To these graver\nlessons we devote our morning sermon.\n\nThis giant no doubt in early life gave evidences of what he was to be.\nIt is almost always so. There were two Napoleons--the boy Napoleon and\nthe man Napoleon--but both alike; two Howards--the boy Howard and the\nman Howard--but both alike; two Samsons--the boy Samson and the man\nSamson--but both alike. This giant was no doubt the hero of the\nplayground, and nothing could stand before his exhibitions of youthful\nprowess. At eighteen years of age he was betrothed to the daughter of\na Philistine. Going down toward Timnath, a lion came out upon him,\nand, although this young giant was weaponless, he seized the monster\nby the long mane and shook him as a hungry hound shakes a March hare,\nand made his bones crack, and left him by the wayside bleeding under\nthe smiting of his fist and the grinding heft of his heel.\n\nThere he stands, looming up above other men, a mountain of flesh, his\narms bunched with muscle that can lift the gate of a city, taking an\nattitude defiant of everything. His hair had never been cut, and it\nrolled down in seven great plaits over his shoulders, adding to his\nbulk, fierceness, and terror. The Philistines want to conquer him, and\ntherefore they must find out where the secret of his strength lies.\n\nThere is a dissolute woman living in the valley of Sorek by the name\nof Delilah. They appoint her the agent in the case. The Philistines\nare secreted in the same building, and then Delilah goes to work and\ncoaxes Samson to tell what is the secret of his strength. \"Well,\" he\nsays, \"if you should take seven green withes such as they fasten wild\nbeasts with and put them around me I should be perfectly powerless.\"\nSo she binds him with the seven green withes. Then she claps her hands\nand says: \"They come--the Philistines!\" and he walks out as though\nthey were no impediment. She coaxes him again, and says: \"Now tell me\nthe secret of this great strength?\" and he replies: \"If you should\ntake some ropes that have never been used and tie me with them I\nshould be just like other men.\" She ties him with the ropes, claps her\nhands, and shouts: \"They come--the Philistines!\" He walks out as\neasily as he did before--not a single obstruction. She coaxes him\nagain, and he says: \"Now, if you should take these seven long plaits\nof hair, and by this house-loom weave them into a web, I could not get\naway.\" So the house-loom is rolled up, and the shuttle flies backward\nand forward and the long plaits of hair are woven into a web. Then she\nclaps her hands, and says: \"They come--the Philistines!\" He walks out\nas easily as he did before, dragging a part of the loom with him.\n\nBut after awhile she persuades him to tell the truth. He says: \"If you\nshould take a razor or shears and cut off this long hair, I should be\npowerless and in the hands of my enemies.\" Samson sleeps, and that she\nmay not wake him up during the process of shearing, help is called in.\nYou know that the barbers of the East have such a skillful way of\nmanipulating the head to this very day that, instead of waking up a\nsleeping man, they will put a man wide awake sound asleep. I hear the\nblades of the shears grinding against each other, and I see the long\nlocks falling off. The shears or razor accomplishes what green withes\nand new ropes and house-loom could not do. Suddenly she claps her\nhands, and says: \"The Philistines be upon thee, Samson!\" He rouses up\nwith a struggle, but his strength is all gone. He is in the hands of\nhis enemies.\n\nI hear the groan of the giant as they take his eyes out, and then I\nsee him staggering on in his blindness, feeling his way as he goes on\ntoward Gaza. The prison door is open, and the giant is thrust in. He\nsits down and puts his hands on the mill-crank, which, with exhausting\nhorizontal motion, goes day after day, week after week, month after\nmonth--work, work, work! The consternation of the world in captivity,\nhis locks shorn, his eyes punctured, grinding corn in Gaza!\n\nI. First of all, behold in this giant of the text that physical power\nis not always an index of moral power. He was a huge man--the lion\nfound it out, and the three thousand men whom he slew found it out;\nyet he was the subject of petty revenges and out-gianted by low\npassion. I am far from throwing any discredit upon physical stamina.\nThere are those who seem to have great admiration for delicacy and\nsickliness of constitution. I never could see any glory in weak nerves\nor sick headache. Whatever effort in our day is made to make the men\nand women more robust should have the favor of every good citizen as\nwell as of every Christian. Gymnastics may be positively religious.\n\nGood people sometimes ascribe to a wicked heart what they ought to\nascribe to a slow liver. The body and the soul are such near neighbors\nthat they often catch each other's diseases. Those who never saw a\nsick day, and who, like Hercules, show the giant in the cradle, have\nmore to answer for than those who are the subjects of life-long\ninfirmities. He who can lift twice as much as you can, and walk twice\nas far, and work twice as long, will have a double account to meet in\nthe judgment.\n\nHow often it is that you do not find physical energy indicative of\nspiritual power! If a clear head is worth more than one dizzy with\nperpetual vertigo--if muscles with the play of health in them are\nworth more than those drawn up in chronic \"rheumatics\"--if an eye\nquick to catch passing objects is better than one with vision dim and\nuncertain--then God will require of us efficiency just in proportion\nto what he has given us. Physical energy ought to be a type of moral\npower. We ought to have as good digestion of truth as we have capacity\nto assimilate food. Our spiritual hearing ought to be as good as our\nphysical hearing. Our spiritual taste ought to be as clear as our\ntongue. Samsons in body, we ought to be giants in moral power.\n\nBut while you find a great many men who realize that they ought to use\ntheir money aright, and use their intelligence aright, how few men you\nfind aware of the fact that they ought to use their physical organism\naright! With every thump of the heart there is something saying,\n\"Work! work!\" and, lest we should complain that we have no tools to\nwork with, God gives us our hands and feet, with every knuckle, and\nwith every joint, and with every muscle saying to us, \"Lay hold and do\nsomething.\"\n\nBut how often it is that men with physical strength do not serve\nChrist! They are like a ship full manned and full rigged, capable of\nvast tonnage, able to endure all stress of weather, yet swinging idly\nat the docks, when these men ought to be crossing and recrossing the\ngreat ocean of human suffering and sin with God's supplies of mercy.\nHow often it is that physical strength is used in doing positive\ndamage, or in luxurious ease, when, with sleeves rolled up and bronzed\nbosom, fearless of the shafts of opposition, it ought to be laying\nhold with all its might, and tugging away to lift up this sunken wreck\nof a world.\n\nIt is a most shameful fact that much of the business of the Church and\nof the world must be done by those comparatively invalid. Richard\nBaxter, by reason of his diseases, all his days sitting in the door of\nthe tomb, yet writing more than a hundred volumes, and sending out an\ninfluence for God that will endure as long as the \"Saints' Everlasting\nRest.\" Edward Payson, never knowing a well day, yet how he preached,\nand how he wrote, helping thousands of dying souls like himself to\nswim in a sea of glory! And Robert M'Cheyne, a walking skeleton, yet\nyou know what he did in Dundee, and how he shook Scotland with zeal\nfor God. Philip Doddridge, advised by his friends, because of his\nillness, not to enter the ministry, yet you know what he did for the\n\"rise and progress of religion\" in the Church and in the world.\n\nWilberforce was told by his doctors that he could not live a\nfortnight, yet at that very time entering upon philanthropic\nenterprises that demanded the greatest endurance and persistence.\nRobert Hall, suffering excruciations, so that often in his pulpit\nwhile preaching he would stop and lie down on a sofa, then getting up\nagain to preach about heaven until the glories of the celestial city\ndropped on the multitude, doing more work, perhaps, than almost any\nwell man in his day.\n\nOh, how often it is that men with great physical endurance are not as\ngreat in moral and spiritual stature! While there are achievements for\nthose who are bent all their days with sickness--achievements of\npatience, achievements of Christian endurance--I call upon men of\nhealth to-day, men of muscle, men of nerve, men of physical power, to\ndevote themselves to the Lord. Giants in body, you ought to be giants\nin soul.\n\nII. Behold also, in the story of my text, illustration of the fact of\nthe damage that strength can do if it be misguided. It seems to me\nthat this man spent a great deal of his time in doing evil--this\nSamson of my text. To pay a bet which he had lost by guessing of his\nriddle he robs and kills thirty people. He was not only gigantic in\nstrength, but gigantic in mischief, and a type of those men in all\nages of the world who, powerful in body or mind, or any faculty of\nsocial position or wealth, have used their strength for iniquitous\npurposes.\n\nIt is not the small, weak men of the day who do the damage. These\nsmall men who go swearing and loafing about your stores and shops and\nbanking-houses, assailing Christ and the Bible and the Church--they do\nnot do the damage. They have no influence. They are vermin that you\ncrush with your foot. But it is the giants of the day, the misguided\ngiants, giants in physical power, or giants in mental acumen, or\ngiants in social position, or giants in wealth, who do the damage.\n\nThe men with sharp pens that stab religion and throw their poison all\nthrough our literature; the men who use the power of wealth to\nsanction iniquity, and bribe justice, and make truth and honor bow to\ntheir golden scepter.\n\nMisguided giants--look out for them! In the middle and the latter part\nof the last century no doubt there were thousands of men in Paris and\nEdinburgh and London who hated God and blasphemed the name of the\nAlmighty; but they did but little mischief--they were small men,\ninsignificant men. Yet there were giants in those days.\n\nWho can calculate the soul-havoc of a Rousseau, going on with a very\nenthusiasm of iniquity, with fiery imagination seizing upon all the\nimpulsive natures of his day? or David Hume, who employed his life as\na spider employs its summer, in spinning out silken webs to trap the\nunwary? or Voltaire, the most learned man of his day, marshaling a\ngreat host of skeptics, and leading them out in the dark land of\ninfidelity? or Gibbon, who showed an uncontrollable grudge against\nreligion in his history of one of the most fascinating periods of the\nworld's existence--the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire--a book in\nwhich, with all the splendors of his genius, he magnified the errors\nof Christian disciples, while, with a sparseness of notice that never\ncan be forgiven, he treated of the Christian heroes of whom the world\nwas not worthy?\n\nOh, men of stout physical health, men of great mental stature, men of\nhigh social position, men of great power of any sort, I want you to\nunderstand your power, and I want you to know that that power devoted\nto God will be a crown on earth, to you typical of a crown in heaven;\nbut misguided, bedraggled in sin, administrative of evil, God will\nthunder against you with His condemnation in the day when millionaire\nand pauper, master and slave, king and subject, shall stand side by\nside in the judgment, and money-bags, and judicial ermine, and royal\nrobe shall be riven with the lightnings.\n\nBehold also, how a giant may be slain of a woman. Delilah started the\ntrain of circumstances that pulled down the temple of Dagon about\nSamson's ears. And tens of thousands of giants have gone down to death\nand hell through the same impure fascinations. It seems to me that it\nis high time that pulpit and platform and printing-press speak out\nagainst the impurities of modern society. Fastidiousness and Prudery\nsay: \"Better not speak--you will rouse up adverse criticism; you will\nmake worse what you want to make better; better deal in glittering\ngeneralities; the subject is too delicate for polite ears.\" But there\ncomes a voice from heaven overpowering the mincing sentimentalities of\nthe day, saying: \"Cry aloud, spare not, lift up thy voice like a\ntrumpet, and show my people their transgressions and the house of\nJacob their sins.\"\n\nThe trouble is that when people write or speak upon this theme they\nare apt to cover it up with the graces of belles-lettres, so that the\ncrime is made attractive instead of repulsive. Lord Byron in \"Don\nJuan\" adorns this crime until it smiles like a May queen. Michelet,\nthe great French writer, covers it up with bewitching rhetoric until\nit glows like the rising sun, when it ought to be made loathsome as a\nsmall-pox hospital. There are to-day influences abroad which, if\nunresisted by the pulpit and the printing-press, will turn New York\nand Brooklyn into Sodom and Gomorrah, fit only for the storm of fire\nand brimstone that whelmed the cities of the plain.\n\nYou who are seated in your Christian homes, compassed by moral and\nreligious restraints, do not realize the gulf of iniquity that bounds\nyou on the north and the south and the east and the west. While I\nspeak there are tens of thousands of men and women going over the\nawful plunge of an impure life; and while I cry to God for mercy upon\ntheir souls, I call upon you to marshal in the defense of your homes,\nyour Church and your nation. There is a banqueting hall that you have\nnever heard described. You know all about the feast of Ahasuerus,\nwhere a thousand lords sat. You know all about Belshazzar's carousal,\nwhere the blood of the murdered king spurted into the faces of the\nbanqueters. You may know of the scene of riot and wassail, when there\nwas set before Esopus one dish of food that cost $400,000. But I speak\nnow of a different banqueting hall. Its roof is fretted with fire. Its\nfloor is tesselated with fire. Its chalices are chased with fire. Its\nsong is a song of fire. Its walls are buttresses of fire. Solomon\nrefers to it when he says: \"Her guests are in the depths of hell.\"\n\nOur American communities are suffering from the gospel of Free\nLoveism, which, fifteen or twenty years ago, was preached on the\nplatform and in some of the churches of this country. I charge upon\nFree Loveism that it has blighted innumerable homes, and that it has\nsent innumerable souls to ruin. Free Loveism is bestial; it is\nworse--it is infernal! It has furnished this land with about one\nthousand divorces annually. In one county in the State of Indiana it\nfurnished eleven divorces in one day before dinner. It has roused up\nelopements, North, South, East, and West. You can hardly take up a\npaper but you read of an elopement. As far as I can understand the\ndoctrine of Free Loveism it is this: That every man ought to have\nsomebody else's wife, and every wife somebody else's husband. They do\nnot like our Christian organization of society, and I wish they would\nall elope, the wretches of one sex taking the wretches of the other,\nand start to-morrow morning for the great Sahara Desert, until the\nsimoom shall sweep seven feet of sand all over them, and not one\npassing caravan for the next five hundred years bring back one\nmiserable bone of their carcasses! Free Loveism! It is the\ndouble-distilled extract of nux vomica, ratsbane, and adder's tongue.\nNever until society goes back to the old Bible, and hears its eulogy\nof purity and its anathema of uncleanness--never until then will this\nevil be extirpated.\n\nIV. Behold also in this giant of the text and in the giant of our own\ncentury that great physical power must crumble and expire. The Samson\nof the text long ago went away. He fought the lion. He fought the\nPhilistines. He could fight anything, but death was too much for him.\nHe may have required a longer grave and a broader grave; but the tomb\nnevertheless was his terminus.\n\nIf, then, we are to be compelled to go out of this world, where are we\nto go to? This body and soul must soon part. What shall be the destiny\nof the former I know--dust to dust. But what shall be the destiny of\nthe latter? Shall it rise into the companionship of the white-robed,\nwhose sins Christ has slain? or will it go down among the unbelieving,\nwho tried to gain the world and save their souls, but were swindled\nout of both? Blessed be God, we have a Champion! He is so styled in\nthe Bible: A Champion who has conquered death and hell, and he is\nready to fight all our battles from the first to the last. \"Who is\nthis that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah, mighty to\nsave?\" If we follow in the wake of that Champion death has no power\nand the grave no victory. The worst man trusting in Him shall have his\ndying pangs alleviated and his future illumined.\n\nV. In the light of this subject I want to call your attention to a\nfact which may not have been rightly considered by five men in this\nhouse, and that is the fact that we must be brought into judgment for\nthe employment of our physical organism. Shoulder, brain, hand,\nfoot--we must answer in judgment for the use we have made of them.\nHave they been used for the elevation of society or for its\ndepression? In proportion as our arm is strong and our step elastic\nwill our account at last be intensified. Thousands of sermons are\npreached to invalids. I preach this sermon this morning to stout men\nand healthful women. We must give to God an account for the right use\nof this physical organism.\n\nThese invalids have comparatively little to account for, perhaps. They\ncould not lift twenty pounds. They could not walk half a mile without\nsitting down to rest. In the preparation of this subject I have said\nto myself, how shall I account to God in judgment for the use of a\nbody which never knew one moment of real sickness? Rising up in\njudgment, standing beside the men and women who had only little\nphysical energy, and yet consumed that energy in a conflagration of\nreligious enthusiasm, how will we feel abashed!\n\nOh, men of the strong arm and the stout heart, what use are you making\nof your physical forces? Will you be able to stand the test of that\nday when we must answer for the use of every talent, whether it were a\nphysical energy, or a mental acumen, or a spiritual power?\n\nThe day approaches, and I see one who in this world was an invalid,\nand as she stands before the throne of God to answer she says, \"I was\nsick all my days. I had but very little strength, but I did as well as\nI could in being kind to those who were more sick and more\nsuffering.\" And Christ will say, \"Well done, faithful servant.\"\n\nAnd then a little child will stand before the throne, and she will\nsay, \"On earth I had a curvature of the spine, and I was very weak,\nand I was very sick; but I used to gather flowers out of the wild-wood\nand bring them to my sick mother, and she was comforted when she saw\nthe sweet flowers out of the wild-wood. I didn't do much, but I did\nsomething.\" And Christ shall say, as He takes her up in His arm and\nkisses her, \"Well done, well done, faithful servant; enter thou into\nthe joy of thy Lord.\"\n\nWhat, then, will be said to us--we to whom the Lord gave physical\nstrength and continuous health? Hark! it thunders again. The judgment!\nthe judgment!\n\nI said to an old Scotch minister, who was one of the best friends I\never had, \"Doctor, did you ever know Robert Pollock, the Scotch poet,\nwho wrote 'The Course of Time'?\" \"Oh, yes,\" he replied, \"I knew him\nwell; I was his classmate.\" And then the doctor went on to tell me how\nthat the writing of \"The Course of Time\" exhausted the health of\nRobert Pollock, and he expired. It seems as if no man could have such\na glimpse of the day for which all other days were made as Robert\nPollock had, and long survive that glimpse. In the description of that\nday he says, among other things:\n\n    \"Begin the woe, ye woods, and tell it to the doleful winds\n    And doleful winds wail to the howling hills,\n    And howling hills mourn to the dismal vales,\n    And dismal vales sigh to the sorrowing brooks,\n    And sorrowing brooks weep to the weeping stream,\n    And weeping stream awake the groaning deep;\n    Ye heavens, great archway of the universe, put sack-cloth on;\n    And ocean, robe thyself in garb of widowhood,\n    And gather all thy waves into a groan, and utter it.\n    Long, loud, deep, piercing, dolorous, immense.\n    The occasion asks it, Nature dies, and angels come to lay\n        her in her grave.\"\n\nWhat Robert Pollock saw in poetic dream, you and I will see in\npositive reality--the judgment! the judgment!\n\n\n\n\nTHE PLEIADES AND ORION.\n\n    \"Seek Him that maketh the Seven Stars and Orion.\"--AMOS. v. 8\n\n\nA country farmer wrote this text--Amos of Tekoa. He plowed the earth\nand threshed the grain by a new threshing-machine just invented, as\nformerly the cattle trod out the grain. He gathered the fruit of the\nsycamore-tree, and scarified it with an iron comb just before it was\ngetting ripe, as it was necessary and customary in that way to take\nfrom it the bitterness. He was the son of a poor shepherd, and\nstuttered; but before the stammering rustic the Philistines, and\nSyrians, and Phoenicians, and Moabites, and Ammonites, and Edomites,\nand Israelites trembled.\n\nMoses was a law-giver, Daniel was a prince, Isaiah a courtier, and\nDavid a king; but Amos, the author of my text, was a peasant, and, as\nmight be supposed, nearly all his parallelisms are pastoral, his\nprophecy full of the odor of new-mown hay, and the rattle of locusts,\nand the rumble of carts with sheaves, and the roar of wild beasts\ndevouring the flock while the shepherd came out in their defense. He\nwatched the herds by day, and by night inhabited a booth made out of\nbushes, so that through these branches he could see the stars all\nnight long, and was more familiar with them than we who have tight\nroofs to our houses, and hardly ever see the stars except among the\ntall brick chimneys of the great towns. But at seasons of the year\nwhen the herds were in special danger, he would stay out in the open\nfield all through the darkness, his only shelter the curtain of the\nnight, heaven, with the stellar embroideries and silvered tassels of\nlunar light.\n\nWhat a life of solitude, all alone with his herds! Poor Amos! And at\ntwelve o'clock at night, hark to the wolf's bark, and the lion's roar,\nand the bear's growl, and the owl's te-whit-te-whos, and the serpent's\nhiss, as he unwittingly steps too near while moving through the\nthickets! So Amos, like other herdsmen, got the habit of studying the\nmap of the heavens, because it was so much of the time spread out\nbefore him. He noticed some stars advancing and others receding. He\nassociated their dawn and setting with certain seasons of the year. He\nhad a poetic nature, and he read night by night, and month by month,\nand year by year, the poem of the constellations, divinely rhythmic.\nBut two rosettes of stars especially attracted his attention while\nseated on the ground, or lying on his back under the open scroll of\nthe midnight heavens--the Pleiades, or Seven Stars, and Orion. The\nformer group this rustic prophet associated with the spring, as it\nrises about the first of May. The latter he associated with the\nwinter, as it comes to the meridian in January. The Pleiades, or Seven\nStars, connected with all sweetness and joy; Orion, the herald of the\ntempest. The ancients were the more apt to study the physiognomy and\njuxtaposition of the heavenly bodies, because they thought they had a\nspecial influence upon the earth; and perhaps they were right. If the\nmoon every few hours lifts and lets down the tides of the Atlantic\nOcean, and the electric storms of last year in the sun, by all\nscientific admission, affected the earth, why not the stars have\nproportionate effect?\n\nAnd there are some things which make me think that it may not have\nbeen all superstition which connected the movements and appearance of\nthe heavenly bodies with great moral events on earth. Did not a meteor\nrun on evangelistic errand on the first Christmas night, and designate\nthe rough cradle of our Lord? Did not the stars in their courses fight\nagainst Sisera? Was it merely coincidental that before the destruction\nof Jerusalem the moon was eclipsed for twelve consecutive nights? Did\nit merely happen so that a new star appeared in constellation\nCassiopeia, and then disappeared just before King Charles IX. of\nFrance, who was responsible for St. Bartholomew massacre, died? Was it\nwithout significance that in the days of the Roman Emperor Justinian\nwar and famine were preceded by the dimness of the sun, which for\nnearly a year gave no more light than the moon, although there were no\nclouds to obscure it?\n\nAstrology, after all, may have been something more than a brilliant\nheathenism. No wonder that Amos of the text, having heard these two\nanthems of the stars, put down the stout rough staff of the herdsman\nand took into his brown hand and cut and knotted fingers the pen of a\nprophet, and advised the recreant people of his time to return to God,\nsaying: \"Seek Him that maketh the Seven Stars and Orion.\" This\ncommand, which Amos gave 785 years B.C., is just as appropriate for\nus, 1885 A.D.\n\nIn the first place, Amos saw, as we must see, that the God who made\nthe Pleiades and Orion must be the God of order. It was not so much a\nstar here and a star there that impressed the inspired herdsman, but\nseven in one group, and seven in the other group. He saw that night\nafter night and season after season and decade after decade they had\nkept step of light, each one in its own place, a sisterhood never\nclashing and never contesting precedence. From the time Hesiod called\nthe Pleiades the \"seven daughters of Atlas\" and Virgil wrote in his\n\u00c6neid of \"Stormy Orion\" until now, they have observed the order\nestablished for their coming and going; order written not in\nmanuscript that may be pigeon-holed, but with the hand of the Almighty\non the dome of the sky, so that all nations may read it. Order.\nPersistent order. Sublime order. Omnipotent order.\n\nWhat a sedative to you and me, to whom communities and nations\nsometimes seem going pell-mell, and world ruled by some fiend at\nhap-hazard, and in all directions maladministration! The God who keeps\nseven worlds in right circuit for six thousand years can certainly\nkeep all the affairs of individuals and nations and continents in\nadjustment. We had not better fret much, for the peasant's argument of\nthe text was right. If God can take care of the seven worlds of the\nPleiades and the four chief worlds of Orion, He can probably take care\nof the one world we inhabit.\n\nSo I feel very much as my father felt one day when we were going to\nthe country mill to get a grist ground, and I, a boy of seven years,\nsat in the back part of the wagon, and our yoke of oxen ran away with\nus and along a labyrinthine road through the woods, so that I thought\nevery moment we would be dashed to pieces, and I made a terrible\noutcry of fright, and my father turned to me with a face perfectly\ncalm, and said: \"De Witt, what are you crying about? I guess we can\nride as fast as the oxen can run.\" And, my hearers, why should we be\naffrighted and lose our equilibrium in the swift movement of worldly\nevents, especially when we are assured that it is not a yoke of\nunbroken steers that are drawing us on, but that order and wise\ngovernment are in the yoke?\n\nIn your occupation, your mission, your sphere, do the best you can,\nand then trust to God; and if things are all mixed and disquieting,\nand your brain is hot and your heart sick, get some one to go out with\nyou into the starlight and point out to you the Pleiades, or, better\nthan that, get into some observatory, and through the telescope see\nfurther than Amos with the naked eye could--namely, two hundred stars\nin the Pleiades, and that in what is called the sword of Orion there\nis a nebula computed to be two trillion two hundred thousand billions\nof times larger than the sun. Oh, be at peace with the God who made\nall that and controls all that--the wheel of the constellations\nturning in the wheel of galaxies for thousands of years without the\nbreaking of a cog or the slipping of a band or the snap of an axle.\nFor your placidity and comfort through the Lord Jesus Christ I charge\nyou, \"Seek Him that maketh the Seven Stars and Orion.\"\n\nAgain, Amos saw, as we must see, that the God who made these two\ngroups of the text was the God of light. Amos saw that God was not\nsatisfied with making one star, or two or three stars, but He makes\nseven; and having finished that group of worlds, makes another\ngroup--group after group. To the Pleiades He adds Orion. It seems that\nGod likes light so well that He keeps making it. Only one being in the\nuniverse knows the statistics of solar, lunar, stellar, meteoric\ncreations, and that is the--Creator Himself. And they have all been\nlovingly christened, each one a name as distinct as the names of your\nchildren. \"He telleth the number of the stars; He calleth them all by\ntheir names.\" The seven Pleiades had names given to them, and they are\nAlcyone, Merope, Cel\u00e6no, Electra, Sterope, Taygete, and Maia.\n\nBut think of the billions and trillions of daughters of starry light\nthat God calls by name as they sweep by Him with beaming brow and\nlustrous robe! So fond is God of light--natural light, moral light,\nspiritual light. Again and again is light harnessed for\nsymbolization--Christ, the bright and morning star; evangelization,\nthe daybreak; the redemption of nations, Sun of Righteousness rising\nwith healing in His wings. Oh, men and women, with so many sorrows and\nsins and perplexities, if you want light of comfort, light of pardon,\nlight of goodness, in earnest, pray through Christ, \"Seek Him that\nmaketh the Seven Stars and Orion.\"\n\nAgain, Amos saw, as we must see, that the God who made these two\narchipelagoes of stars must be an unchanging God. There had been no\nchange in the stellar appearance in this herdsman's life-time, and his\nfather, a shepherd, reported to him that there had been no change in\nhis life-time. And these two clusters hang over the celestial arbor\nnow just as they were the first night that they shone on the Edenic\nbowers, the same as when the Egyptians built the Pyramids from the top\nof which to watch them, the same as when the Chaldeans calculated the\neclipses, the same as when Elihu, according to the Book of Job, went\nout to study the aurora borealis, the same under Ptolemaic system and\nCopernican system, the same from Calisthenes to Pythagoras, and from\nPythagoras to Herschel. Surely, a changeless God must have fashioned\nthe Pleiades and Orion! Oh, what an anodyne amid the ups and downs of\nlife, and the flux and reflux of the tides of prosperity, to know that\nwe have a changeless God, the same yesterday, to-day, and forever.\n\nXerxes garlanded and knighted the steersman of his boat in the\nmorning, and hanged him in the evening of the same day. Fifty thousand\npeople stood around the columns of the national capitol, shouting\nthemselves hoarse at the presidential inaugural, and in four months so\ngreat were the antipathies that a ruffian's pistol in Washington depot\nexpressed the sentiment of a great multitude. The world sits in its\nchariot and drives tandem, and the horse ahead is Huzza, and the horse\nbehind is Anathema. Lord Cobham, in King James' time, was applauded,\nand had thirty-five thousand dollars a year, but was afterward\nexecrated, and lived on scraps stolen from the royal kitchen.\nAlexander the Great after death remained unburied for thirty days,\nbecause no one would do the honor of shoveling him under. The Duke of\nWellington refused to have his iron fence mended, because it had been\nbroken by an infuriated populace in some hour of political\nexcitement, and he left it in ruins that men might learn what a fickle\nthing is human favor. \"But the mercy of the Lord is from everlasting\nto everlasting to them that fear Him, and His righteousness unto the\nchildren's children of such as keep His covenant, and to those who\nremember His commandments to do them.\" This moment \"seek Him that\nmaketh the Seven Stars and Orion.\"\n\nAgain, Amos saw, as we must see, that the God who made these two\nbeacons of the Oriental night sky must be a God of love and kindly\nwarning. The Pleiades rising in mid-sky said to all the herdsmen and\nshepherds and husbandmen: \"Come out and enjoy the mild weather, and\ncultivate your gardens and fields.\" Orion, coming in winter, warned\nthem to prepare for tempest. All navigation was regulated by these two\nconstellations. The one said to shipmaster and crew: \"Hoist sail for\nthe sea, and gather merchandise from other lands.\" But Orion was the\nstorm-signal, and said: \"Reef sail, make things snug, or put into\nharbor, for the hurricanes are getting their wings out.\" As the\nPleiades were the sweet evangels of the spring, Orion was the warning\nprophet of the winter.\n\nOh, now I get the best view of God I ever had! There are two kinds of\nsermons I never want to preach--the one that presents God so kind, so\nindulgent, so lenient, so imbecile that men may do what they will\nagainst Him, and fracture His every law, and put the cry of their\nimpertinence and rebellion under His throne, and while they are\nspitting in His face and stabbing at His heart, He takes them up in\nHis arms and kisses their infuriated brow and cheek, saying, \"Of such\nis the kingdom of heaven.\" The other kind of sermon I never want to\npreach is the one that represents God as all fire and torture and\nthundercloud, and with red-hot pitch-fork tossing the human race into\nparoxysms of infinite agony. The sermon that I am now preaching\nbelieves in a God of loving, kindly warning, the God of spring and\nwinter, the God of the Pleiades and Orion.\n\nYou must remember that the winter is just as important as the spring.\nLet one winter pass without frost to kill vegetation and ice to bind\nthe rivers and snow to enrich our fields, and then you will have to\nenlarge your hospitals and your cemeteries. \"A green Christmas makes a\nfat grave-yard,\" was the old proverb. Storms to purify the air.\nThermometer at ten degrees above zero to tone up the system. December\nand January just as important as May and June. I tell you we need the\nstorms of life as much as we do the sunshine. There are more men\nruined by prosperity than by adversity. If we had our own way in life,\nbefore this we would have been impersonations of selfishness and\nworldliness and disgusting sin, and puffed up until we would have been\nlike Julius C\u00e6sar, who was made by sycophants to believe that he was\ndivine, and the freckles on his face were as the stars of the\nfirmament.\n\nOne of the swiftest transatlantic voyages made last summer by the\n\"Etruria\" was because she had a stormy wind abaft, chasing her from\nNew York to Liverpool. But to those going in the opposite direction\nthe storm was a buffeting and a hinderance. It is a bad thing to have\na storm ahead, pushing us back; but if we be God's children and\naiming toward heaven, the storms of life will only chase us the sooner\ninto the harbor. I am so glad to believe that the monsoons, and\ntyphoons, and mistrals, and siroccos of the land and sea are not\nunchained maniacs let loose upon the earth, but are under divine\nsupervision! I am so glad that the God of the Seven Stars is also the\nGod of Orion! It was out of Dante's suffering came the sublime \"Divina\nCommedia,\" and out of John Milton's blindness came \"Paradise Lost,\"\nand out of miserable infidel attack came the \"Bridgewater Treatise\" in\nfavor of Christianity, and out of David's exile came the songs of\nconsolation, and out of the sufferings of Christ came the possibility\nof the world's redemption, and out of your bereavement, your\npersecution, your poverties, your misfortunes, may yet come an eternal\nheaven.\n\nOh, what a mercy it is that in the text and all up and down the Bible\nGod induces us to look out toward other worlds! Bible astronomy in\nGenesis, in Joshua, in Job, in the Psalms, in the prophets, major and\nminor, in St. John's Apocalypse, practically saying, \"Worlds! worlds!\nworlds! Get ready for them!\" We have a nice little world here that we\nstick to, as though losing that we lose all. We are afraid of falling\noff this little raft of a world. We are afraid that some meteoric\niconoclast will some night smash it, and we want everything to revolve\naround it, and are disappointed when we find that it revolves around\nthe sun instead of the sun revolving around it. What a fuss we make\nabout this little bit of a world, its existence only a short time\nbetween two spasms, the paroxysm by which it was hurled from chaos\ninto order, and the paroxysm of its demolition.\n\nAnd I am glad that so many texts call us to look off to other worlds,\nmany of them larger and grander and more resplendent. \"Look there,\"\nsays Job, \"at Mazaroth and Arcturus and his sons!\" \"Look there,\" says\nSt. John, \"at the moon under Christ's feet!\" \"Look there,\" says\nJoshua, \"at the sun standing still above Gibeon!\" \"Look there,\" says\nMoses, \"at the sparkling firmament!\" \"Look there,\" says Amos, the\nherdsman, \"at the Seven Stars and Orion!\" Don't let us be so sad about\nthose who shove off from this world under Christly pilotage. Don't let\nus be so agitated about our own going off this little barge or sloop\nor canal-boat of a world to get on some \"Great Eastern\" of the\nheavens. Don't let us persist in wanting to stay in this barn, this\nshed, this outhouse of a world, when all the King's palaces already\noccupied by many of our best friends are swinging wide open their\ngates to let us in.\n\nWhen I read, \"In my Father's house are many mansions,\" I do not know\nbut that each world is a room, and as many rooms as there are worlds,\nstellar stairs, stellar galleries, stellar hallways, stellar windows,\nstellar domes. How our departed friends must pity us shut up in these\ncramped apartments, tired if we walk fifteen miles, when they some\nmorning, by one stroke of wing, can make circuit of the whole stellar\nsystem and be back in time for matins! Perhaps yonder twinkling\nconstellation is the residence of the martyrs; that group of twelve\nluminaries is the celestial home of the Apostles. Perhaps that steep\nof light is the dwelling-place of angels cherubic, seraphic,\narchangelic. A mansion with as many rooms as worlds, and all their\nwindows illuminated for festivity.\n\nOh, how this widens and lifts and stimulates our expectation! How\nlittle it makes the present, and how stupendous it makes the future!\nHow it consoles us about our pious dead, that instead of being boxed\nup and under the ground have the range of as many rooms as there are\nworlds, and welcome everywhere, for it is the Father's house, in which\nthere are many mansions! Oh, Lord God of the Seven Stars and Orion,\nhow can I endure the transport, the ecstasy, of such a vision! I must\nobey my text and seek Him. I will seek Him. I seek Him now, for I call\nto mind that it is not the material universe that is most valuable,\nbut the spiritual, and that each of us has a soul worth more than all\nthe worlds which the inspired herdsman saw from his booth on the hills\nof Tekoa.\n\nI had studied it before, but the Cathedral of Cologne, Germany, never\nimpressed me as it did this summer. It is admittedly the grandest\nGothic structure in the world, its foundation laid in 1248, only two\nor three years ago completed. More than six hundred years in building.\nAll Europe taxed for its construction. Its chapel of the Magi with\nprecious stones enough to purchase a kingdom. Its chapel of St. Agnes\nwith masterpieces of painting. Its spire springing five hundred and\neleven feet into the heavens. Its stained glass the chorus of all rich\ncolors. Statues encircling the pillars and encircling all. Statues\nabove statues, until sculpture can do no more, but faints and falls\nback against carved stalls and down on pavements over which the kings\nand queens of the earth have walked to confession. Nave and aisles and\ntransept and portals combining the splendors of sunrise. Interlaced,\ninterfoliated, intercolumned grandeur. As I stood outside, looking at\nthe double range of flying buttresses and the forest of pinnacles,\nhigher and higher and higher, until I almost reeled from dizziness, I\nexclaimed; \"Great doxology in stone! Frozen prayer of many nations!\"\n\nBut while standing there I saw a poor man enter and put down his pack\nand kneel beside his burden on the hard floor of that cathedral. And\ntears of deep emotion came into my eyes, as I said to myself: \"There\nis a soul worth more than all the material surroundings. That man will\nlive after the last pinnacle has fallen, and not one stone of all that\ncathedral glory shall remain uncrumbled. He is now a Lazarus in rags\nand poverty and weariness, but immortal, and a son of the Lord God\nAlmighty; and the prayer he now offers, though amid many\nsuperstitions, I believe God will hear; and among the Apostles whose\nsculptured forms stand in the surrounding niches he will at last be\nlifted, and into the presence of that Christ whose sufferings are\nrepresented by the crucifix before which he bows; and be raised in due\ntime out of all his poverties into the glorious home built for him and\nbuilt for us by 'Him who maketh the Seven Stars and Orion.'\"\n\n\n\n\nTHE QUEEN'S VISIT.\n\n    \"Behold, the half was not told me.\"--I KINGS x: 7.\n\n\nSolomon had resolved that Jerusalem should be the center of all\nsacred, regal, and commercial magnificence. He set himself to work,\nand monopolized the surrounding desert as a highway for his caravans.\nHe built the city of Palmyra around one of the principal wells of the\nEast, so that all the long trains of merchandise from the East were\nobliged to stop there, pay toll, and leave part of their wealth in the\nhands of Solomon's merchants. He manned the fortress Thapsacus at the\nchief ford of the Euphrates, and put under guard everything that\npassed there. The three great products of Palestine--wine pressed from\nthe richest clusters and celebrated all the world over; oil which in\nthat hot country is the entire substitute for butter and lard, and was\npressed from the olive branches until every tree in the country became\nan oil well; and honey which was the entire substitute for\nsugar--these three great products of the country Solomon exported, and\nreceived in return fruits and precious woods and the animals of every\nclime.\n\nHe went down to Ezion-geber and ordered a fleet of ships to be\nconstructed, oversaw the workmen, and watched the launching of the\nflotilla which was to go out on more than a year's voyage, to bring\nhome the wealth of the then known world. He heard that the Egyptian\nhorses were large and swift, and long-maned and round-limbed, and he\nresolved to purchase them, giving eighty-five dollars apiece for them,\nputting the best of these horses in his own stall, and selling the\nsurplus to foreign potentates at great profit.\n\nHe heard that there was the best of timber on Mount Lebanon, and he\nsent out one hundred and eighty thousand men to hew down the forest\nand drag the timber through the mountain gorges, to construct it into\nrafts to be floated to Joppa, and from thence to be drawn by ox-teams\ntwenty-five miles across the land to Jerusalem. He heard that there\nwere beautiful flowers in other lands. He sent for them, planted them\nin his own gardens, and to this very day there are flowers found in\nthe ruins of that city such as are to be found in no other part of\nPalestine, the lineal descendants of the very flowers that Solomon\nplanted. He heard that in foreign groves there were birds of richest\nvoice and most luxuriant wing. He sent out people to catch them and\nbring them there, and he put them into his cages.\n\nStand back now and see this long train of camels coming up to the\nking's gate, and the ox-trains from Egypt, gold and silver and\nprecious stones, and beasts of every hoof, and birds of every wing,\nand fish of every scale! See the peacocks strut under the cedars, and\nthe horsemen run, and the chariots wheel! Hark to the orchestra! Gaze\nupon the dance! Not stopping to look into the wonders of the temple,\nstep right on to the causeway, and pass up to Solomon's palace!\n\nHere we find ourselves amid a collection of buildings on which the\nking had lavished the wealth of many empires. The genius of Hiram, the\narchitect, and of the other artists is here seen in the long line of\ncorridors and the suspended gallery and the approach to the throne.\nTraceried window opposite traceried window. Bronzed ornaments bursting\ninto lotus and lily and pomegranate. Chapiters surrounded by network\nof leaves in which imitation fruit seemed suspended as in hanging\nbaskets. Three branches--so Josephus tells us--three branches\nsculptured on the marble, so thin and subtle that even the leaves\nseemed to quiver. A laver capable of holding five hundred barrels of\nwater on six hundred brazen ox-heads, which gushed with water and\nfilled the whole place with coolness and crystalline brightness and\nmusical plash. Ten tables chased with chariot wheel and lion and\ncherubim. Solomon sat on a throne of ivory. At the seating place of\nthe throne, on each end of the steps, a brazen lion. Why, my friends,\nin that place they trimmed their candles with snuffers of gold, and\nthey cut their fruits with knives of gold, and they washed their faces\nin basins of gold, and they scooped out the ashes with shovels of\ngold, and they stirred the altar fires with tongs of gold. Gold\nreflected in the water! Gold flashing from the apparel! Gold blazing\nin the crown! Gold, gold, gold!\n\nOf course the news of the affluence of that place went out everywhere\nby every caravan and by wing of every ship, until soon the streets of\nJerusalem are crowded with curiosity seekers. What is that long\nprocession approaching Jerusalem? I think from the pomp of it there\nmust be royalty in the train. I smell the breath of the spices which\nare brought as presents, and I hear the shout of the drivers, and I\nsee the dust-covered caravan showing that they come from far away. Cry\nthe news up to the palace. The Queen of Sheba advances. Let all the\npeople come out to see. Let the mighty men of the land come out on the\npalace corridors. Let Solomon come down the stairs of the palace\nbefore the queen has alighted. Shake out the cinnamon, and the\nsaffron, and the calamus, and the frankincense, and pass it into the\ntreasure house. Take up the diamonds until they glitter in the sun.\n\nThe Queen of Sheba alights. She enters the palace. She washes at the\nbath. She sits down at the banquet. The cup-bearers bow. The meat\nsmokes. The music trembles in the dash of the waters from the molten\nsea. Then she rises from the banquet, and walks through the\nconservatories, and gazes on the architecture, and she asks Solomon\nmany strange questions, and she learns about the religion of the\nHebrews, and she then and there becomes a servant of the Lord God.\n\nShe is overwhelmed. She begins to think that all the spices she\nbrought, and all the precious woods which are intended to be turned\ninto harps and psalteries and into railings for the causeway between\nthe temple and the palace, and the one hundred and eighty thousand\ndollars in money--she begins to think that all these presents amount\nto nothing in such a place, and she is almost ashamed that she has\nbrought them, and she says within herself: \"I heard a great deal\nabout this place, and about this wonderful religion of the Hebrews,\nbut I find it far beyond my highest anticipations. I must add more\nthan fifty per cent. to what has been related. It exceeds everything\nthat I could have expected. The half--the half was not told me.\"\n\nLearn from this subject what a beautiful thing it is when social\nposition and wealth surrender themselves to God. When religion comes\nto a neighborhood, the first to receive it are the women. Some men say\nit is because they are weak-minded. I say it is because they have\nquicker perception of what is right, more ardent affection and\ncapacity for sublimer emotion. After the women have received the\nGospel then all the distressed and the poor of both sexes, those who\nhave no friends, accept Jesus. Last of all come the people of\naffluence and high social position. Alas, that it is so!\n\nIf there are those here to-day who have been favored of fortune, or,\nas I might better put it, favored of God, surrender all you have and\nall you expect to be to the Lord who blessed this Queen of Sheba.\nCertainly you are not ashamed to be found in this queen's company. I\nam glad that Christ has had His imperial friends in all\nages--Elizabeth Christina, Queen of Prussia; Maria Feodorovna, Queen\nof Russia; Marie, Empress of France; Helena, the imperial mother of\nConstantine; Arcadia, from her great fortunes building public baths in\nConstantinople and toiling for the alleviation of the masses; Queen\nClotilda, leading her husband and three thousand of his armed warriors\nto Christian baptism; Elizabeth of Burgundy, giving her jeweled glove\nto a beggar, and scattering great fortunes among the distressed;\nPrince Albert, singing \"Rock of Ages\" in Windsor Castle, and Queen\nVictoria, incognita, reading the Scriptures to a dying pauper.\n\nI bless God that the day is coming when royalty will bring all its\nthrones, and music all its harmonies, and painting all its pictures,\nand sculpture all its statuary, and architecture all its pillars, and\nconquest all its scepters; and the queens of the earth, in long line\nof advance, frankincense filling the air and the camels laden with\ngold, shall approach Jerusalem, and the gates shall be hoisted, and\nthe great burden of splendor shall be lifted into the palace of this\ngreater than Solomon.\n\nAgain, my subject teaches me what is earnestness in the search of\ntruth. Do you know where Sheba was? It was in Abyssinia, or some say\nin the southern part of Arabia Felix. In either case it was a great\nway off from Jerusalem. To get from there to Jerusalem she had to\ncross a country infested with bandits, and go across blistering\ndeserts. Why did not the Queen of Sheba stay at home and send a\ncommittee to inquire about this new religion, and have the delegates\nreport in regard to that religion and wealth of King Solomon? She\nwanted to see for herself, and hear for herself. She could not do this\nby work of committee. She felt she had a soul worth ten thousand\nkingdoms like Sheba, and she wanted a robe richer than any woven by\nOriental shuttles, and she wanted a crown set with the jewels of\neternity. Bring out the camels. Put on the spices. Gather up the\njewels of the throne and put them on the caravan. Start now; no time\nto be lost. Goad on the camels. When I see that caravan,\ndust-covered, weary, and exhausted, trudging on across the desert and\namong the bandits until it reaches Jerusalem, I say: \"There is an\nearnest seeker after the truth.\"\n\nBut there are a great many of you, my friends, who do not act in that\nway. You all want to get the truth, but you want the truth to come\nto-you; you do not want to go to it. There are people who fold their\narms and say: \"I am ready to become a Christian at any time; if I am\nto be saved I shall be saved, and if I am to be lost I shall be lost.\"\nA man who says that and keeps on saying it, will be lost. Jerusalem\nwill never come to you; you must go to Jerusalem. The religion of the\nLord Jesus Christ will not come to you; you must go and get religion.\nBring out the camels; put on all the sweet spices, all the treasures\nof the heart's affection. Start for the throne. Go in and hear the\nwaters of salvation dashing in fountains all around about the throne.\nSit down at the banquet--the wine pressed from the grapes of the\nheavenly Eschol, the angels of God the cup-bearers. Goad on the\ncamels; Jerusalem will never come to you; you must go to Jerusalem.\nThe Bible declares it: \"The Queen of the South\"--that is, this very\nwoman I am speaking of--\"the Queen of the South shall rise up in\njudgment against this generation and condemn it; for she came from the\nuttermost parts of the earth to hear the wisdom of Solomon: and,\nbehold! a greater than Solomon is here.\" God help me to break up the\ninfatuation of those people who are sitting down in idleness expecting\nto be saved. \"Strive to enter in at the strait gate. Ask, and it\nshall be given you; seek, and ye shall find; knock, and it shall be\nopened to you.\" Take the Kingdom of Heaven by violence. Urge on the\ncamels!\n\nAgain, my subject impresses me with the fact that religion is a\nsurprise to any one that gets it. This story of the new religion in\nJerusalem, and of the glory of King Solomon, who was a type of\nChrist--that story rolls on and on, and is told by every traveler\ncoming back from Jerusalem. The news goes on the wing of every ship\nand with every caravan, and you know a story enlarges as it is retold,\nand by the time that story gets down into the southern part of Arabia\nFelix, and the Queen of Sheba hears it, it must be a tremendous story.\nAnd yet this queen declares in regard to it, although she had heard so\nmuch and had her anticipations raised so high, the half--the half was\nnot told her.\n\nSo religion is always a surprise to any one that gets it. The story of\ngrace--an old story. Apostles preached it with rattle of chain;\nmartyrs declared it with arm of fire; death-beds have affirmed it with\nvisions of glory, and ministers of religion have sounded it through\nthe lanes, and the highways, and the chapels, and the cathedrals. It\nhas been cut into stone with chisel, and spread on the canvas with\npencil; and it has been recited in the doxology of great\ncongregations. And yet when a man first comes to look on the palace of\nGod's mercy, and to see the royalty of Christ, and the wealth of this\nbanquet, and the luxuriance of His attendants, and the loveliness of\nHis face, and the joy of His service, he exclaims with prayers, with\ntears, with sighs, with triumphs: \"The half--the half was not told\nme!\"\n\nI appeal to those in this house who are Christians. Compare the idea\nyou had of the joy of the Christian life before you became a Christian\nwith the appreciation of that joy you have now since you have become a\nChristian, and you are willing to attest before angels and men that\nyou never in the days of your spiritual bondage had any appreciation\nof what was to come. You are ready to-day to answer, and if I gave you\nan opportunity in the midst of this assemblage, you would speak out\nand say in regard to the discoveries you have made of the mercy and\nthe grace and the goodness of God: \"The half--the half was not told\nme!\"\n\nWell, we hear a great deal about the good time that is coming to this\nworld, when it is to be girded with salvation. Holiness on the bells\nof the horses. The lion's mane patted by the hand of a babe. Ships of\nTarshish bringing cargoes for Jesus, and the hard, dry, barren,\nwinter-bleached, storm-scarred, thunder-split rock breaking into\nfloods of bright water. Deserts into which dromedaries thrust their\nnostrils, because they were afraid of the simoom--deserts blooming\ninto carnation roses and silver-tipped lilies.\n\nIt is the old story. Everybody tells it. Isaiah told it, John told it,\nPaul told it, Ezekiel told it, Luther told it, Calvin told it, John\nMilton told it--everybody tells it; and yet--and yet when the midnight\nshall fly the hills, and Christ shall marshal His great army, and\nChina, dashing her idols into the dust, shall hear the voice of God\nand wheel into line; and India, destroying her Juggernaut and\nsnatching up her little children from the Ganges, shall hear the\nvoice of God and wheel into line; and vine-covered Italy, and\nwheat-crowned Russia, and all the nations of the earth shall hear the\nvoice of God and fall into line; then the Church, which has been\ntoiling and struggling through the centuries, robed and garlanded like\na bride adorned for her husband, shall put aside her veil and look up\ninto the face of her Lord the King, and say: \"The half--the half was\nnot told me.\"\n\nWell, there is coming a greater surprise to every Christian--a greater\nsurprise than anything I have depicted. Heaven is an old story.\nEverybody talks about it. There is hardly a hymn in the hymn-book that\ndoes not refer to it. Children read about it in their Sabbath-school\nbook. Aged men put on their spectacles to study it. We say it is a\nharbor from the storm. We call it our home. We say it is the house of\nmany mansions. We weave together all sweet, beautiful, delicate,\nexhilarant words; we weave them into letters, and then we spell it out\nin rose and lily and amaranth. And yet that place is going to be a\nsurprise to the most intelligent Christian. Like the Queen of Sheba,\nthe report has come to us from the far country, and many of us have\nstarted. It is a desert march, but we urge on the camels. What though\nour feet be blistered with the way? We are hastening to the palace. We\ntake all our loves and hopes and Christian ambitions, as frankincense\nand myrrh and cassia, to the great King. We must not rest. We must not\nhalt. The night is coming on, and it is not safe out here in the\ndesert. Urge on the camels. I see the domes against the sky, and the\nhouses of Lebanon, and the temples and the gardens. See the fountains\ndance in the sun, and the gates flash as they open to let in the poor\npilgrims.\n\nSend the word up to the palace that we are coming, and that we are\nweary of the march of the desert. The King will come out and say:\n\"Welcome to the palace; bathe in these waters, recline on these banks.\nTake this cinnamon and frankincense and myrrh and put it upon a censer\nand swing it before the altar.\" And yet, my friends, when heaven\nbursts upon us it will be a greater surprise than that--Jesus on the\nthrone, and we made like Him! All our Christian friends surrounding us\nin glory! All our sorrows and tears and sins gone by forever! The\nthousands of thousands, the one hundred and forty-and-four thousand,\nthe great multitudes that no man can number, will cry, world without\nend: \"The half--the half was not told us!\"\n\n\n\n\nVICARIOUS SUFFERING.\n\n    \"Without shedding of blood is no remission.\"--HEB. ix: 22.\n\n\nJohn G. Whittier, the last of the great school of American poets that\nmade the last quarter of a century brilliant, asked me in the White\nMountains, one morning after prayers, in which I had given out\nCowper's famous hymn about \"The Fountain Filled with Blood,\" \"Do you\nreally believe there is a literal application of the blood of Christ\nto the soul?\" My negative reply then is my negative reply now. The\nBible statement agrees with all physicians, and all physiologists, and\nall scientists, in saying that the blood is the life, and in the\nChristian religion it means simply that Christ's life was given for\nour life. Hence all this talk of men who say the Bible story of blood\nis disgusting, and that they don't want what they call a\n\"slaughter-house religion,\" only shows their incapacity or\nunwillingness to look through the figure of speech toward the thing\nsignified. The blood that, on the darkest Friday the world ever saw,\noozed, or trickled, or poured from the brow, and the side, and the\nhands, and the feet of the illustrious sufferer, back of Jerusalem, in\na few hours coagulated and dried up, and forever disappeared; and if\nman had depended on the application of the literal blood of Christ,\nthere would not have been a soul saved for the last eighteen\ncenturies.\n\nIn order to understand this red word of my text, we only have to\nexercise as much common sense in religion as we do in everything else.\nPang for pang, hunger for hunger, fatigue for fatigue, tear for tear,\nblood for blood, life for life, we see every day illustrated. The act\nof substitution is no novelty, although I hear men talk as though the\nidea of Christ's suffering substituted for our suffering were\nsomething abnormal, something distressingly odd, something wildly\neccentric, a solitary episode in the world's history; when I could\ntake you out into this city, and before sundown point you to five\nhundred cases of substitution and voluntary suffering of one in behalf\nof another.\n\nAt two o'clock to-morrow afternoon go among the places of business or\ntoil. It will be no difficult thing for you to find men who, by their\nlooks, show you that they are overworked. They are prematurely old.\nThey are hastening rapidly toward their decease. They have gone\nthrough crises in business that shattered their nervous system, and\npulled on the brain. They have a shortness of breath, and a pain in\nthe back of the head, and at night an insomnia that alarms them. Why\nare they drudging at business early and late? For fun? No; it would be\ndifficult to extract any amusement out of that exhaustion. Because\nthey are avaricious? In many cases no. Because their own personal\nexpenses are lavish? No; a few hundred dollars would meet all their\nwants. The simple fact is, the man is enduring all that fatigue and\nexasperation, and wear and tear, to keep his home prosperous. There\nis an invisible line reaching from that store, from that bank, from\nthat shop, from that scaffolding, to a quiet scene a few blocks, a few\nmiles away, and there is the secret of that business endurance. He is\nsimply the champion of a homestead, for which he wins bread, and\nwardrobe, and education, and prosperity, and in such battle ten\nthousand men fall. Of ten business men whom I bury, nine die of\noverwork for others. Some sudden disease finds them with no power of\nresistance, and they are gone. Life for life. Blood for blood.\nSubstitution!\n\nAt one o'clock to-morrow morning, the hour when slumber is most\nuninterrupted and most profound, walk amid the dwelling-houses of the\ncity. Here and there you will find a dim light, because it is the\nhousehold custom to keep a subdued light burning: but most of the\nhouses from base to top are as dark as though uninhabited. A merciful\nGod has sent forth the archangel of sleep, and he puts his wings over\nthe city. But yonder is a clear light burning, and outside on the\nwindow casement a glass or pitcher containing food for a sick child;\nthe food is set in the fresh air. This is the sixth night that mother\nhas sat up with that sufferer. She has to the last point obeyed the\nphysician's prescription, not giving a drop too much or too little, or\na moment too soon or too late. She is very anxious, for she has buried\nthree children with the same disease, and she prays and weeps, each\nprayer and sob ending with a kiss of the pale cheek. By dint of\nkindness she gets the little one through the ordeal. After it is all\nover, the mother is taken down. Brain or nervous fever sets in, and\none day she leaves the convalescent child with a mother's blessing,\nand goes up to join the three in the kingdom of heaven. Life for life.\nSubstitution! The fact is that there are an uncounted number of\nmothers who, after they have navigated a large family of children\nthrough all the diseases of infancy, and got them fairly started up\nthe flowering slope of boyhood and girlhood, have only strength enough\nleft to die. They fade away. Some call it consumption; some call it\nnervous prostration; some call it intermittent or malarial\ndisposition; but I call it martyrdom of the domestic circle. Life for\nlife. Blood for blood. Substitution!\n\nOr perhaps the mother lingers long enough to see a son get on the\nwrong road, and his former kindness becomes rough reply when she\nexpresses anxiety about him. But she goes right on, looking carefully\nafter his apparel, remembering his every birthday with some memento,\nand when he is brought home worn out with dissipation, nurses him till\nhe gets well and starts him again, and hopes, and expects, and prays,\nand counsels, and suffers, until her strength gives out and she fails.\nShe is going, and attendants, bending over her pillow, ask her if she\nhas any message to leave, and she makes great effort to say something,\nbut out of three or four minutes of indistinct utterance they can\ncatch but three words: \"My poor boy!\" The simple fact is she died for\nhim. Life for life. Substitution!\n\nAbout twenty-four years ago there went forth from our homes hundreds\nof thousands of men to do battle for their country. All the poetry of\nwar soon vanished, and left them nothing but the terrible prose. They\nwaded knee-deep in mud. They slept in snow-banks. They marched till\ntheir cut feet tracked the earth. They were swindled out of their\nhonest rations, and lived on meat not fit for a dog. They had jaws all\nfractured, and eyes extinguished, and limbs shot away. Thousands of\nthem cried for water as they lay dying on the field the night after\nthe battle, and got it not. They were homesick, and received no\nmessage from their loved ones. They died in barns, in bushes, in\nditches, the buzzards of the summer heat the only attendants on their\nobsequies. No one but the infinite God who knows everything, knows the\nten thousandth part of the length, and breadth, and depth, and height\nof anguish of the Northern and Southern battlefields. Why did these\nfathers leave their children and go to the front, and why did these\nyoung men, postponing the marriage-day, start out into the\nprobabilities of never coming back? For the country they died. Life\nfor life. Blood for blood. Substitution!\n\nBut we need not go so far. What is that monument in Greenwood? It is\nto the doctors who fell in the Southern epidemics. Why go? Were there\nnot enough sick to be attended in these Northern latitudes? Oh, yes;\nbut the doctor puts a few medical books in his valise, and some vials\nof medicine, and leaves his patients here in the hands of other\nphysicians, and takes the rail-train. Before he gets to the infected\nregions he passes crowded rail-trains, regular and extra, taking the\nflying and affrighted populations. He arrives in a city over which a\ngreat horror is brooding. He goes from couch to couch, feeling of\npulse and studying symptoms, and prescribing day after day, night\nafter night, until a fellow-physician says: \"Doctor, you had better go\nhome and rest; you look miserable.\" But he can not rest while so many\nare suffering. On and on, until some morning finds him in a delirium,\nin which he talks of home, and then rises and says he must go and look\nafter those patients. He is told to lie down; but he fights his\nattendants until he falls back, and is weaker and weaker, and dies for\npeople with whom he had no kinship, and far away from his own family,\nand is hastily put away in a stranger's tomb, and only the fifth part\nof a newspaper line tells us of his sacrifice--his name just mentioned\namong five. Yet he has touched the furthest height of sublimity in\nthat three weeks of humanitarian service. He goes straight as an arrow\nto the bosom of Him who said: \"I was sick and ye visited Me.\" Life for\nlife. Blood for blood. Substitution!\n\nIn the legal profession I see the same principle of self-sacrifice. In\n1846, William Freeman, a pauperized and idiotic negro, was at Auburn,\nN.Y., on trial for murder. He had slain the entire Van Nest family.\nThe foaming wrath of the community could be kept off him only by armed\nconstables. Who would volunteer to be his counsel? No attorney wanted\nto sacrifice his popularity by such an ungrateful task. All were\nsilent save one, a young lawyer with feeble voice, that could hardly\nbe heard outside the bar, pale and thin and awkward. It was William H.\nSeward, who saw that the prisoner was idiotic and irresponsible, and\nought to be put in an asylum rather than put to death, the heroic\ncounsel uttering these beautiful words:\n\n\"I speak now in the hearing of a people who have prejudged prisoner\nand condemned me for pleading in his behalf. He is a convict, a\npauper, a negro, without intellect, sense, or emotion. My child with\nan affectionate smile disarms my care-worn face of its frown whenever\nI cross my threshold. The beggar in the street obliges me to give\nbecause he says, 'God bless you!' as I pass. My dog caresses me with\nfondness if I will but smile on him. My horse recognizes me when I\nfill his manger. What reward, what gratitude, what sympathy and\naffection can I expect here? There the prisoner sits. Look at him.\nLook at the assemblage around you. Listen to their ill-suppressed\ncensures and their excited fears, and tell me where among my neighbors\nor my fellow-men, where, even in his heart, I can expect to find a\nsentiment, a thought, not to say of reward or of acknowledgment, or\neven of recognition? Gentlemen, you may think of this evidence what\nyou please, bring in what verdict you can, but I asseverate before\nHeaven and you, that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, the\nprisoner at the bar does not at this moment know why it is that my\nshadow falls on you instead of his own.\"\n\nThe gallows got its victim, but the post-mortem examination of the\npoor creature showed to all the surgeons and to all the world that the\npublic were wrong, and William H. Seward was right, and that hard,\nstony step of obloquy in the Auburn court-room was the first step of\nthe stairs of fame up which he went to the top, or to within one step\nof the top, that last denied him through the treachery of American\npolitics. Nothing sublimer was ever seen in an American court-room\nthan William H. Seward, without reward, standing between the fury of\nthe populace and the loathsome imbecile. Substitution!\n\nIn the realm of the fine arts there was as remarkable an instance. A\nbrilliant but hypercriticised painter, Joseph William Turner, was met\nby a volley of abuse from all the art galleries of Europe. His\npaintings, which have since won the applause of all civilized nations,\n\"The Fifth Plague of Egypt,\" \"Fishermen on a Lee Shore in Squally\nWeather,\" \"Calais Pier,\" \"The Sun Rising Through Mist,\" and \"Dido\nBuilding Carthage,\" were then targets for critics to shoot at. In\ndefense of this outrageously abused man, a young author of twenty-four\nyears, just one year out of college, came forth with his pen, and\nwrote the ablest and most famous essays on art that the world ever\nsaw, or ever will see--John Ruskin's \"Modern Painters.\" For seventeen\nyears this author fought the battles of the maltreated artist, and\nafter, in poverty and broken-heartedness, the painter had died, and\nthe public tried to undo their cruelties toward him by giving him a\nbig funeral and burial at St. Paul's Cathedral, his old-time friend\ntook out of a tin box nineteen thousand pieces of paper containing\ndrawings by the old painter, and through many weary and uncompensated\nmonths assorted and arranged them for public observation. People say\nJohn Ruskin in his old days is cross, misanthropic, and morbid.\nWhatever he may do that he ought not to do, and whatever he may say\nthat he ought not to say between now and his death, he will leave this\nworld insolvent as far as it has any capacity to pay this author's pen\nfor its chivalric and Christian defense of a poor painter's pencil.\nJohn Ruskin for William Turner. Blood for blood. Substitution!\n\nWhat an exalting principle this which leads one to suffer for another!\nNothing so kindles enthusiasm or awakens eloquence, or chimes poetic\ncanto, or moves nations. The principle is the dominant one in our\nreligion--Christ the Martyr, Christ the celestial Hero, Christ the\nDefender, Christ the Substitute. No new principle, for it was as old\nas human nature; but now on a grander, wider, higher, deeper, and more\nworld-resounding scale! The shepherd boy as a champion for Israel with\na sling toppled the giant of Philistine braggadocio in the dust; but\nhere is another David who, for all the armies of churches militant and\ntriumphant, hurls the Goliath of perdition into defeat, the crash of\nhis brazen armor like an explosion at Hell Gate. Abraham had at God's\ncommand agreed to sacrifice his son Isaac, and the same God just in\ntime had provided a ram of the thicket as a substitute; but here is\nanother Isaac bound to the altar, and no hand arrests the sharp edges\nof laceration and death, and the universe shivers and quakes and\nrecoils and groans at the horror.\n\nAll good men have for centuries been trying to tell whom this\nSubstitute was like, and every comparison, inspired and uninspired,\nevangelistic, prophetic, apostolic, and human, falls short, for Christ\nwas the Great Unlike. Adam a type of Christ, because he came directly\nfrom God; Noah a type of Christ, because he delivered his own family\nfrom deluge; Melchisedec a type of Christ, because he had no\npredecessor or successor; Joseph a type of Christ, because he was cast\nout by his brethren; Moses a type of Christ, because he was a\ndeliverer from bondage; Joshua a type of Christ, because he was a\nconqueror; Samson a type of Christ, because of his strength to slay\nthe lions and carry off the iron gates of impossibility; Solomon a\ntype of Christ, in the affluence of his dominion; Jonah a type of\nChrist, because of the stormy sea in which he threw himself for the\nrescue of others; but put together Adam and Noah and Melchisedec and\nJoseph and Moses and Joshua and Samson and Solomon and Jonah, and they\nwould not make a fragment of a Christ, a quarter of a Christ, the half\nof a Christ, or the millionth part of a Christ.\n\nHe forsook a throne and sat down on His own footstool. He came from\nthe top of glory to the bottom of humiliation, and changed a\ncircumference seraphic for a circumference diabolic. Once waited on by\nangels, now hissed at by brigands. From afar and high up He came down;\npast meteors swifter than they; by starry thrones, Himself more\nlustrous; past larger worlds to smaller worlds; down stairs of\nfirmaments, and from cloud to cloud, and through tree-tops and into\nthe earners stall, to thrust His shoulder under our burdens and take\nthe lances of pain through His vitals, and wrapped himself in all the\nagonies which we deserve for our misdoings, and stood on the splitting\ndecks of a foundering vessel, amid the drenching surf of the sea, and\npassed midnights on the mountains amid wild beasts of prey, and stood\nat the point where all earthly and infernal hostilities charged on Him\nat once with their keen sabers--our Substitute!\n\nWhen did attorney ever endure so much for a pauper client, or\nphysician for the patient in the lazaretto, or mother for the child in\nmembranous croup, as Christ for us, and Christ for you, and Christ for\nme? Shall any man or woman or child in this audience who has ever\nsuffered for another find it hard to understand this Christly\nsuffering for us? Shall those whose sympathies have been wrung in\nbehalf of the unfortunate have no appreciation of that one moment\nwhich was lifted out of all the ages of eternity as most conspicuous,\nwhen Christ gathered up all the sins of those to be redeemed under His\none arm, and all their sorrows under His other arm, and said: \"I will\natone for these under my right arm, and will heal all those under my\nleft arm. Strike me with all thy glittering shafts, O Eternal Justice!\nRoll over me with all thy surges, ye oceans of sorrow\"? And the\nthunderbolts struck Him from above, and the seas of trouble rolled up\nfrom beneath, hurricane after hurricane, and cyclone after cyclone,\nand then and there in presence of heaven and earth and hell, yea, all\nworlds witnessing, the price, the bitter price, the transcendent\nprice, the awful price, the glorious price, the infinite price, the\neternal price, was paid that sets us free.\n\nThat is what Paul means, that is what I mean, that is what all those\nwho have ever had their heart changed mean by \"blood.\" I glory in this\nreligion of blood! I am thrilled as I see the suggestive color in\nsacramental cup, whether it be of burnished silver set on cloth\nimmaculately white, or rough-hewn from wood set on table in log-hut\nmeeting-house of the wilderness. Now I am thrilled as I see the altars\nof ancient sacrifice crimson with the blood of the slain lamb, and\nLeviticus is to me not so much the Old Testament as the New. Now I see\nwhy the destroying angel passing over Egypt in the night spared all\nthose houses that had blood sprinkled on their door-posts. Now I know\nwhat Isaiah means when he speaks of \"one in red apparel coming with\ndyed garments from Bozrah;\" and whom the Apocalypse means when it\ndescribes a heavenly chieftain whose \"vesture was dipped in blood;\"\nand what Peter, the apostle, means when he speaks of the \"precious\nblood that cleanseth from all sin;\" and what the old, worn-out,\ndecrepit missionary Paul means when, in my text, he cries, \"Without\nshedding of blood is no remission.\" By that blood you and I will be\nsaved--or never saved at all. In all the ages of the world God has not\nonce pardoned a single sin except through the Saviour's expiation, and\nHe never will. Glory be to God that the hill back of Jerusalem was the\nbattle-field on which Christ achieved our liberty!\n\nThe most exciting and overpowering day of last summer was the day I\nspent on the battle-field of Waterloo. Starting out with the morning\ntrain from Brussels, Belgium, we arrived in about an hour on that\nfamous spot. A son of one who was in the battle, and who had heard\nfrom his father a thousand times the whole scene recited, accompanied\nus over the field. There stood the old Hougomont Ch\u00e2teau, the walls\ndented, and scratched, and broken, and shattered by grape-shot and\ncannon-ball. There is the well in which three hundred dying and dead\nwere pitched. There is the chapel with the head of the infant Christ\nshot off. There are the gates at which, for many hours, English and\nFrench armies wrestled. Yonder were the one hundred and sixty guns of\nthe English, and the two hundred and fifty guns of the French. Yonder\nthe Hanoverian Hussars fled for the woods. Yonder was the ravine of\nOhain, where the French cavalry, not knowing there was a hollow in the\nground, rolled over and down, troop after troop, tumbling into one\nawful mass of suffering, hoof of kicking horses against brow and\nbreast of captains and colonels and private soldiers, the human and\nthe beastly groan kept up until, the day after, all was shoveled under\nbecause of the malodor arising in that hot month of June.\n\n\"There,\" said our guide, \"the Highland regiments lay down on their\nfaces waiting for the moment to spring upon the foe. In that orchard\ntwenty-five hundred men were cut to pieces. Here stood Wellington with\nwhite lips, and up that knoll rode Marshal Ney on his sixth horse,\nfive having been shot under him. Here the ranks of the French broke,\nand Marshal Ney, with his boot slashed of a sword, and his hat off,\nand his face covered with powder and blood, tried to rally his troops\nas he cried: 'Come and see how a marshal of French dies on the\nbattle-field.' From yonder direction Grouchy was expected for the\nFrench re-enforcement, but he came not. Around those woods Blucher was\nlooked for to re-enforce the English, and just in time he came up.\nYonder is the field where Napoleon stood, his arm through the reins of\nthe horse's bridle, dazed and insane, trying to go back.\" Scene of a\nbattle that went on from twenty-five minutes to twelve o'clock, on the\neighteenth of June, until four o'clock, when the English seemed\ndefeated, and their commander cried out; \"Boys, can you think of\ngiving way? Remember old England!\" and the tides turned, and at eight\no'clock in the evening the man of destiny, who was called by his\ntroops Old Two Hundred Thousand, turned away with broken heart, and\nthe fate of centuries was decided.\n\nNo wonder a great mound has been reared there, hundreds of feet\nhigh--a mound at the expense of millions of dollars and many years in\nrising, and on the top is the great Belgian lion of bronze, and a\ngrand old lion it is. But our great Waterloo was in Palestine. There\ncame a day when all hell rode up, led by Apollyon, and the Captain of\nour salvation confronted them alone. The Rider on the white horse of\nthe Apocalypse going out against the black horse cavalry of death, and\nthe battalions of the demoniac, and the myrmidons of darkness. From\ntwelve o'clock at noon to three o'clock in the afternoon the greatest\nbattle of the universe went on. Eternal destinies were being decided.\nAll the arrows of hell pierced our Chieftain, and the battle-axes\nstruck Him, until brow and cheek and shoulder and hand and foot were\nincarnadined with oozing life; but He fought on until He gave a final\nstroke with sword from Jehovah's buckler, and the commander-in-chief\nof hell and all his forces fell back in everlasting ruin, and the\nvictory is ours. And on the mound that celebrates the triumph we plant\nthis day two figures, not in bronze or iron or sculptured marble, but\ntwo figures of living light, the Lion of Judah's tribe and the Lamb\nthat was slain.\n\n\n\n\nPOSTHUMOUS OPPORTUNITY.\n\n    \"If the tree fall toward the south or toward the north, in the\n    place where the tree falleth there it shall be.\"--ECCLES. xi: 3.\n\n\nThere is a hovering hope in the minds of a vast multitude that there\nwill be an opportunity in the next world to correct the mistakes of\nthis; that, if we do make complete shipwreck of our earthly life, it\nwill be on a shore up which we may walk to a palace; that, as a\ndefendant may lose his case in the Circuit Court, and carry it up to\nthe Supreme Court or Court of Chancery and get a reversal of judgment\nin his behalf, all the costs being thrown over on the other party, so,\nif we fail in the earthly trial, we may in the higher jurisdiction of\neternity have the judgment of the lower court set aside, all the costs\nremitted, and we may be victorious defendants forever.\n\nMy object in this sermon is to show that common sense, as well as my\ntext, declares that such an expectation is chimerical. You say that\nthe impenitent man, having got into the next world and seeing the\ndisaster, will, as a result of that disaster, turn, the pain the cause\nof his reformation. But you can find ten thousand instances in this\nworld of men who have done wrong and distress overtook them suddenly.\nDid the distress heal them? No; they went right on.\n\nThat man was flung of dissipations. \"You must stop drinking,\" said\nthe doctor, \"and quit the fast life you are leading, or it will\ndestroy you.\". The patient suffers paroxysm after paroxysm; but, under\nskillful medical treatment, he begins to sit up, begins to walk about\nthe room, begins to go to business. And, lo! he goes back to the same\ngrog-shops for his morning dram, and his even dram, and the drams\nbetween. Flat down again! Same doctor. Same physical anguish. Same\nmedical warning.\n\nNow, the illness is more protracted; the liver is more stubborn, the\nstomach more irritable, and the digestive organs are more rebellious.\nBut after awhile he is out again, goes back to the same dram-shops,\nand goes the same round of sacrilege against his physical health.\n\nHe sees that his downward course is ruining his household, that his\nlife is a perpetual perjury against his marriage vow, that that\nbroken-hearted woman is so unlike the roseate young wife that he\nmarried, that her old schoolmates do not recognize her; that his sons\nare to be taunted for a life-time by the father's drunkenness, that\nthe daughters are to pass into life under the scarification of a\ndisreputable ancestor. He is drinking up their happiness, their\nprospects for this life, and, perhaps, for the life to come. Sometimes\nan appreciation of what he is doing comes upon him. His nervous system\nis all a tangle. From crown of head to sole of foot he is one aching,\nrasping, crucifying, damning torture. Where is he? In hell on earth.\nDoes it reform him?\n\nAfter awhile he has delirium tremens, with a whole jungle of hissing\nreptiles let out on his pillow, and his screams horrify the neighbors\nas he dashes out of his bed, crying: \"Take these things off me!\" As he\nsits, pale and convalescent, the doctor says: \"Now I want to have a\nplain talk with you, my dear fellow. The next attack of this kind you\nwill have you will be beyond all medical skill, and you will die.\" He\ngets better and goes forth into the same round again. This time\nmedicine takes no effect. Consultation of physicians agree in saying\nthere is no hope. Death ends the scene.\n\nThat process of inebriation, warning, and dissolution is going on\nwithin stone's throw of this church, going on in all the neighborhoods\nof Christendom. Pain does not correct. Suffering does not reform. What\nis true in one sense is true in all senses, and will forever be so,\nand yet men are expecting in the next world purgatorial rejuvenation.\nTake up the printed reports of the prisons of the United States, and\nyou will find that the vast majority of the incarcerated have been\nthere before, some of them four, five, six times. With a million\nillustrations all working the other way in this world, people are\nexpecting that distress in the next state will be salvatory. You can\nnot imagine any worse torture in any other world than that which some\nmen have suffered here, and without any salutary consequence.\n\nFurthermore, the prospect of a reformation in the next world is more\nimprobable than a reformation here. In this world the life started\nwith innocence of infancy. In the case supposed the other life will\nopen with all the accumulated bad habits of many years upon him.\nSurely, it is easier to build a strong ship out of new timber than out\nof an old hulk that has been ground up in the breakers. If with\ninnocence to start with in this life a man does not become godly, what\nprospect is there that in the next world, starting with sin, there\nwould be a seraph evoluted? Surely the sculptor has more prospect of\nmaking a fine statue out of a block of pure white Parian marble than\nout of an old black rock seamed and cracked with the storms of a half\ncentury. Surely upon a clean, white sheet of paper it is easier to\nwrite a deed or a will than upon a sheet of paper all scribbled and\nblotted and torn from top to bottom. Yet men seem to think that,\nthough the life that began here comparatively perfect turned out\nbadly, the next life will succeed, though it starts with a dead\nfailure.\n\n\"But,\" says some one, \"I think we ought to have a chance in the next\nlife, because this life is so short it allows only small opportunity.\nWe hardly have time to turn around between cradle and tomb, the wood\nof the one almost touching the marble of the other.\" But do you know\nwhat made the ancient deluge a necessity? It was the longevity of the\nantediluvians. They were worse in the second century of their\nlife-time than in the first hundred years, and still worse in the\nthird century, and still worse all the way on to seven, eight, and\nnine hundred years, and the earth had to be washed, and scrubbed, and\nsoaked, and anchored, clear out of sight for more than a month before\nit could be made fit for decent people to live in. Longevity never\ncures impenitency. All the pictures of Time represent him with a\nscythe to cut, but I never saw any picture of Time with a case of\nmedicines to heal. Seneca says that Nero for the first five years of\nhis public life was set up for an example of clemency and kindness,\nbut his path all the way descended until at sixty-eight he became a\nsuicide. If eight hundred years did not make antediluvians any better,\nbut only made them worse, the ages of eternity could have no effect\nexcept prolongation of depravity.\n\n\"But,\" says some one, \"in the future state evil surroundings will be\nwithdrawn and elevated influences substituted, and hence expurgation,\nand sublimation, and glorification.\" But the righteous, all their sins\nforgiven, have passed on into a beatific state, and consequently the\nunsaved will be left alone. It can not be expected that Doctor Duff,\nwho exhausted himself in teaching Hindoos the way to heaven, and\nDoctor Abeel, who gave his life in the evangelization of China, and\nAdoniram Judson, who toiled for the redemption of Borneo, should be\nsent down by some celestial missionary society to educate those who\nwasted all their earthly existence. Evangelistic and missionary\nefforts are ended. The entire kingdom of the morally bankrupt by\nthemselves, where are the salvatory influences to come from? Can one\nspeckled and bad apple in a barrel of diseased apples turn the other\napples good? Can those who are themselves down help others up? Can\nthose who have themselves failed in the business of the soul pay the\ndebts of their spiritual insolvents? Can a million wrongs make one\nright?\n\nPoneropolis was a city where King Philip of Thracia put all the bad\npeople of his kingdom. If any man had opened a primary school at\nPoneropolis I do not think the parents from other cities would have\nsent their children there. Instead of amendment in the other world,\nall the associations, now that the good are evolved, will be\ndegenerating and down. You would not want to send a man to a cholera\nor yellow fever hospital for his health; and the great lazaretto of\nthe next world, containing the diseased and plague-struck, will be a\npoor place for moral recovery. If the surroundings in this world were\ncrowded of temptation, the surroundings of the next world, after the\nrighteous have passed up and on, will be a thousand per cent. more\ncrowded of temptation.\n\nThe Count of Chateaubriand made his little son sleep at night at the\ntop of a castle turret, where the winds howled and where specters were\nsaid to haunt the place; and while the mother and sisters almost died\nwith fright, the son tells us that the process gave him nerves that\ncould not tremble and a courage that never faltered. But I don't think\nthat towers of darkness and the spectral world swept by Sirocco and\nEuroclydon will ever fit one for the land of eternal sunshine. I\nwonder what is the curriculum of that college of Inferno, where, after\nproper preparation by the sins of this life, the candidate enters,\npassing on from freshman class of depravity to sophomore of\nabandonment, and from sophomore to junior, and from junior to senior,\nand day of graduation comes, and with diploma signed by Satan, the\npresident, and other professorial demoniacs, attesting that the\ncandidate has been long enough under their drill, he passes up to\nenter heaven! Pandemonium a preparative course for heavenly admission!\nAh, my friends, Satan and his cohorts have fitted uncounted\nmultitudes for ruin, but never fitted one soul for happiness.\n\nFurthermore, it would not be safe for this world if men had another\nchance in the next. If it had been announced that, however wickedly a\nman might act in this world, he could fix it up all right in the next,\nsociety would be terribly demoralized, and the human race demolished\nin a few years. The fear that, if we are bad and unforgiven here, it\nwill not be well for us in the next existence, is the chief influence\nthat keeps civilization from rushing back to semi-barbarism, and\nsemi-barbarism from rushing into midnight savagery, and midnight\nsavagery from extinction; for it is the astringent impression of all\nnations, Christian and heathen, that there is no future chance for\nthose who have wasted this.\n\nMultitudes of men who are kept within bounds would say, \"Go to, now!\nLet me get all out of this life there is in it. Come, gluttony, and\ninebriation, and uncleanness, and revenge, and all sensualities, and\nwait upon me! My life may be somewhat shortened in this world by\ndissoluteness, but that will only make heavenly indulgence on a larger\nscale the sooner possible. I will overtake the saints at last, and\nwill enter the Heavenly Temple only a little later than those who\nbehaved themselves here. I will on my way to heaven take a little\nwider excursion than those who were on earth pious, and I shall go to\nheaven _via_ Gehenna and _via_ Sheol.\" Another chance in the next\nworld means free license and wild abandonment in this.\n\nSuppose you were a party in an important case at law, and you knew\nfrom consultation with judges and attorneys that it would be tried\ntwice, and the first trial would be of little importance, but that the\nsecond would decide everything; for which trial would you make the\nmost preparation, for which retain the ablest attorneys, for which be\nmost anxious about the attendance of witnesses? You would put all the\nstress upon the second trial, all the anxiety, all the expenditure,\nsaying, \"The first is nothing, the last is everything.\" Give the race\nassurance of a second and more important trial in the subsequent life,\nand all the preparation for eternity would be _post-mortem_,\npost-funeral, post-sepulchral, and the world with one jerk be pitched\noff into impiety and godlessness.\n\nFurthermore, let me ask why a chance should be given in the next world\nif we have refused innumerable chances in this? Suppose you give a\nbanquet, and you invite a vast number of friends, but one man declines\nto come, or treats your invitation with indifference. You in the\ncourse of twenty years give twenty banquets, and the same man is\ninvited to them all, and treats them all in the same obnoxious way.\nAfter awhile you remove to another house, larger and better, and you\nagain invite your friends, but send no invitation to the man who\ndeclined or neglected the other invitations. Are you to blame? Has he\na right to expect to be invited after all the indignities he has done\nyou? God in this world has invited us all to the banquet of His grace.\nHe invited us by His Providence and His Spirit three hundred and\nsixty-five days of every year since we knew our right hand from our\nleft. If we declined it every time, or treated the invitation with\nindifference, and gave twenty or forty or fifty years of indignity on\nour part toward the Banqueter, and at last He spreads the banquet in a\nmore luxurious and kingly place, amid the heavenly gardens, have we a\nright to expect Him to invite us again, and have we a right to blame\nHim if He does not invite us?\n\nIf twelve gates of salvation stood open twenty years or fifty years\nfor our admission, and at the end of that time they are closed, can we\ncomplain of it and say, \"These gates ought to be open again. Give us\nanother chance\"? If the steamer is to sail for Hamburg, and we want to\nget to Germany by that line, and we read in every evening and every\nmorning newspaper that it will sail on a certain day, for two weeks we\nhave that advertisement before our eyes, and then we go down to the\ndocks fifteen minutes after it has shoved off into the stream and say:\n\"Come back. Give me another chance. It is not fair to treat me in this\nway. Swing up to the dock again, and throw out planks, and let me come\non board.\" Such behavior would invite arrest as a madman.\n\nAnd if, after the Gospel ship has lain at anchor before our eyes for\nyears and years, and all the benign voices of earth and heaven have\nurged us to get on board, as she might sail away at any moment, and\nafter awhile she sails without us, is it common sense to expect her to\ncome back? You might as well go out on the Highlands at Neversink and\ncall to the \"Aurania\" after she has been three days out, and expect\nher to return, as to call back an opportunity for heaven when it once\nhas sped away. All heaven offered us as a gratuity, and for a\nlife-time we refuse to take it, and then rush on the bosses of\nJehovah's buckler demanding another chance. There ought to be, there\ncan be, there will be no such thing as posthumous opportunity. Thus,\nour common sense agrees with my text--\"If the tree fall toward the\nsouth, or toward the north, in the place where the tree falleth, there\nit shall be.\"\n\nYou see that this idea lifts this world up from an unimportant\nway-station to a platform of stupendous issues, and makes all eternity\nwhirl around this hour. But one trial for which all the preparation\nmust be made in this world, or never made at all. That piles up all\nthe emphases and all the climaxes and all the destinies into life\nhere. No other chance! Oh, how that augments the value and the\nimportance of this chance!\n\nAlexander with his army used to surround a city, and then would lift a\ngreat light in token to the people that, if they surrendered before\nthat light went out, all would be well; but if once the light went\nout, then the battering-rams would swing against the wall, and\ndemolition and disaster would follow. Well, all we need do for our\npresent and everlasting safety is to make surrender to Christ, the\nKing and Conqueror--surrender of our hearts, surrender of our lives,\nsurrender of everything. And He keeps a great light burning, light of\nGospel invitation, light kindled with the wood of the cross and\nflaming up against the dark night of our sin and sorrow. Surrender\nwhile that great light continues to burn, for after it goes out there\nwill be no other opportunity of making peace with God through our Lord\nJesus Christ. Talk of another chance! Why, this is a supernal chance!\n\nIn the time of Edward the Sixth, at the battle of Musselburgh, a\nprivate soldier, seeing that the Earl of Huntley had lost his helmet,\ntook off his own helmet and put it upon the head of the earl; and the\nhead of the private soldier uncovered, he was soon slain, while his\ncommander rode safely out of the battle. But in our case, instead of a\nprivate soldier offering helmet to an earl, it is a King putting His\ncrown upon an unworthy subject, the King dying that we might live.\nTell it to all points of the compass. Tell it to night and day. Tell\nit to all earth and heaven. Tell it to all centuries, all ages, all\nmillenniums, that we have such a magnificent chance in this world that\nwe need no other chance in the next.\n\nI am in the burnished Judgment Hall of the Last Day. A great white\nthrone is lifted, but the Judge has not yet taken it. While we are\nwaiting for His arrival I hear immortal spirits in conversation. \"What\nare you waiting here for?\" says a soul that went up from Madagascar to\na soul that ascended from America. The latter says: \"I came from\nAmerica, where forty years I heard the Gospel preached, and Bible\nread, and from the prayer that I learned in infancy at my mother's\nknee until my last hour I had Gospel advantage, but, for some reason,\nI did not make the Christian choice, and I am here waiting for the\nJudge to give me a new trial and another chance.\" \"Strange!\" says the\nother; \"I had but one Gospel call in Madagascar, and I accepted it,\nand I do not need another chance.\"\n\n\"Why are you here?\" says one who on earth had feeblest intellect to\none who had great brain, and silvery tongue, and scepters of\ninfluence. The latter responds: \"Oh, I knew more than my fellows. I\nmastered libraries, and had learned titles from colleges, and my name\nwas a synonym for eloquence and power. And yet I neglected my soul,\nand I am here waiting for a new trial.\" \"Strange,\" says the one of the\nfeeble earthly capacity; \"I knew but little of worldly knowledge, but\nI knew Christ, and made Him my partner, and I have no need of another\nchance.\"\n\nNow the ground trembles with the approaching chariot. The great\nfolding-doors of the Hall swing open. \"Stand back!\" cry the celestial\nushers. \"Stand back, and let the Judge of quick and dead pass\nthrough!\" He takes the throne, and, looking over the throng of\nnations, He says: \"Come to judgment, the last judgment, the only\njudgment!\" By one flash from the throne all the history of each one\nflames forth to the vision of himself and all others. \"Divide!\" says\nthe Judge to the assembly. \"Divide!\" echo the walls. \"Divide!\" cry the\nguards angelic.\n\nAnd now the immortals separate, rushing this way and that, and after\nawhile there is a great aisle between them, and a great vacuum\nwidening and widening, and the Judge, turning to the throng on one\nside, says: \"He that is righteous, let him be righteous still, and he\nthat is holy, let him be holy still;\" and then, turning toward the\nthrong on the opposite side, He says: \"He that is unjust, let him be\nunjust still, and he that is filthy, let him be filthy still;\" and\nthen, lifting one hand toward each group, He declares: \"If the tree\nfall toward the south or toward the north, in the place where the\ntree falleth, there it shall be.\" And then I hear something jar with a\ngreat sound. It is the closing of the Book of Judgment. The Judge\nascends the stairs behind the throne. The hall of the last assize is\ncleared and shut. The high court of eternity is adjourned forever.\n\n\n\n\nTHE LORD'S RAZOR.\n\n    \"In the same day shall the Lord shave with a razor that is\n    hired, namely, by them beyond the river, by the King of\n    Assyria.\"--ISAIAH vii: 20.\n\n\nThe Bible is the boldest book ever written. There are no similitudes\nin Ossian or the Iliad or the Odyssey so daring. Its imagery sometimes\nseems on the verge of the reckless, but only seems so. The fact is\nthat God would startle and arouse and propel men and nations. A tame\nand limping similitude would fail to accomplish the object. While\nthere are times when He employs in the Bible the gentle dew and the\nmorning cloud and the dove and the daybreak in the presentation of\ntruth, we often find the iron chariot, the lightning, the earthquake,\nthe spray, the sword, and, in my text, the razor.\n\nThis keen-bladed instrument has advanced in usefulness with the ages.\nIn Bible times and lands the beard remained uncut save in the seasons\nof mourning and humiliation, but the razor was always a suggestive\nsymbol. David says of Doeg, his antagonist: \"Thy tongue is a sharp\nrazor working deceitfully;\" that is, it pretends to clear the face,\nbut is really used for deadly incision. In this morning's text the\nweapon of the toilet appears under the following circumstances: Judea\nneeded to have some of its prosperities cut off, and God sends\nagainst it three Assyrian kings--first Sennacherib, then Esrahaddon,\nand afterward Nebuchadnezzar. Those three sharp invasions, that cut\ndown the glory of Judea, are compared to so many sweeps of the razor\nacross the face of the land. And these circumstances were called a\nhired razor because God took the kings of Assyria, with whom He had no\nsympathy, to do the work, and paid them in palaces and spoils and\nannexations. These kings were hired to execute the divine behests. And\nnow the text, which on its first reading may have seemed trivial or\ninapt, is charged with momentous import: \"In the same day shall the\nLord shave with a razor that is hired--namely, by them beyond the\nriver, by the King of Assyria.\"\n\nWell, if God's judgments are razors, we had better be careful how we\nuse them on other people. In careful sheath these domestic weapons are\nput away, where no one by accident may touch them, and where the hands\nof children may not reach them. Such instruments must be carefully\nhandled or not handled at all. But how recklessly some people wield\nthe judgments of God! If a man meet with business misfortune, how many\nthere are ready to cry out: \"That is a judgment of God upon him\nbecause he was unscrupulous, or arrogant, or overreaching, or miserly.\nI thought he would get cut down! What a clean sweep of everything! His\ncity house and country house gone! His stables emptied of all the fine\nbays and sorrels and grays that used to prance by his door! All his\nresources overthrown, and all that he prided himself on tumbled into\ndemolition! Good for him!\" Stop, my brother. Don't sling around too\nfreely the judgments of God, for they are razors.\n\nSome of the most wicked business men succeed, and they live and die in\nprosperity, and some of the most honest and conscientious are driven\ninto bankruptcy. Perhaps his manner was unfortunate, and he was not\nreally as proud as he looked to be. Some of those who carry their head\nerect and look imperial are humble as a child, while many a man in\nseedy coat and slouch hat and unblacked shoes is as proud as Lucifer.\nYou can not tell by a man's look. Perhaps he was not unscrupulous in\nbusiness, for there are two sides to every story, and everybody that\naccomplishes anything for himself or others gets industriously lied\nabout. Perhaps his business misfortune was not a punishment, but the\nfatherly discipline to prepare him for heaven, and God may love him\nfar more than He loves you, who can pay dollar for dollar, and are put\ndown in the commercial catalogues as A1. Whom the Lord loveth He gives\nfour hundred thousand dollars and lets die on embroidered pillows? No:\nwhom the Lord loveth He chasteneth. Better keep your hand off the\nLord's razors, lest they cut and wound people that do not deserve it.\nIf you want to shave off some of the bristling pride of your own heart\ndo so; but be very careful how you put the sharp edge on others.\n\nHow I do dislike the behavior of those persons who, when people are\nunfortunate, say: \"I told you so--getting punished--served him right.\"\nIf those I-told-you-so's got their desert they would long ago have\nbeen pitched over the battlements. The mote in their neighbor's\neyes--so small that it takes a microscope to find it--gives them more\ntrouble than the beam which obscures their own optics. With air\nsometimes supercilious and sometimes Pharisaical, and always\nblasphemous, they take the razor of the divine judgment and sharpen it\non the hone of their own hard hearts, and then go to work on men\nsprawled out at full length under disaster, cutting mercilessly. They\nbegin by soft expressions of sympathy and pity and half praise, and,\nlather the victim all over before they put on the sharp edge.\n\nLet us be careful how we shoot at others lest we take down the wrong\none, remembering the servant of King William Rufus who shot at a deer,\nbut the arrow glanced against a tree and killed the king. Instead of\ngoing out with shafts to pierce, and razors to cut, we had better\nimitate the friend of Richard Coeur de Lion, who, in the war of the\nCrusades, was captured and imprisoned, but none of his friends knew\nwhere. So his loyal friend went around the land from stronghold to\nstronghold, and sung at each window a snatch of song that Richard\nCoeur de Lion had taught him in other days. And one day, coming before\na jail where he suspected his king might be incarcerated, he sung two\nlines of song, and immediately King Richard responded from his cell\nwith the other two lines, and so his whereabouts were discovered, and\nimmediately a successful movement was made for his liberation. So let\nus go up and down the world with the music of kind words and\nsympathetic hearts, serenading the unfortunate, and trying to get out\nof trouble men who had noble natures, but, by unforeseen\ncircumstances, have been incarcerated, thus liberating kings. More\nhymn-book and less razor.\n\nEspecially ought we to be apologetic and merciful toward those who,\nwhile they have great faults, have also great virtues. Some people are\nbarren of virtues. No weeds verily, but no flowers. I must not be too\nmuch enraged at a nettle along the fence if it be in a field\ncontaining forty acres of ripe Michigan wheat. At the present time,\nnaturalists tell us, there is on the sun a spot twenty thousand miles\nlong, but from the brightness and warmth I conclude it is a good deal\nof a sun yet.\n\nAgain, when I read in my text that the Lord shaves with the hired\nrazor of Assyria the land of Judea, I bethink myself of the precision\nof God's providence. A razor swung the tenth part of an inch out of\nthe right line means either failure or laceration, but God's dealings\nnever slip, and they do not miss by the thousandth part of an inch the\nright direction. People talk as though things in this world were at\nloose ends. Cholera sweeps across Marseilles and Madrid and Palermo,\nand we watch anxiously. Will the epidemic sweep Europe and America?\nPeople say, \"That will entirely depend on whether inoculation is a\nsuccessful experiment; that will depend entirely on quarantine\nregulations; that will depend on the early or late appearance of\nfrost; that epidemic is pitched into the world, and it goes blundering\nacross the continents, and it is all guess-work and an appalling\nperhaps.\"\n\nMy friends, I think, perhaps, that God had something to do with it,\nand that His mercy may have in some way protected us--that He may have\ndone as much for us as the quarantine and the health officers. It was\nright and a necessity that all caution should be used, but there has\ncome enough macaroni from Italy, and enough grapes from the south of\nFrance, and enough rags from tatterdemalions, and hidden in these\narticles of transportation enough choleraic germs to have left by this\ntime all Brooklyn mourning at Greenwood, and all Philadelphia at\nLaurel Hill, and all Boston at Mount Auburn. I thank all the doctors\nand quarantines; but, more than all, and first of all, and last of\nall, and all the time, I thank God. In all the six thousand years of\nthe world's existence there has not one thing merely \"happened so.\"\nGod is not an anarchist, but a King, a Father.\n\nWhen little Tod, the son of President Lincoln, died, all the land\nsympathized with the sorrow in the White House. He used to rush into\nthe room where the cabinet was in session, and while the most eminent\nmen of the land were discussing the questions of national existence.\nBut the child had no care about those questions. Now God the Father,\nand God the Son, and God the Holy Ghost are in perpetual session in\nregard to this world and kindred worlds. Shall you, His child, rush in\nto criticise or arraign or condemn the divine government? No; the\nCabinet of the Eternal Three can govern and will govern in the wisest\nand best way, and there never will be a mistake, and like razor\nskillfully swung, shall cut that which ought to be cut, and avoid that\nwhich ought to be avoided. Precision to the very hair-breadth. Earthly\ntime-pieces may get out of order and strike wrong, saying that it is\none o'clock when it is two, or two when it is three. God's clock is\nalways right, and when it is one it strikes one, and when it is twelve\nit strikes twelve, and the second hand is as accurate as the minute\nhand.\n\nFurther, my text tells us that God sometimes shaves nations: \"In the\nsame day shall the Lord shave with the razor that is hired.\" With one\nsharp sweep He went across Judea and down went its pride and its\npower. In 1861 God shaved our nation. We had allowed to grow Sabbath\ndesecration, and oppression, and blasphemy, and fraud, and impurity,\nand all sorts of turpitude. The South had its sins, and the North its\nsins, and the East its sins, and the West its sins. We had been warned\nagain and again, and we did not heed. At length the sword of war cut\nfrom the St. Lawrence to the Gulf, and from Atlantic seaboard to\nPacific seaboard. The pride of the land, not the cowards, but the\nheroes, on both sides went down. And that which we took for the sword\nof war was the Lord's razor.\n\nIn 1862, again, it went across the land. In 1863 again. In 1864 again.\nThen the sharp instrument was incased and put away. Never in the\nhistory of the ages was any land more thoroughly shaved than during\nthose four years of civil combat; and, my brethren, if we do not quit\nsome of our individual sins, national sins, the Lord will again take\nus in hand. He has other razors within reach besides war: epidemics,\ndroughts, deluges, plagues--grasshopper and locust; or our\novertowering success may so far excite the jealousy of other lands\nthat, under some pretext, the great nations of Europe and Asia may\ncombine to put us down. This nation, so easily approached on north\nand south and from both oceans, might have on hand at once more\nhostilities than were ever arrayed against any power.\n\nWe have recently been told by skillful engineers that all our\nfortresses around New York harbor could not keep the shells from being\nhurled from the sea into the heart of these great cities. Insulated\nChina, the wealthiest of all nations, as will be realized when her\nresources are developed, will have adopted all the modes of modern\nwarfare, and at the Golden Gate may be discussing whether Americans\nmust go. If the combined jealousies of Europe and Asia should come\nupon us, we should have more work on hand than would be pleasant. I\nhope no such combination against us will ever be formed, but I want to\nshow that, as Assyria was the hired razor against Judea, and Cyrus the\nhired razor against Babylon, and the Huns the hired razor against the\nGoths, there are now many razors that the Lord could hire if, because\nof our national sins, He should undertake to shave us. In 1870,\nGermany was the razor with which the Lord shaved France. England is\nthe razor with which very shortly the Lord will shave Russia. But\nnations are to repent in a day. May a speedy and world-wide coming to\nGod hinder, on both sides the sea, all national calamity. But do not\nlet us, as a nation, either by unrighteous law at Washington, or bad\nlives among ourselves, defy the Almighty.\n\nOne would think that our national symbol of the eagle might sometimes\nsuggest another eagle, that which ancient Rome carried. In the talons\nof that eagle were clutched at one time Britain, France, Spain, Italy,\nDalmatia, Rhactia, Noricum, Pannonia, Moesia, Dacia, Thrace,\nMacedonia, Greece, Asia Minor, Syria, Phoenicia, Palestine, Egypt, and\nall Northern Africa, and all the islands of the Mediterranean, indeed,\nall the world that was worth having, an hundred and twenty millions of\npeople under the wings of that one eagle. Where is she now? Ask\nGibbon, the historian, in his prose poem, the \"Decline and Fall of the\nRoman Empire.\" Ask her gigantic ruins straggling their sadness through\nthe ages, the screech owl at windows out of which world-wide\nconquerors looked. Ask the day of judgment when her crowned\ndebauchees, Commodus and Pertinax, and Caligula and Diocletian, shall\nanswer for their infamy? As men and as nations let us repent, and have\nour trust in a pardoning God, rather than depend on former successes\nfor immunity! Out of thirteen greatest battles of the world, Napoleon\nhad lost but one before Waterloo. Pride and destruction often ride in\nthe same saddle.\n\nBut notice once more, and more than all in my text, that God is so\nkind and loving, that when it is necessary for Him to cut, He has to\ngo to others for the sharp-edged weapon. \"In the same day shall the\nLord shave with a razor that is hired.\" God is love. God is pity. God\nis help. God is shelter. God is rescue. There are no sharp edges about\nHim, no thrusting points, no instruments of laceration. If you want\nbalm for wounds, He has that. If you want salve for divine eyesight,\nHe has that. But if there is sharp and cutting work to do which\nrequires a razor, that He hires. God has nothing about Him that hurts,\nsave when dire necessity demands, and then He has to go clear off to\nsome one else to get the instrument.\n\nThis divine geniality will be no novelty to those who have pondered\nthe Calvarean massacre, where God submerged Himself in human tears,\nand crimsoned Himself from punctured arteries, and let the terrestrial\nand infernal worlds maul Him until the chandeliers of the sky had to\nbe turned out, because the universe could not endure the indecency.\nIllustrious for love He must have been to take all that as our\nsubstitute, paying out of His own heart the price of our admission at\nthe gates of heaven.\n\nKing Henry II., of England, crowned his son as king, and on the day of\ncoronation put on a servant's garb and waited, he, the king, at the\nson's table, to the astonishment of all the princes. But we know of a\nmore wondrous scene, the King of heaven and earth offering to put on\nyou, His child, the crown of life, and in the form of a servant\nwaiting on you with blessing. Extol that love, all painting, all\nsculpture, all music, all architecture, all worship! In Dresdenian\ngallery let Raphael hold Him up as a child, and in Antwerp Cathedral\nlet Rubens hand Him down from the cross as a martyr, and Handel make\nall his oratorio vibrate around that one chord--\"He was wounded for\nour transgressions, bruised for our iniquity.\" But not until all the\nredeemed get home, and from the countenances of all the piled-up\ngalleries of the ransomed shall be revealed the wonders of redemption,\nshall either man or seraph or archangel know the height, and depth,\nand length, and breadth of the love of God.\n\nAt our national capital, a monument in honor of him who did more than\nany one to achieve our American Independence, was for scores of years\nin building, and most of us were discouraged and said it never would\nbe completed. And how glad we all were when in the presence of the\nhighest officials of the nation, the work was done! But will the\nmonument to Him who died for the eternal liberation of the human race\never be completed? For ages the work has been going up; evangelists\nand apostles and martyrs have been adding to the heavenly pile, and\nevery one of the millions of the redeemed going up from earth, has\nmade to it contribution of gladness, and weight of glory is swung to\nthe top of other weight of glory, higher and higher as the centuries\ngo by, higher and higher as the whole millenniums roll, sapphire on\nthe top of jasper, sardonyx on the top of chalcedony, and chrysoprasus\nabove topaz, until, far beneath shall be the walls and towers and\ndomes of the great capitol, a monument forever and forever rising, and\nyet never done. \"Unto Him who hath loved us and washed us from our\nsins in His own blood, and made us kings and priests forever.\"\n\nAllelujah, amen.\n\n\n\n\nWINDOWS TOWARD JERUSALEM.\n\n    \"His windows being open and his chamber toward\n    Jerusalem.\"--DAN. vi: 10.\n\n\nThe scoundrelly princes of Persia, urged on by political jealousy\nagainst Daniel, have succeeded in getting a law passed that whosoever\nprays to God shall be put under the paws and teeth of the lions, who\nare lashing themselves in rage and hunger up and down the stone cage,\nor putting their lower jaws on the ground, bellowing till the earth\ntrembles. But the leonine threat did not hinder the devotion of\nDaniel, the Coeur-de-Lion of the ages. His enemies might as well have\na law that the sun should not draw water or that the south wind should\nnot sweep across a garden of magnolias or that God should be\nabolished. They could not scare him with the red-hot furnaces, and\nthey can not now scare him with the lions. As soon as Daniel hears of\nthis enactment he leaves his office of Secretary of State, with its\nupholstery of crimson and gold, and comes down the white marble steps\nand goes to his own house. He opens his window and puts the shutters\nback and pulls the curtain aside so that he can look toward the sacred\ncity of Jerusalem, and then prays.\n\nI suppose the people in the street gathered under and before his\nwindow, and said: \"Just see that man defying the law; he ought to be\narrested.\" And the constabulary of the city rush to the police\nhead-quarters and report that Daniel is on his knees at the wide-open\nwindow. \"You are my prisoner,\" says the officer of the law, dropping a\nheavy hand on the shoulder of the kneeling Daniel. As the constables\nopen the door of the cavern to thrust in their prisoner, they see the\nglaring eyes of the monsters. But Daniel becomes the first lion-tamer,\nand they lick his hand and fawn at his feet, and that night he sleeps\nwith the shaggy mane of a wild beast for his pillow, while the king\nthat night, sleepless in the palace, has on him the paw and teeth of a\nlion he can not tame--the lion of a remorseful conscience.\n\nWhat a picture it would be for some artist; Darius, in the early dusk\nof morning, not waiting for footmen or chariot, hastening to the den,\nall flushed and nervous and in dishabille, and looking through the\ncrevices of the cage to see what had become of his prime-minister!\n\"What, no sound!\" he says: \"Daniel is surely devoured, and the lions\nare sleeping after their horrid meal, the bones of the poor man\nscattered across the floor of the cavern.\" With trembling voice Darius\ncalls out, \"Daniel!\" No answer, for the prophet is yet in profound\nslumber. But a lion, more easily awakened, advances, and, with hot\nbreath blown through the crevice, seems angrily to demand the cause of\nthis interruption, and then another wild beast lifts his mane from\nunder Daniel's head, and the prophet, waking up, comes forth to report\nhimself all unhurt and well.\n\nBut our text stands us at Daniel's window, open toward Jerusalem. Why\nin that direction open? Jerusalem was his native land, and all the\npomp of his Babylonish successes could not make him forget it. He\ncame there from Jerusalem at eighteen years of age, and he never\nvisited it, though he lived to be eighty-five years. Yet, when he\nwanted to arouse the deepest emotions and grandest aspirations of his\nheart, he had his window open toward his native Jerusalem. There are\nmany of you to-day who understand that without any exposition. This is\ngetting to be a nation of foreigners. They have come into all\noccupations and professions. They sit in all churches. It may be\ntwenty years ago since you got your naturalization papers, and you may\nbe thoroughly Americanized, but you can't forget the land of your\nbirth, and your warmest sympathies go out toward it. Your windows are\nopen toward Jerusalem. Your father and mother are buried there. It may\nhave been a very humble home in which you were born, but your memory\noften plays around it, and you hope some day to go and see it--the\nhill, the tree, the brook, the house, the place so sacred, the door\nfrom which you started off with parental blessing to make your own way\nin the world; and God only knows how sometimes you have longed to see\nthe familiar places of your childhood, and how in awful crises of life\nyou would like to have caught a glimpse of the old, wrinkled face that\nbent over you as you lay on the gentle lap twenty or forty or fifty\nyears ago. You may have on this side of the sea risen in fortune, and,\nlike Daniel, have become great, and may have come into prosperities\nwhich you never could have reached if you had stayed there, and you\nmay have many windows to your house--bay-windows, and\nsky-light-windows, and windows of conservatory, and windows on all\nsides--but you have at least one window open toward Jerusalem.\n\nWhen the foreign steamer comes to the wharf, you see the long line of\nsailors, with shouldered mail-bags, coming down the planks, carrying\nas many letters as you might suppose would be enough for a year's\ncorrespondence, and this repeated again and again during the week.\nMultitudes of them are letters from home, and at all the post-offices\nof the land people will go to the window and anxiously ask for them,\nhundreds of thousands of persons finding that window of foreign mails\nthe open window toward Jerusalem. Messages that say: \"When are you\ncoming home to see us? Brother has gone into the army. Sister is dead.\nFather and mother are getting very feeble. We are having a great\nstruggle to get on here. Would you advise us to come to you, or will\nyou come to us? All join in love, and hope to meet you, if not in this\nworld, then in a better. Good-bye.\"\n\nYes, yes; in all these cities, and amid the flowering western\nprairies, and on the slopes of the Pacific, and amid the Sierras, and\non the banks of the lagoon, and on the ranches of Texas there is an\nuncounted multitude who, this hour, stand and sit and kneel with their\nwindows open toward Jerusalem. Some of them played on the heather of\nthe Scottish hills. Some of them were driven out by Irish famine. Some\nof them, in early life, drilled in the German army. Some of them were\naccustomed at Lyons or Marseilles or Paris to see on the street Victor\nHugo and Gambetta. Some chased the chamois among the Alpine\nprecipices. Some plucked the ripe clusters from Italian vineyard.\nSome lifted their faces under the midnight sun of Norway. It is no\ndishonor to our land that they remember the place of their nativity.\nMiscreants would they be if, while they have some of their windows\nopen to take in the free air of America and the sunlight of an\natmosphere which no kingly despot has ever breathed, they forgot\nsometime to open the window toward Jerusalem.\n\nNo wonder that the son of the Swiss, when far away from home, hearing\nthe national air of his country sung, the malady of home-sickness\ncomes on him so powerfully as to cause his death. You have the example\nof the heroic Daniel of my text for keeping early memories fresh.\nForget not the old folks at home. Write often; and, if you have\nsurplus of means and they are poor, make practical contribution, and\nrejoice that America is bound to all the world by ties of sanguinity\nas is no other nation. Who can doubt but it is appointed for the\nevangelization of other lands? What a stirring, melting, gospelizing\ntheory that all the doors of other nations are open toward us, while\nour windows are open toward them!\n\nBut Daniel, in the text, kept this port-hole of his domestic fortress\nunclosed because Jerusalem was the capital of sacred influences. There\nhad smoked the sacrifice. There was the Holy of Holies. There was the\nArk of the Covenant. There stood the temple. We are all tempted to\nkeep our windows open on the opposite side, toward the world, that we\nmay see and hear and appropriate its advantages. What does the world\nsay? What does the world think? What does the world do? Worshipers of\nthe world instead of worshipers of God. Windows open toward Babylon.\nWindows open toward Corinth. Windows open toward Athens. Windows open\ntoward Sodom. Windows open toward the flats, instead of windows open\ntoward the hills. Sad mistake, for this world as a god is like\nsomething I saw the other day in the museum of Strasburg, Germany--the\nfigure of a virgin in wood and iron. The victim in olden time was\nbrought there, and this figure would open its arms to receive him,\nand, once infolded, the figure closed with a hundred knives and lances\nupon him, and then let him drop one hundred and eighty feet sheer\ndown. So the world first embraces its idolaters, then closes upon them\nwith many tortures, and then lets them drop forever down. The highest\nhonor the world could confer was to make a man Roman emperor; but, out\nof sixty-three emperors, it allowed only six to die peacefully in\ntheir beds.\n\nThe dominion of this world over multitudes is illustrated by the names\nof coins of many countries. They have their pieces of money which they\ncall sovereigns and half sovereigns, crowns and half crowns, Napoleons\nand half Napoleons, Fredericks and double Fredericks, and ducats, and\nIsabellinos, all of which names mean not so much usefulness as\ndominion. The most of our windows open toward the exchange, toward the\nsalon of fashion, toward the god of this world. In olden times the\nlength of the English yard was fixed by the length of the arm of King\nHenry I., and we are apt to measure things by a variable standard and\nby the human arm that in the great crises of life can give us no help.\nWe need, like Daniel, to open our windows toward God and religion.\n\nBut, mark you, that good lion-tamer is not standing at the window, but\nkneeling, while he looks out. Most photographs are taken of those in\nstanding or sitting posture. I now remember but one picture of a man\nkneeling, and that was David Livingstone, who in the cause of God and\ncivilization sacrificed himself; and in the heart of Africa his\nservant, Majwara, found him in the tent by the light of a candle,\nstuck on the top of a box, his head in his hands upon the pillow, and\ndead on his knees. But here is a great lion-tamer, living under the\ndash of the light, and his hair disheveled of the breeze, praying. The\nfact is, that a man can see further on his knees than standing on\ntiptoe. Jerusalem was about five hundred and fifty statute miles from\nBabylon, and the vast Arabian Desert shifted its sands between them.\nYet through that open window Daniel saw Jerusalem, saw all between it,\nsaw beyond, saw time, saw eternity, saw earth, and saw heaven. Would\nyou like to see the way through your sins to pardon, through your\ntroubles to comfort, through temptation to rescue, through dire\nsickness to immortal health, through night to day, through things\nterrestrial to things celestial, you will not see them till you take\nDaniel's posture. No cap of bone to the joints of the fingers, no cap\nof bone to the joints of the elbow, but cap of bone to the knees, made\nso because the God of the body was the God of the soul, and especial\nprovision for those who want to pray, and physiological structure\njoins with spiritual necessity in bidding us pray, and pray, and pray.\n\nIn olden time the Earl of Westmoreland said he had no need to pray,\nbecause he had enough pious tenants on his estate to pray for him;\nbut all the prayers of the church universal amount to nothing unless,\nlike Daniel, we pray for ourselves. Oh, men and women, bounded on one\nside by Shadrach's red-hot furnace, and the other side by devouring\nlions, learn the secret of courage and deliverance by looking at that\nBabylonish window open toward the south-west! \"Oh,\" you say, \"that is\nthe direction of the Arabian Desert!\" Yes; but on the other side of\nthe desert is God, is Christ, is Jerusalem, is heaven.\n\nThe Brussels lace is superior to all other lace, so beautiful, so\nmultiform, so expensive--four hundred francs a pound. All the world\nseeks it. Do you know how it is made? The spinning is done in a dark\nroom, the only light admitted through a small aperture, and that light\nfalling directly on the pattern. And the finest specimens of Christian\ncharacter I have ever seen or ever expect to see are those to be found\nin lives all of whose windows have been darkened by bereavement and\nmisfortune save one, but under that one window of prayer the\ninterlacing of divine workmanship went on until it was fit to deck a\nthrone, a celestial embroidery which angels admired and God approved.\n\nBut it is another Jerusalem toward which we now need to open our\nwindows. The exiled evangelist of Ephesus saw it one day as the surf\nof the Icarian sea foamed and splashed over the bowlders at his feet,\nand his vision reminded me of a wedding-day when the bride by sister\nand maid was having garlands twisted for her hair and jewels strung\nfor her neck just before she puts her betrothed hand into the hand of\nher affianced: \"I, John, saw the Holy City, New Jerusalem, coming\ndown from God out of heaven prepared as a bride adorned for her\nhusband.\" Toward that bridal Jerusalem are our windows opened?\n\nWe would do well to think more of heaven. It is not a mere annex of\nearth. It is not a desolate outpost. As Jerusalem was the capital of\nJudae, and Babylon the capital of the Babylonian monarchy, and London\nis the capital of Great Britain, and Washington is the capital of our\nown republic, the New Jerusalem is the capital of the universe. The\nking lives there, and the royal family of the redeemed have their\npalaces there, and there is a congress of many nations and the\nparliament of all the worlds. Yea, as Daniel had kindred in Jerusalem\nof whom he often thought, though he had left home when a very young\nman, perhaps father and mother and brothers and sisters still living,\nand was homesick to see them, and they belonged to the high circles of\nroyalty, Daniel himself having royal blood in his veins, so we have in\nthe New Jerusalem a great many kindred, and we are sometimes homesick\nto see them, and they are all princes and princesses, in them the\nblood imperial, and we do well to keep our windows open toward their\neternal residence.\n\nIt is a joy for us to believe that while we are interested in them\nthey are interested in us. Much thought of heaven makes one heavenly.\nThe airs that blow through that open window are charged with life, and\nsweep up to us aromas from gardens that never wither, under skies that\nnever cloud, in a spring-tide that never terminates. Compared with it\nall other heavens are dead failures.\n\nHomer's heaven was an elysium which he describes as a plain at the\nend of the earth or beneath, with no snow nor rainfall, and the sun\nnever goes down, and Rhadamanthus, the justest of men, rules. Hesiod's\nheaven is what he calls the islands of the blessed, in the midst of\nthe ocean, three times a year blooming with most exquisite flowers,\nand the air is tinted with purple, while games and music and\nhorse-races occupy the time. The Scandinavian's heaven was the hall of\nWalhalla, where the god Odin gave unending wine-suppers to earthly\nheroes and heroines. The Mohammedan's heaven passes its disciples in\nover the bridge Al-Sirat, which is finer than a hair and sharper than\na sword, and then they are let loose into a riot of everlasting\nsensuality.\n\nThe American aborigines look forward to a heaven of illimitable\nhunting-ground, partridge and deer and wild duck more than plentiful,\nand the hounds never off the scent, and the guns never missing fire.\nBut the geographer has followed the earth round, and found no Homer's\nelysium. Voyagers have traversed the deep in all directions, and found\nno Hesiod's islands of the blessed. The Mohammedan's celestial\ndebauchery and the Indian's eternal hunting-ground for vast multitudes\nhave no charm. But here rolls in the Bible heaven. No more sea--that\nis, no wide separation. No more night--that is, no insomnia. No more\ntears--that is, no heart-break. No more pain--that is, dismissal of\nlancet and bitter draught and miasma, and banishment of neuralgias and\ncatalepsies and consumptions. All colors in the wall except gloomy\nblack; all the music in the major-key, because celebrative and\njubilant. River crystalline, gate crystalline, and skies crystalline,\nbecause everything is clear and without doubt. White robes, and that\nmeans sinlessness. Vials full of odors, and that means pure regalement\nof the senses. Rainbow, and that means the storm is over. Marriage\nsupper, and that means gladdest festivity. Twelve manner of fruits,\nand that means luscious and unending variety. Harp, trumpet, grand\nmarch, anthem, amen, and hallelujah in the same orchestra. Choral\nmeeting solo, and overture meeting antiphon, and strophe joining\ndithyramb, as they roll into the ocean of doxologies. And you and I\nmay have all that, and have it forever through Christ, if we will let\nHim with the blood of one wounded hand rub out our sin, and with the\nother wounded hand swing open the shining portals.\n\nDay and night keep your window open toward that Jerusalem. Sing about\nit. Pray about it. Think about it. Talk about it. Dream about it. Do\nnot be inconsolable about your friends who have gone into it. Do not\nworry if something in your heart indicates that you are not far off\nfrom its ecstasies. Do not think that when a Christian dies he stops,\nfor he goes on.\n\nAn ingenious man has taken the heavenly furlongs as mentioned in\nRevelation, and has calculated that there will be in heaven one\nhundred rooms sixteen feet square for each ascending soul, though this\nworld should lose a hundred millions yearly. But all the rooms of\nheaven will be ours, for they are family rooms; and as no room in your\nhouse is too good for your children, so all the rooms of all the\npalaces of the heavenly Jerusalem will be free to God's children and\neven the throne-room will not be denied, and you may run up the steps\nof the throne, and put your hand on the side of the throne, and sit\ndown beside the king according to the promise: \"To him that overcometh\nwill I grant to sit with me in my throne.\"\n\nBut you can not go in except as conquerors. Many years ago the Turks\nand Christians were in battle, and the Christians were defeated, and\nwith their commander Stephen fled toward a fortress where the mother\nof this commander was staying. When she saw her son and his army in\ndisgraceful retreat, she had the gates of the fortress rolled shut,\nand then from the top of the battlement cried out to her son, \"You can\nnot enter here except as conqueror!\" Then Stephen rallied his forces\nand resumed the battle and gained the day, twenty thousand driving\nback two hundred thousand. For those who are defeated in the battle\nwith sin and death and hell nothing but shame and contempt; but for\nthose who gain the victory through our Lord Jesus Christ the gates of\nthe New Jerusalem will hoist, and there shall be an abundant entrance\ninto the everlasting kingdom of our Lord, toward which you do well to\nkeep your windows open.\n\n\n\n\nSTORMED AND TAKEN.\n\n    \"And Abimelech gat him up to Mount Zalmon, he and all the\n    people that were with him, and Abimelech took an ax in his\n    hand, and cut down a bough from the trees, and took it, and\n    laid it on his shoulder.... And all the people likewise cut\n    down every man his bough, and followed Abimelech, and put them\n    to the hold, and set the hold on fire upon them; so that all\n    the men of the tower of Shechem died also, about a thousand\n    men and women.\"--JUDGES ix: 48, 49.\n\n\nAbimelech is a name malodorous in Bible history, and yet full of\nprofitable suggestion. Buoys are black and uncomely, but they tell\nwhere the rocks are. The snake's rattle is hideous, but it gives\ntimely warning. From the piazza of my summer home, night by night I\nsaw a lighthouse fifteen miles away, not placed there for adornment,\nbut to tell mariners to stand off from that dangerous point. So all\nthe iron-bound coast of moral danger is marked with Saul, and Herod,\nand Rehoboam, and Jezebel, and Abimelech. These bad people are\nmentioned in the Bible, not only as warnings, but because there were\nsometimes flashes of good conduct in their lives worthy of imitation.\nGod sometimes drives a very straight nail with a very poor hammer.\n\nThe city of Shechem had to be taken, and Abimelech and his men were to\ndo it. I see the dust rolling up from their excited march. I hear the\nshouting of the captains and the yell of the besiegers. The swords\nclack sharply on the parrying shields, and the vociferation of two\narmies in death-grapple is horrible to hear. The battle goes on all\nday, and as the sun is setting Abimelech and his army cry \"Surrender!\"\nto the beaten foe. And, unable longer to resist, the city of Shechem\nfalls; and there are pools of blood, and dissevered limbs, and glazed\neyes looking up beggingly for mercy that war never shows, and dying\nsoldiers with their head on the lap of mother, or wife, or sister, who\nhave come out for the last offices of kindness and affection: and a\ngroan rolls across the city, stopping not, because there is no spot\nfor it to rest, so full is the place of other groans. A city wounded!\nA city dying! A city dead! Wail for Shechem, all ye who know the\nhorrors of a sacked town!\n\nAs I look over the city I can find only one building standing, and\nthat is the temple of the god Berith. Some soldiers outside of the\ncity, in a tower, finding that they can no longer defend Shechem, now\nbegin to look out for their own personal safety, and they fly to this\ntemple of Berith. They get within the door, shut it, and they say,\n\"Now we are safe. Abimelech has taken the whole city, but he can not\ntake this temple of Berith. Here we shall be under the protection of\nthe gods.\" Oh, Berith, the god! do your best now for these refugees.\nIf you have eyes, pity them. If you have hands, help them. If you have\nthunderbolts, strike for them.\n\nBut how shall Abimelech and his army take this temple of Berith and\nthe men who are there fortified? Will they do it with sword? Nay.\nWill they do it with spear? Nay. With battering-ram, rolled up by\nhundred-armed strength, crashing against the walls? Nay. Abimelech\nmarches his men to a wood in Zalmon. With his ax he hews off a limb of\na tree, and puts that limb upon his own shoulder, and then he says to\nhis men, \"You do the same.\" They are obedient to their commander.\n\nOh, what a strange army, with what strange equipment! They come to the\nfoot of the temple of Berith, and Abimelech takes his limb of a tree\nand throws it down; and the first platoon of soldiers come up and they\nthrow down their branches; and the second platoon, and the third,\nuntil all around about the temple of Berith there is a pile of\ntree-branches. The Shechemites look out from the windows of the temple\nupon what seems to them childish play on the part of their enemies.\nBut soon the flints are struck, and the spark begins to kindle the\nbrush, and the flame comes up all through the pile, and the red\nelements leap to the casement, and the woodwork begins to blaze, and\none arm of flame is thrown up on the right side of the temple, and\nanother arm of flame is thrown up on the left side of the temple,\nuntil they clasp their lurid palms under the wild night sky, and the\ncry of \"Fire!\" within, and \"Fire!\" without announces the terror, and\nthe strangulation, and the doom of the Shechemites, and the complete\noverthrow of the temple of the god Berith. Then there went up a shout,\nlong and loud, from the stout lungs and swarthy chests of Abimelech\nand his men, as they stood amid the ashes and the dust, crying:\n\"Victory! Victory!\"\n\nNow, I learn first from this subject the folly of depending upon any\none form of tactics in anything we have to do for this world or for\nGod. Look over the weaponry of olden times--javelins, battle-axes,\nhabergeons--and show me a single weapon with which Abimelech and his\nmen could have gained such complete victory. It is no easy thing to\ntake a temple thus armed. I saw a house where, during revolutionary\ntimes, a man and his wife kept back a whole regiment hour after hour,\nbecause they were inside the house, and the assaulting soldiers were\noutside the house. Yet here Abimelech and his army come up, they\nsurround this temple, and they capture it without the loss of a single\nman on the part of Abimelech, although I suppose some of the old\nIsraelitish heroes told Abimelech: \"You are only going up there to be\ncut to pieces.\" Yet you are willing to testify to-day that by no other\nmode--certainly not by ordinary modes--could that temple so easily, so\nthoroughly have been taken. Fathers and mothers, brethren and sisters\nin Jesus Christ, what the Church most wants to learn this day is that\nany plan is right, is lawful, is best, which helps to overthrow the\ntemple of sin, and capture this world for God. We are very apt to\nstick to the old modes of attack.\n\nWe put on the old-style coat of mail. We come up with the sharp, keen,\nglittering steel spear of argument, expecting in that way to take the\ncastle, but they have a thousand spears where we have ten. And so the\ncastle of sin stands. Oh, my friends, we will never capture this world\nfor God by any keen saber of sarcasm, by any glittering lances of\nrhetoric, by any sapping and mining of profound disquisition, by any\ngunpowdery explosions of indignation, by sharp shootings of wit, by\nhowitzers of mental strength made to swing shell five miles, by\ncavalry horses gorgeously caparisoned pawing the air. In vain all the\nattempts on the part of these ecclesiastical foot soldiers, light\nhorsemen, and grenadiers.\n\nMy friends, I propose this morning a different style of tactics. Let\neach one go to the forest of God's promise and invitation, and hew\ndown a branch and put it on his shoulder, and let us all come around\nthese obstinate iniquities, and then, with this pile, kindled by the\nfires of a holy zeal and the flames of a consecrated life, we will\nburn them out. What steel can not do, fire may. And I, this morning,\nannounce myself in favor of any plan of religious attack that\nsucceeds--any plan of religious attack, however radical, however odd,\nhowever unpopular, however hostile to all the conventionalities of\nChurch and State. We want more heart in our song, more heart in our\nalms-giving, more heart in our prayers, more heart in our preaching.\nOh, for less of Abimelech's sword, and more of Abimelech's\nconflagration! I have often heard\n\n    \"There is a fountain filled with blood\"\n\nsung artistically by four birds perched on their Sunday roost in the\ngallery, until I thought of Jenny Lind, and Nilsson, and Sontag, and\nall the other warblers; but there came not one tear to my eye, nor one\nmaster emotion to my heart. But one night I went down to the African\nMethodist meeting-house in Philadelphia, and at the close of the\nservice a black woman, in the midst of the audience, began to sing\nthat hymn, and all the audience joined in, and we were floated some\nthree or four miles nearer heaven than I have ever been since. I saw\nwith my own eyes that \"fountain filled with blood\"--red, agonizing,\nsacrificial, redemptive--and I heard the crimson plash of the wave as\nwe all went down under it:\n\n    \"For sinners plunged beneath that flood\n    Lose all their guilty stains.\"\n\nOh, my friends, the Gospel is not a syllogism; It is not casuistry, it\nis not polemics, or the science of squabble. It is blood-red fact; it\nis warm-hearted invitation; it is leaping, bounding, flying good news;\nit is efflorescent with all light; it is rubescent with all glow; it\nis arborescent with all sweet shade. I have seen the sun rise on Mount\nWashington, and from the Tip-top House; but there was no beauty in\nthat compared with the day-spring from on high when Christ gives light\nto a soul. I have heard Parepa sing; but there was no music in that\ncompared with the voice of Christ when He said: \"Thy sins are forgiven\nthee; go in peace.\" Good news! Let every one cut down a branch of this\ntree of life and wave it. Let him throw it down and kindle it. Let all\nthe way from Mount Zalmon to Shechem be filled with the tossing joy.\nGood news! This bonfire of the Gospel shall consume the last temple of\nsin, and will illumine the sky with apocalyptic joy that Jesus Christ\ncame into the world to save sinners. Any new plan that makes a man\nquit his sin, and that prostrates a wrong, I am as much in favor of as\nthough all the doctors, and the bishops, and the archbishops, and the\nsynods, and the academical gownsmen of Christianity sanctioned it. The\ntemple of Berith must come down, and I do not care how it comes.\n\nStill further, I learn from this subject the power of example. If\nAbimelech had sat down on the grass and told his men to go and get the\nboughs, and go out to the battle, they would never have gone at all,\nor, if they had, it would have been without any spirit or effective\nresult; but when Abimelech goes with his own ax and hews down a\nbranch, and with Abimelech's arm puts it on Abimelech's shoulder, and\nmarches on--then, my text says, all the people did the same. How\nnatural that was! What made Garibaldi and Stonewall Jackson the most\nmagnetic commanders of this century? They always rode ahead. Oh, the\novercoming power of example! Here is a father on the wrong road; all\nhis boys go on the wrong road. Here is a father who enlists for\nChrist; his children enlist.\n\nI saw, in some of the picture-galleries of Europe, that before many of\nthe great works of the masters--the old masters--there would be\nsometimes four or five artists taking copies of the pictures. These\ncopies they were going to carry with them, perhaps to distant lands;\nand I have thought that your life and character are a masterpiece, and\nit is being copied, and long after you are gone it will bloom or blast\nin the homes of those who knew you, and be a Gorgon or a Madonna. Look\nout what you say. Look out what you do. Eternity will hear the echo.\nThe best sermon ever preached is a holy life. The best music ever\nchanted is a consistent walk.\n\nI saw, near the beach, a wrecker's machine. It was a cylinder with\nsome holes at the side, made for the thrusting in of some long poles\nwith strong leverage; and when there is a vessel in trouble or going\nto pieces out in the offing, the wreckers shoot a rope out to the\nsuffering men. They grasp it, and the wreckers turn the cylinder, and\nthe rope winds around the cylinder, and those who are shipwrecked are\nsaved. So at your feet to-day there is an influence with a tremendous\nleverage. The rope attached to it swings far out into the billowy\nfuture. Your children, your children's children, and all the\ngenerations that are to follow, will grip that influence and feel the\nlong-reaching pull long after the figures on your tombstone are so\nnear worn out that the visitor can not tell whether it was in 1885, or\n1775, or 1675 that you died.\n\nStill further, I learn from this subject the advantages of concerted\naction. If Abimelech had merely gone out with a tree-branch the work\nwould not have been accomplished, or if ten, twenty, or thirty men had\ngone; but when all the axes are lifted, and all the sharp edges fall,\nand all these men carry each his tree-branch down and throw it about\nthe temple, the victory is gained--the temple falls. My friends, where\nthere is one man in the Church of God at this day shouldering his\nwhole duty there are a great many who never lift an ax or swing a\nblow.\n\nOh, we all want our boat to get over to the golden sands, but the most\nof us are seated either in the prow or in the stern, wrapped in our\nstriped shawl, holding a big-handled sunshade, while others are\nblistered in the heat, and pull until the oar-locks groan, and the\nblades bend till they snap. Oh, religious sleepy-heads, wake up! While\nwe have in our church a great many who are toiling for God, there are\nsome too lazy to brush the flies off their heavy eyelids.\n\nSuppose, in military circles, on the morning of battle the roll is\ncalled, and out of a thousand men only a hundred men in the regiment\nanswered. What excitement there would be in the camp! What would the\ncolonel say? What high talking there would be among the captains, and\nmajors, and the adjutants! Suppose word came to head-quarters that\nthese delinquents excused themselves on the ground that they had\noverslept themselves, or that the morning was damp and they were\nafraid of getting their feet wet, or that they were busy cooking\nrations. My friends, this is the morning of the day of God Almighty's\nbattle! Do you not see the troops? Hear you not all the trumpets of\nheaven and all the drums of hell? Which side are you on? If you are on\nthe right side, to what cavalry troop, to what artillery service, to\nwhat garrison duty do you belong? In other words, in what\nSabbath-school do you teach? in what prayer-meeting do you exhort? to\nwhat penitentiary do you declare eternal liberty? to what almshouse do\nyou announce the riches of heaven? What broken bone of sorrow have you\never set? Are you doing nothing? Is it possible that a man or woman\nsworn to be a follower of the Lord Jesus Christ is doing nothing? Then\nhide the horrible secret from the angels. Keep it away from the book\nof judgment. If you are doing nothing do not let the world find it\nout, lest they charge your religion with being a false-face. Do not\nlet your cowardice and treason be heard among the martyrs about the\nthrone, lest they forget the sanctity of the place and curse your\nbetrayal of that cause for which they agonized and died.\n\nMay the eternal God rouse us all to action! As for myself, I feel I\nwould be ashamed to die now and enter heaven until I have accomplished\nsomething more decisive for the Lord that bought me. I would like to\njoin with you in an oath, with hand high uplifted to heaven, swearing\nnew allegiance to Jesus Christ, and to work more for His kingdom. Are\nyou ready to join with me in some new work for Christ? I feel that\nthere is such a thing as claustral piety, that there is such a thing\nas insular work; but it seems to me that what we want now is concerted\naction. The temple of Berith is very broad, and it is very high. It\nhas been going up by the hands of men and devils, and no human\nenginery can demolish it; but if the fifty thousand ministers of\nChrist in this country should each take a branch of the tree of life,\nand all their congregations should do the same, and we should march on\nand throw these branches around the great temples of sin, and\nworldliness and folly, it would need no match, or coal, or torch of\nours to touch off the pile; for, as in the days of Elijah, fire would\nfall from heaven and kindle the bonfire of Christian victory over\ndemolished sin. It is kindling now! Huzzah! The day is ours!\n\nStill further, I learn from this subject the danger of false refuges.\nAs soon as these Shechemites got into the temple they thought they\nwere safe. They said: \"Berith will take care of us. Abimelech may\nbatter down everything else; he can not batter down this temple where\nwe are now hid.\" But very soon they heard the timbers crackling, and\nthey were smothered with smoke, and they miserably died. And you and I\nare just as much tempted to false refuges. The mirror this morning may\nhave persuaded you that you have a comely cheek; your best friends\nmay have persuaded you that you have elegant manners. Satan may have\ntold you that you are all right; but bear with me if I tell you that,\nif unpardoned, you are all wrong. I have no clinometer by which to\nmeasure how steep is the inclined plane you are descending, but I know\nit is very steep. \"Well,\" you say, \"if the Bible is true I am a\nsinner. Show me some refuge; I will step right into it.\"\n\nI suppose every person in this audience this moment is stepping into\nsome kind of refuge. Here you step in the tower of good works. You\nsay: \"I shall be safe here in this refuge.\" The battlements are\nadorned; the steps are varnished; on the wall are pictures of all the\nsuffering you have alleviated, and all the schools you have\nestablished, and all the fine things you have ever done. Up in that\ntower you feel you are safe. But hear you not the tramp of your\nunpardoned sins all around the tower? They each have a match. They are\nkindling the combustible material. You feel the heat and the\nsuffocation. Oh, may you leap in time, the Gospel declaring: \"By the\ndeeds of the law shall no flesh living be justified.\"\n\n\"Well,\" you say, \"I have been driven out of that tower; where shall I\ngo?\" Step into this tower of indifference. You say: \"If this tower is\nattacked, it will be a great while before it is taken.\" You feel at\nease. But there is an Abimelech, with ruthless assaults, coming on.\nDeath and his forces are gathering around, and they demand that you\nsurrender everything, and they clamor for your immortal overthrow, and\nthey throw their skeleton arms in the windows, and with their iron\nfists they beat against the door; and while you are trying to keep\nthem out you see the torches of judgment kindling, and every forest is\na torch, and every mountain a torch, and every sea a torch; and while\nthe Alps, the Pyrenees, and Himalayas turn into a live coal, blown\nredder and redder by the whirlwind breath of a God omnipotent, what\nwill become of your refuge of lies?\n\n\"But,\" says some one, \"you are engaged in a very mean business,\ndriving us from tower to tower.\" Oh, no. I want to tell you of a\nGibraltar that never has been and never will be taken; of a wall that\nno satanic assault can scale; of a bulwark that the judgment\nearthquakes can not budge. The Bible refers to it when it says: \"In\nGod is thy refuge, and underneath thee are the everlasting arms.\" Oh,\nfling yourself into it! Tread down unceremoniously everything that\nintercepts you. Wedge your way there. There are enough hounds of death\nand peril after you to make you hurry. Many a man has perished just\noutside the tower, with his foot on the step, with his hand on the\nlatch. Oh, get inside! Not one surplus second have you to spare.\nQuick, quick, quick!\n\nGreat God, is life such an uncertain thing? If I bear a little too\nhard with my right foot on the earth, does it break through into the\ngrave? Is this world, which swings at the speed of thousands of miles\nan hour around the sun, going with tenfold more speed toward the\njudgment-day? Oh, I am overborne with the thought; and in the\nconclusion I cry to one and I cry to the other: \"Oh, time! Oh,\neternity! Oh, the dead! Oh, the judgment-day! Oh, Jesus! Oh, God!\"\nBut, catching at the last apostrophe, I feel that I have something to\nhold on to: for \"in God is thy refuge, and underneath thee are the\neverlasting arms.\" And, exhausted with my failure to save myself, I\nthrow my whole weight of body, mind, and soul on this divine promise,\nas a weary child throws itself into the arms of its mother; as a\nwounded soldier throws himself on the hospital pillow; as a pursued\nman throws himself into the refuge; for \"in God is thy refuge, and\nunderneath thee are the everlasting arms.\" Oh, for a flood of tears\nwith which to express the joy of this eternal rescue!\n\n\n\n\nALL THE WORLD AKIN.\n\n    \"And hath made of one blood all nations of men.\"--ACTS xvii: 26.\n\n\nSome have supposed that God originally made an Asiatic Adam and a\nEuropean Adam and an African Adam and an American Adam, but that\ntheory is entirely overthrown by my text, which says that all nations\nare blood relatives, having sprung from one and the same stock. A\ndifference in climate makes much of the difference in national temper.\n\nAn American goes to Europe and stays there a long while, and finds his\npulse moderating and his temper becoming more calm. The air on this\nside the ocean is more tonic than on the other side. An American\nbreathes more oxygen than a European. A European coming to America\nfinds a great change taking place in himself. He walks with more rapid\nstrides, and finds his voice becoming keener and shriller. The\nEnglishman who walks in London Strand at the rate of three miles the\nhour, coming to America and residing for a long while here, walks\nBroadway at the rate of four miles the hour. Much of the difference\nbetween an American and a European, between an Asiatic and an African,\nis atmospheric. The lack of the warm sunlight pales the Greenlander.\nThe full dash of the sunlight darkens the African.\n\nThen, ignorance or intelligence makes its impression on the physical\norganism--in the one case ignorance flattening the skull, as with the\nEgyptian; in the other case intelligence building up the great dome of\nthe forehead, as with the German. Then the style of god that the\nnation worships decides how much it shall be elevated or debased, so\nthat those nations that worship reptiles are themselves only a\nsuperior form of reptile, while those nations that worship the natural\nsun in the heavens are the noblest style of barbaric people. But\nwhatever be the difference of physiognomy, and whatever the difference\nof temperament, the physiologist tells us that after careful analysis\nhe finds out that the plasma and the disk in the human blood have the\nsame characteristics: so that if you should put twenty men from twenty\nnationalities abreast in line of battle, and a bullet should fly\nthrough the hearts of the twenty men, the blood flowing forth would,\nthrough analysis, prove itself to be the same blood in every instance.\nIn other words, the science of the day confirming the truth of my text\nthat \"God hath made of one blood all nations of men.\"\n\nI have thought, my friends, it might be profitable this morning if I\ngave you some of the moral and religious impressions which I received\nwhen, through your indulgence, I had transatlantic absence. First, I\nobserve that the majority of people in all lands are in a mighty\nstruggle for bread. While in nearly all lands there are only a few\ncases of actual starvation reported, there is a vast population in\nevery country I visited who have a limited supply of food, or such\nfood as is incompetent to sustain physical vigor. This struggle in\nsome lands is becoming more agonizing, while here and there it is\nlightened. I have joy in reporting that Ireland, about the sufferings\nof which we have heard so much, has far better prospects than I have\nseen there in previous visits. In 1879, coming home from that land, I\nprophesied the famine that must come upon, and did come upon, the\ndeluged fields of that country. This year the crops are large, and\nboth parties--those who like the English Government and those who\ndon't like it--are expecting relief. I said to one of the intelligent\nmen of Ireland: \"Tell me in a few words what are the sufferings of\nIreland, and what is the Land Relief enactment?\" He replied: \"I will\ntell you. Suppose I am a landlord and you a tenant. You rent from me a\nplace for ten pounds a year. You improve it. You turn it from a bog\ninto a garden. You put a house upon it. After a while I, the landlord,\ncome around, and I say to my agent: 'How much rent is this man\npaying;' He answers, 'Ten pounds.' 'Is that all? Put his rent up to\ntwenty pounds.' The tenant goes on improving his property, and after\nawhile I come around and I say to my agent, 'How much rent is this man\npaying?' He says, 'Twenty pounds.' 'Put his rent up to twenty-five\npounds.' The tenant protests and says, 'I can't pay it.' Then I, the\nlandlord, say, 'Pay it or get out;' and the tenant is helpless, and,\nleaving the place, the property in its improved condition turns over\nto the landlord. Now, to stop that outrage the Relief Enactment comes\nin and appoints commissioners who shall see that if the tenant is\nturned out, he shall receive the difference of value between the farm\nas he got it and the farm as he surrenders it. Moreover, the\ngovernment loans money to the tenant, so that he may buy the property\nout and out if the landlord will sell.\" Mighty advancement toward the\nrighting of a great wrong! But there and in all lands, not excepting\nour own, there is a far-reaching distress. And let those who broke\ntheir fast this morning, and those who shall dine to-day, remember\nthose who are in want, and by prayer and practical beneficence do all\nthey can to alleviate the hunger swoon of nations.\n\nAnother impression was--indeed the impression carried with me all the\nsummer--the thought already suggested, the brotherhood of man. The\nfact is that the differences are so small between nations that they\nmay be said to be all alike. Though I spent the most of the summer in\nsilence, I spoke a few times and to people of different nations, and\nhow soon I noticed that they were very much alike! If a man knows how\nto play the piano, it does not make any difference whether he finds it\nin New Orleans or San Francisco or Boston or St. Petersburg or Moscow\nor Madras; it has so many keys, and he puts his fingers right on them.\nAnd the human heart is a divine instrument, with just so many keys in\nall cases, and you strike some of them and there is joy, and you\nstrike some of them and there is sorrow. Plied by the same motives,\nlifted up by the same success, depressed by the same griefs. The\ncab-men of London have the same characteristics as the cab-men of New\nYork, and are just as modest and retiring. The gold and silver drive\nPiccadilly and the Boulevards just as they drive Wall Street. If there\nbe a great political excitement in Europe, the Bourse in Paris howls\njust as loudly as ever did the American gold-room.\n\nThe same grief that we saw in our country in 1864 you may find now in\nthe military hospitals of England containing the wounded and sick from\nthe Egyptian wars. The same widowhood and orphanage that sat down in\ndespair after the battles of Shiloh and South Mountain poured their\ngrief in the Shannon and the Clyde and the Dee and the Thames. Oh, ye\nmen and women who know how to pray, never get up from your knees until\nyou have implored God in behalf of the fourteen hundred millions of\nthe race just like yourselves, finding life a tremendous struggle! For\nwho knows but that as the sun to-day draws up drops of water from the\nCaspian and the Black seas and from the Amazon and the Mississippi,\nafter a while to distill the rain, these very drops on the fields--who\nknows but that the sun of righteousness may draw up the tears of your\nsympathy, and then rain them down in distillation of comfort o'er all\nthe world?\n\nWho is that poor man, carried on a stretcher to the Afghan ambulance?\nHe is your brother. If in the Pantheon at Paris you smite your hand\nagainst the wall among the tombs of the dead, you will hear a very\nstrange echo coming from all parts of the Pantheon just as soon as you\nsmite the wall. And I suppose it is so arranged that every stroke of\nsorrow among the tombs of bereavement ought to have loud, long, and\noft-repeated echoes of sympathy all around the world. Oh, what a\nbeautiful theory it is--and it is a Christian theory--that Englishman,\nScotchman, Irishman, Norwegian, Frenchman, Italian, Russian, are all\nakin. Of one blood all nations. That is a very beautiful inscription\nthat I saw a few days ago over the door in Edinburgh, the door of the\nhouse where John Knox used to live. It is getting somewhat dim now,\nbut there is the inscription, fit for the door of any household--\"Love\nGod above all, and your neighbor as yourself.\"\n\nI was also impressed in journeying on the other side the sea with the\ndifference the Bible makes in countries. The two nations of Europe\nthat are the most moral to-day and that have the least crime are\nScotland and Wales. They have by statistics, as you might find, fewer\nthefts, fewer arsons, fewer murders. What is the reason? A bad book\ncan hardly live in Wales. The Bible crowds it out. I was told by one\nof the first literary men in Wales: \"There is not a bad book in the\nWelsh language.\" He said: \"Bad books come down from London, but they\ncan not live here.\" It is the Bible that is dominant in Wales. And\nthen in Scotland just open your Bible to give out your text, and there\nis a rustling all over the house almost startling to an American. What\nis it? The people opening their Bibles to find the text, looking at\nthe context, picking out the referenced passages, seeing whether you\nmake right quotation. Scotland and Wales Bible-reading people. That\naccounts for it. A man, a city, a nation that reads God's Word must be\nvirtuous. That Book is the foe of all wrong-doing. What makes\nEdinburgh better than Constantinople? The Bible.\n\nOh, I am afraid in America we are allowing the good book to be covered\nup with other good books! We have our ever-welcome morning and evening\nnewspapers, and we have our good books on all subjects--geological\nsubjects, botanical subjects, physiological subjects, theological\nsubjects--good books, beautiful books, and so many good books that we\nhave not time to read the Bible. Oh, my friends, it is not a matter of\nvery great importance that you have a family Bible on the center-table\nin your parlor! Better have one pocket New Testament, the passages\nmarked, the leaves turned down, the binding worn smooth with much\nusage, than fifty pictorial family Bibles too handsome to read! Oh,\nlet us take a whisk-broom and brush the dust off our Bibles! Do you\nwant poetry? Go and hear Job describe the war-horse, or David tell how\nthe mountains skipped like lambs. Do you want logic? Go and hear Paul\nreason until your brain aches under the spell of his mighty intellect.\nDo you want history? Go and see Moses put into a few pages stupendous\ninformation which Herodotus, Thucydides, and Prescott never preached\nafter. And, above all, if you want to find how a nation struck down by\nsin can rise to happiness and to heaven, read of that blood which can\nwash away the pollution of a world. There is one passage in the Bible\nof vast tonnage: \"God so loved the world that He gave His only\nbegotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but\nhave everlasting life.\" Oh, may God fill this country with Bibles and\nhelp the people to read them!\n\nI was also impressed in my transatlantic journeys with the wonderful\npower that Christ holds among the nations. The great name in Europe\nto-day is not Victoria, not Marquis of Salisbury, not William the\nEmperor, not Bismarck; the great name in Europe to-day is Christ. You\nfind the crucifix on the gate-post, you find it in the hay field, you\nfind it at the entrance of the manor, you find it by the side of the\nroad.\n\nThe greatest pictures in all the galleries of Italy, Germany, France,\nEngland, and Scotland are Bible pictures. What were the subjects of\nRaphael's great paintings? \"The Transfiguration,\" \"The Miraculous\nDraught of Fishes,\" \"The Charge to Peter,\" \"The Holy Family,\" \"The\nMassacre of the Innocents,\" \"Moses at the Burning Bush,\" \"The\nNativity,\" \"Michael the Archangel,\" and the four or five exquisite\n\"Madonnas.\" What are Tintoretto's great pictures? \"Fall of Adam,\"\n\"Cain and Abel,\" \"The Plague of the Fiery Serpent,\" \"Paradise,\" \"Agony\nin the Garden,\" \"The Temptation,\" \"The Adoration of the Magi,\" \"The\nCommunication,\" \"Baptism,\" \"Massacre of the Innocents,\" \"The Flight\ninto Egypt,\" \"The Crucifixion,\" \"The Madonna.\" What are Titian's great\npictures? \"The Flagellation of Christ,\" \"The Supper at Emmaus,\" \"The\nDeath of Abel,\" \"The Assumption,\" \"The Entombment,\" \"Faith,\" \"The\nMadonna.\" What are Michael Angelo's great pictures? \"The\nAnnunciation,\" \"The Spirits in Prison,\" \"At the feet of Christ,\" \"The\nInfant Christ,\" \"The Crucifixion,\" \"The Last Judgment.\" What are Paul\nVeronese's great pictures? \"Queen of Sheba,\" \"The Marriage in Cana,\"\n\"Magdalen Washing the Feet of Christ,\" \"The Holy Family.\" Who has not\nheard of Da Vinci's \"Last Supper\"? Who has not heard of Turner's\n\"Pools of Solomon\"? Who has not heard of Claude's \"Marriage of Isaac\nand Rebecca\"? Who has not heard of D\u00fcrer's \"Dragon of the\nApocalypse\"? The mightiest picture on this planet is Rubens'\n\"Scourging of Christ.\" Painter's pencil loves to sketch the face of\nChrist. Sculptor's chisel loves to present the form of Christ. Organs\nlove to roll forth the sorrows of Christ.\n\nThe first time you go to London go into the Dor\u00e9 picture gallery. As I\nwent and sat down before \"Christ Descending the Steps of the\nPr\u00e6torium,\" at the first I was disappointed. I said: \"There isn't\nenough majesty in that countenance, not enough tenderness in that\neye;\" but as I sat and looked at the picture it grew upon me until I\nwas overwhelmed with its power, and I staggered with emotion as I went\nout into the fresh air, and said; \"Oh, for that Christ I must live,\nand for that Christ I must be willing to die!\" Make that Christ your\npersonal friend, my sister, my brother. You may never go to Milan to\nsee Da Vinci's \"Last Supper;\" but, better than that, you can have\nChrist come and sup with you. You may never get to Antwerp to see\nRubens' \"Descent of Christ from the Cross,\" but you can have Christ\ncome down from the mountain of His suffering into your heart and abide\nthere forever. Oh, you must have Him! We are all so diseased with sin\nthat we want that which hurts us, and we won't have that which cures\nus. The best thing for you and for me to do to-day is to get down on\nour bended knees before God and say: \"Oh, Almighty Son of God, I am\nblind! I want to see. My arms are palsied. I want to take hold of thy\ncross. Have mercy on me, O Lord Jesus!\" Why will you live on husks\nwhen you may sit down to this white bread of heaven? Oh, with such a\nGod, and with such a Christ, and with such a Holy Spirit, and with\nsuch an immortal nature, wake up!\n\nOnce more, I was impressed greatly on the other side the sea with the\nwonderful triumphs of the Christian religion. The tide is rising, the\ntide of moral and spiritual prosperity in the world. I think that any\nman who keeps his eyes open, traveling in foreign lands, will come to\nthat conclusion. More Bibles than ever before, more churches, more\nconsecrated men and women, more people ready to be martyrs now than\never before, if need be; so that instead of there being, as people\nsometimes say, less spirit of martyrdom now than ever before, I\nbelieve where there was once one martyr there would be a thousand\nmartyrs if the fires were kindled--men ready to go through flood and\nfire for Christ's sake. Oh, the signs are promising! The world is on\nthe way to millennial brightness. All art, all invention, all\nliterature, all commerce will be the Lord's.\n\nThese ships that you see going up and down New York harbor are to be\nbrought into the service of God. All those ships I saw at Liverpool,\nat Southampton, at Glasgow, are to be brought into the service of\nChrist. What is that passage, \"Ships of Tarshish shall bring\npresents\"? That is what it means. Oh, what a goodly fleet when the\nvessels of the sea come into the service of God! No guns frowning\nthrough the port-holes, no pikes hung in the gangway, nothing from\ncut-water to taffrail to suggest atrocity. Those ships will come from\nall parts of the seas. Great flocks of ships that never met on the\nhigh sea but in wrath, will cry, \"Ship ahoy!\" and drop down beside\neach other in calmness, the flags of Emmanuel streaming from the\ntop-gallants. The old slaver, with decks scrubbed and washed and\nglistened and burnished--the old slaver will wheel into line; and the\nChinese junk and the Venetian gondola, and the miners' and the\npirates' corvette, will fall into line, equipped, readorned,\nbeautified, only the small craft of this grand flotilla which shall\nfloat out for the truth--a flotilla mightier than the armada of Xerxes\nmoving in the pomp and pride of Persian insolence; mightier than the\nCarthaginian navy rushing with forty thousand oarsmen upon the Roman\ngalleys, the life of nations dashed out against the gunwales.\n\nRise, O sea! and shine, O heavens! to greet this squadron of light and\nvictory! On the glistening decks are the feet of them that bring good\ntidings, and songs of heaven float among the rigging. Crowd on all the\ncanvas. Line-of-battle ship and merchantmen wheel into the way. It is\nnoon. Strike eight bells. From all the squadron the sailors' songs\narise. \"Surely the isles shall wait for thee, and the ships of\nTarshish to bring thy sons from afar, their silver and their gold with\nthem, to the name of the Lord thy God, and the Holy One of Israel.\"\n\n\n\n\nA MOMENTOUS QUEST.\n\n    \"Seek ye the Lord while he may be found.\"--ISA. lv: 6.\n\n\nIsaiah stands head and shoulders above the other Old Testament authors\nin vivid descriptiveness of Christ. Other prophets give an outline of\nour Saviour's features. Some of them present, as it were, the side\nface of Christ; others a bust of Christ; but Isaiah gives us the\nfull-length portrait of Christ. Other Scripture writers excel in some\nthings. Ezekiel more weird, David more pathetic, Solomon more\nepigrammatic, Habakkuk more sublime; but when you want to see Christ\ncoming out from the gates of prophecy in all His grandeur and glory,\nyou involuntarily turn to Isaiah. So that if the prophecies in regard\nto Christ might be called the \"Oratorio of the Messiah,\" the writing\nof Isaiah is the \"Hallelujah Chorus,\" where all the batons wave and\nall the trumpets come in. Isaiah was not a man picked up out of\ninsignificance by inspiration. He was known and honored. Josephus, and\nPhilo, and Sirach extolled him in their writings. What Paul was among\nthe apostles, Isaiah was among the prophets.\n\nMy text finds him standing on a mountain of inspiration, looking out\ninto the future, beholding Christ advancing and anxious that all men\nmight know Him; his voice rings down the ages: \"Seek ye the Lord while\nHe may be found.\" \"Oh,\" says some one: \"that was for olden times.\"\nNo, my hearer. If you have traveled in other lands you have taken a\ncircular letter of credit from some banking-house in New York, and in\nSt. Petersburg, or Venice, or Rome, or Antwerp, or Brussels, or Paris;\nyou presented that letter and got financial help immediately. And I\nwant you to understand that the text, instead of being appropriate for\none age, or for one land, is a circular letter for all ages and for\nall lands, and wherever it is presented for help, the help comes:\n\"Seek ye the Lord while He may be found.\"\n\nI come, to-day, with no hair-spun theories of religion, with no nice\ndistinctions, with no elaborate disquisition; but with a plain talk on\nthe matters of personal religion. I feel that the sermon I preach this\nmorning will be the savor of life unto life, or of death unto death.\nIn other words, the Gospel of Christ is a powerful medicine: it either\nkills or cures. There are those who say: \"I would like to become a\nChristian, I have been waiting a good while for the right kind of\ninfluences to come;\" and still you are waiting. You are wiser in\nworldly things than you are in religious things. If you want to get to\nAlbany, you go to the Grand Central Depot, or to the steam-boat wharf,\nand, having got your ticket, you do not sit down on the wharf or sit\nin the depot; you get aboard the boat or train. And yet there are men\nwho say they are waiting to get to heaven--waiting, waiting, but not\nwith intelligent waiting, or they would get on board the line of\nChristian influences that would bear them into the kingdom of God.\n\nNow you know very well that to seek a thing is to search for it with\nearnest endeavor. If you want to see a certain man in New York, and\nthere is a matter of $10,000 connected with your seeing him, and you\ncan not at first find him, you do not give up the search. You look in\nthe directory, but can not find the name; you go in circles where you\nthink, perhaps, he may mingle, and, having found the part of the city\nwhere he lives, but perhaps not knowing the street, you go through\nstreet after street, and from block to block, and you keep on\nsearching for weeks and for months.\n\nYou say: \"It is a matter of $10,000 whether I see him or not.\" Oh,\nthat men were as persistent in seeking for Christ! Had you one half\nthat persistence you would long ago have found Him who is the joy of\nthe forgiven spirit. We may pay our debts, we may attend church, we\nmay relieve the poor, we may be public benefactors, and yet all our\nlife disobey the text, never seek God, never gain heaven. Oh, that the\nSpirit of God would help this morning while I try to show you, in\ncarrying out the idea of my text, first, how to seek the Lord, and in\nthe next place, when to seek Him. \"Seek ye the Lord while He may be\nfound.\"\n\nI remark, in the first place, you are to seek the Lord through earnest\nand believing prayer. God is not an autocrat or a despot seated on a\nthrone, with His arms resting on brazen lions, and a sentinel pacing\nup and down at the foot of the throne. God is a father seated in a\nbower, waiting for His children to come and climb on His knee, and get\nHis kiss and His benediction. Prayer is the cup with which we go to\nthe \"fountain of living water,\" and dip up refreshment for our\nthirsty soul. Grace does not come to the heart as we set a cask at the\ncorner of the house to catch the rain in the shower. It is a pulley\nfastened to the throne of God, which we pull, bringing the blessing.\n\nI do not care so much what posture you take in prayer, nor how large\nan amount of voice you use. You might get down on your face before\nGod, if you did not pray right inwardly, and there would be no\nresponse. You might cry at the top of your voice, and unless you had a\nbelieving spirit within, your cry would not go further up than the\nshout of a plow-boy to his oxen. Prayer must be believing, earnest,\nloving. You are in your house some summer day, and a shower comes up,\nand a bird, affrighted, darts into the window, and wheels about the\nroom. You seize it. You smooth its ruffled plumage. You feel its\nfluttering heart. You say, \"Poor thing, poor thing!\" Now, a prayer\ngoes out of the storm of this world into the window of God's mercy,\nand He catches it, and He feels its fluttering pulse, and He puts it\nin His own bosom of affection and safety. Prayer is a warm, ardent,\npulsating exercise. It is the electric battery which, touched, thrills\nto the throne of God! It is the diving-bell in which we go down into\nthe depths of God's mercy and bring up \"pearls of great price.\" There\nwas an instance where prayer made the waves of the Gennesaret solid as\nRuss pavement. Oh, how many wonderful things prayer has accomplished!\nHave you ever tried it? In the days when the Scotch Covenanters were\npersecuted, and the enemies were after them, one of the head men\namong the Covenanters prayed: \"Oh, Lord, we be as dead men unless Thou\nshalt help us! Oh, Lord, throw the lap of Thy cloak over these poor\nthings!\" And instantly a Scotch mist enveloped and hid the persecuted\nfrom their persecutors--the promise literally fulfilled: \"While they\nare yet speaking I will hear.\"\n\nOh, impenitent soul, have you ever tried the power of prayer? God\nsays: \"He is loving, and faithful, and patient.\" Do you believe that?\nYou are told that Christ came to save sinners. Do you believe that?\nYou are told that all you have to do to get the pardon of the Gospel\nis to ask for it. Do you believe that? Then come to Him and say: \"Oh,\nLord! I know Thou canst not lie. Thou hast told me to come for pardon,\nand I could get it. I come, Lord. Keep Thy promise, and liberate my\ncaptive soul.\"\n\nOh, that you might have an altar in the parlor, in the kitchen, in the\nstore, in the barn, for Christ will be willing to come again to the\nmanger to hear prayer. He would come in your place of business, as He\nconfronted Matthew, the tax commissioner. If a measure should come\nbefore Congress that you thought would ruin the nation, how you would\nsend in petitions and remonstrances! And yet there has been enough sin\nin your heart to ruin it forever, and you have never remonstrated or\npetitioned against it. If your physical health failed, and you had the\nmeans, you would go and spend the summer in Germany, and the winter in\nItaly, and you would think it a very cheap outlay if you had to go all\nround the earth to get back your physical health. Have you made any\neffort, any expenditure, any exertion for your immortal and spiritual\nhealth? No, you have not taken one step.\n\nO that you might now begin to seek after God with earnest prayer. Some\nof you have been working for years and years for the support of your\nfamilies. Have you given one half day to the working out of your\nsalvation with fear and trembling? You came here this morning with an\nearnest purpose, I take it, as I have come hither with an earnest\npurpose, and we meet face to face, and I tell you, first of all, if\nyou want to find the Lord, you must pray, and pray, and pray.\n\nI remark again, you must seek the Lord through Bible study. The Bible\nis the newest book in the world. \"Oh,\" you say, \"it was made hundreds\nof years ago, and the learned men of King James translated it hundreds\nof years ago.\" I confute that idea by telling you it is not five\nminutes old, when God, by His blessed Spirit, retranslates it into the\nheart. If you will, in the seeking of the way of life through\nScripture study, implore God's light to fall upon the page, you will\nfind that these promises are not one second old, and that they drop\nstraight from the throne of God into your heart.\n\nThere are many people to whom the Bible does not amount to much. If\nthey merely look at the outside beauty, why it will no more lead them\nto Christ than Washington's farewell address or the Koran of Mohammed\nor the Shaster of the Hindoos. It is the inward light of God's Word\nyou must get or die. I went up to the church of the Madeleine, in\nParis, and looked at the doors which were the most wonderfully\nconstructed I ever saw, and I could have stayed there for a whole\nweek; but I had only a little time, so, having glanced at the\nwonderful carving on the doors, I passed in and looked at the radiant\naltars, and the sculptured dome. Alas, that so many stop at the\noutside door of God's Holy Word, looking at the rhetorical beauties,\ninstead of going in and looking at the altars of sacrifice and the\ndome of God's mercy and salvation that hovers over penitent and\nbelieving souls!\n\nO my friends! if you merely want to study the laws of language, do not\ngo to the Bible. It was not made for that. Take \"Howe's Elements of\nCriticism\"--it will be better than the Bible for that. If you want to\nstudy metaphysics, better than the Bible will be the writings of\nWilliam Hamilton. But if you want to know how to have sin pardoned,\nand at last to gain the blessedness of Heaven, search the Scriptures,\n\"for in them ye have eternal life.\"\n\nWhen people are anxious about their souls--and there are some such\nhere to-day--there are those who recommend good books. That is all\nright. But I want to tell you that the Bible is the best book under\nsuch circumstances. Baxter wrote \"A Call to the Unconverted,\" but the\nBible is the best call to the unconverted. Philip Doddridge wrote \"The\nRise and Progress of Religion in the Soul,\" but the Bible is the best\nrise and progress. John Angell James wrote \"Advice to the Anxious\nInquirer,\" but the Bible is the best advice to the anxious inquirer.\n\nO, the Bible is the very book you need, anxious and inquiring soul! A\ndying soldier said to his mate: \"Comrade, give me a drop!\" The comrade\nshook up the canteen, and said: \"There isn't a drop of water in the\ncanteen.\" \"Oh,\" said the dying soldier, \"that's not what I want; feel\nin my knapsack for my Bible,\" and his comrade found the Bible, and\nread him a few of the gracious promises, and the dying soldier said:\n\"Ah, that's what I want. There isn't anything like the Bible for a\ndying soldier, is there, my comrade?\" O blessed book while we live!\nBlessed book when we die!\n\nI remark, again, we must seek God through church ordinances. \"What,\"\nsay you, \"can't a man be saved without going to church?\" I reply,\nthere are men, I suppose, in glory, who have never seen a church: but\nthe church is the ordained means by which we are to be brought to God;\nand if truth affects us when we are alone, it affects us more mightily\nwhen we are in the assembly--the feelings of others emphasizing our\nown feelings. The great law of sympathy comes into play, and a truth\nthat would take hold only with the grasp of a sick man, beats mightily\nagainst the soul with a thousand heart-throbs.\n\nWhen you come into the religious circle, come only with one notion,\nand only for one purpose--to find the way to Christ. When I see people\ncritical about sermons, and critical about tones of voice, and\ncritical about sermonic delivery, they make me think of a man in\nprison. He is condemned to death, but an officer of the government\nbrings a pardon and puts it through the wicket of the prison, and\nsays: \"Here is your pardon. Come and get it.\" \"What! Do you expect me\nto take that pardon offered with such a voice as you have, with such\nan awkward manner as you have? I would rather die than so compromise\nmy rhetorical notions!\" Ah, the man does not say that; he takes it! It\nis his life. He does not care how it is handed to him. And if, this\nmorning, that pardon from the throne of God is offered to our souls,\nshould we not seize it, regardless of all criticism, feeling that it\nis a matter of heaven or hell?\n\nBut I come now to the last part of my text. It tells us when we are to\nseek the Lord. \"While He may be found.\" When is that? Old age? You may\nnot see old age. To-morrow? You may not see to-morrow. To-night? You\nmay not see to-night. Now! O if I could only write on every heart in\nthree capital letters, that word N-O-W--Now!\n\nSin is an awful disease. I hear people say with a toss of the head and\nwith a trivial manner: \"Oh, yes, I'm a sinner.\" Sin is an awful\ndisease. It is leprosy. It is dropsy. It is consumption. It is all\nmoral disorders in one. Now you know there is a crisis in a disease.\nPerhaps you have had some illustration of it in your family. Sometimes\nthe physician has called, and he has looked at the patient and said:\n\"That case was simple enough; but the crisis has passed. If you had\ncalled me yesterday, or this morning, I could have cured the patient.\nIt is too late now; the crisis has passed.\" Just so it is in the\nspiritual treatment of the soul--there is a crisis. Before that, life!\nAfter that, death! O my dear brother, as you love your soul do not let\nthe crisis pass unattended to!\n\nThere are some here who can remember instances in life when, if they\nhad bought a certain property, they would have become very rich. A few\nacres that would have cost them almost nothing were offered them.\nThey refused them. Afterward a large village or city sprung up on\nthose acres of ground, and they see what a mistake they made in not\nbuying the property. There was an opportunity of getting it. It never\ncame back again. And so it is in regard to a man's spiritual and\neternal fortune. There is a chance; if you let that go, perhaps it\nnever comes back. Certainly, that one never comes back.\n\nA gentleman told me that at the battle of Gettysburg he stood upon a\nheight looking off upon the conflicting armies. He said it was the\nmost exciting moment of his life; now one army seeming to triumph, and\nnow the other. After awhile the host wheeled in such a way that he\nknew in five minutes the whole question would be decided. He said the\nemotion was almost unbearable. There is just such a time to-day with\nyou, O impenitent soul!--the forces of light on the one side, and the\nsiege-guns of hell on the other side, and in a few moments the matter\nwill be settled for eternity.\n\nThere is a time which mercy has set for leaving port. If you are on\nboard before that, you will get a passage for heaven. If you are not\non board, you miss your passage for heaven. As in law courts a case is\nsometimes adjourned from term to term, and from year to year till the\nbill of costs eats up the entire estate, so there are men who are\nadjourning the matter of religion from time to time, and from year to\nyear, until heavenly bliss is the bill of costs the man will have to\npay for it.\n\nWhy defer this matter, oh, my dear hearer? Have you any idea that sin\nwill wear out? that it will evaporate? that it will relax its grasp?\nthat you may find religion as a man accidentally finds a lost\npocket-book? Ah, no! No man ever became a Christian by accident, or by\nthe relaxing of sin. The embarrassments are all the time increasing.\nThe hosts of darkness are recruiting, and the longer you postpone this\nmatter the steeper the path will become. I ask those men who are\nbefore me this morning, whether, in the ten or fifteen years they have\npassed in the postponement of these matters, they have come any nearer\nGod or heaven?\n\nI would not be afraid to challenge this whole audience, so far as they\nmay not have found the peace of the Gospel, in regard to the matter.\nYour hearts, you are willing frankly to tell me, are becoming harder\nand harder, and that if you come to Christ it will be more of an\nundertaking now than it ever would have been before. Oh, fly for\nrefuge! The avenger of blood is on the track! The throne of judgment\nwill soon be set; and, if you have anything to do toward your eternal\nsalvation, you had better do it now, for the redemption of your soul\nis precious, and it ceaseth forever!\n\nOh, if men could only catch just one glimpse of Christ, I know they\nwould love Him! Your heart leaps at the sight of a glorious sunrise or\nsunset. Can you be without emotion as the Sun of Righteousness rises\nbehind Calvary, and sets behind Joseph's sepulcher? He is a blessed\nSaviour! Every nation has its type of beauty. There is German beauty,\nand Swiss beauty, and Italian beauty, and English beauty; but I care\nnot in what land a man first looks at Christ, he pronounces Him \"chief\namong ten thousand, and the One altogether lovely.\" O my blessed\nJesus! Light in darkness! The Rock on which I build! The Captain of\nSalvation! My joy! My strength! How strange it is that men can not\nlove Thee!\n\nThe diamond districts of Brazil are carefully guarded, and a man does\nnot get in there except by a pass from the government; but the love of\nChrist is a diamond district we may all enter, and pick up treasures\nfor eternity. Oh, cry for mercy! \"To-day, if ye will hear His voice,\nharden not your hearts.\" There is a way of opposing the mercy of God\ntoo long, and then there remaineth no more sacrifice for sin, but a\nfearful looking for judgment and fiery indignation, which shall devour\nthe adversary. My friends, my neighbors, what can I say to induce you\nto attend to this matter--to attend to it now? Time is flying,\nflying--the city clock joining my voice this moment, seeming to say to\nyou, \"Now is the time! Now is the time!\" Oh, put it not off!\n\nWhy should I stand here and plead, and you sit there? It is your\nimmortal soul. It is a soul that shall never die. It is a soul that\nmust soon appear before God for review. Why throw away your chance for\nheaven? Why plunge off into darkness when all the gates of glory are\nopen? Why become a castaway from God when you can sit upon the throne?\nWhy will ye die miserably when eternal life is offered you, and it\nwill cost you nothing but just willingness to accept it? \"Come, for\nall things are now ready.\" Come, Christ is ready, pardon is ready! The\nChurch is ready. Heaven is ready. You will never find a more\nconvenient season, if you should live fifty years more, than this\nvery one. Reject this, and you may die in your sins. Why do I say\nthis? Is it to frighten your soul? Oh, no! It is to persuade you. I\nshow you the peril. I show you the escape. Would I not be a coward\nbeyond all excuse, if, believing that this great audience must soon be\nlaunched into the eternal world, and that all who believe in Christ\nshall be saved, and that all who reject Christ will be lost--would I\nnot be the veriest coward on earth to hide that truth or to stand\nbefore you with a cold, or even a placid manner? My dear brethren, now\nis the day of your redemption.\n\nIt is very certain that you and I must soon appear before God in\njudgment. We can not escape it. The Bible says: \"Every eye shall see\nHim, and they also which pierced Him, and all the kindreds of the\nearth shall wail because of Him.\" On that day all our advantages will\ncome up for our glory or for our discomfiture--every prayer, every\nsermon, every exhortatory remark, every reproof, every call of grace;\nand while the heavens are rolling away like a scroll, and the world is\nbeing destroyed, your destiny and my destiny will be announced. Alas!\nalas! if on that day it is found that we have neglected these matters.\nWe may throw them off now. We can not then. We will all be in earnest\nthen. But no pardon then. No offer of salvation then. No rescue then.\nDriven away in our wickedness--banished, exiled, forever!\n\nHave you ever imagined what will be the soliloquy of the soul on that\nday unpardoned, as it looks back upon its past life? \"Oh,\" says the\nsoul, \"I had glorious Sabbaths! There was one Sabbath in autumn when\nI was invited to Christ. There was a Sabbath morning when Jesus stood\nand spread out His arm and invited me to His holy heart. I refused\nHim. I have destroyed myself. I have no one else to blame. Ruin\ncomplete! Darkness unpitying, deep, eternal! I am lost!\nNotwithstanding all the opportunities I have had of being saved, I am\nlost! O Thou long-suffering Lord God Almighty, I am lost! O day of\njudgment, I am lost! O father, mother, brother, sister, child in\nglory, I am lost!\" And then as the tide goes out, your soul goes out\nwith it--further from God, further from happiness, and I hear your\nvoice fainter, and fainter, and fainter: \"Lost! Lost! Lost! Lost!\nLost!\" O ye dying, yet immortal men, \"seek the Lord while He may be\nfound.\"\n\nBut I want you to take the hint of the text that I have no time to\ndwell on--the hint that there is a time when He can not be found.\nThere is a man in New York, eighty years of age, who said to a\nclergyman who came in, \"Do you think that a man at eighty years of age\ncan get pardoned?\" \"Oh, yes,\" said the clergyman. The old man said: \"I\ncan't; when I was twenty years of age--I am now eighty years--the\nSpirit of God came to my soul, and I felt the importance of attending\nto these things, but I put it off. I rejected God, and since then I\nhave had no feeling.\" \"Well,\" said the minister, \"wouldn't you like to\nhave me pray with you?\" \"Yes,\" replied the old man, \"but it will do no\ngood. You can pray with me if you like to.\" The minister knelt down\nand prayed, and commended the man's soul to God. It seemed to have no\neffect upon him. After awhile the last hour of the man's life came,\nand through his delirium a spark of intelligence seemed to flash, and\nwith his last breath he said; \"I shall never be forgiven!\" \"O seek the\nLord while He may be found.\"\n\n\n\n\nTHE GREAT ASSIZE.\n\nDOCTOR TALMAGE'S SERMON, PREACHED AT CORK, IRELAND,\nSUNDAY MORNING, SEPT 6th, 1885.\n\n    \"When the Son of Man shall come in His glory, and all the holy\n    angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His\n    glory: and before Him shall be gathered all nations: and He\n    shall separate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth\n    his sheep from the goats.\"--MATTHEW xxv: 31, 32.\n\n\nHalf-way between Chamouny, Switzerland, and Martigny, I reined in the\nhorse on which I was riding, and looked off upon the most wonderful\nnatural amphitheater of valley and mountain and rock, and I said to my\ncompanion, \"What an appropriate place this would be for the last\njudgment. Yonder overhanging rock the place for the judgment seat.\nThese galleries of surrounding hills occupied by attendant angels.\nThis vast valley, sweeping miles this way and miles that, the\naudience-room for all nations.\" But sacred geography does not point\nout the place. Yet we know that somewhere, some time, somehow, an\naudience will be gathered together stupendous beyond all statistics,\nand just as certainly as you and I make up a part of this audience\nto-day, we will make up a part of that audience on that day.\n\nA common sense of justice in every man's heart demands that there\nshall be some great winding-up day, in which that which is now\ninexplicable shall be explained.\n\nWhy did that good man suffer, and that bad man prosper? You say, \"I\ndon't know, but I must know.\" Why is that good Christian woman dying\nof what is called a spider cancer, while that daughter of folly sits\nwrapped in luxury, ease, and health? You say, \"I don't know, but I\nmust know.\" There are so many wrongs to be righted that if there were\nnot some great righting-up day in the presence of all ages, there\nwould be an outcry against God from which His glory would never\nrecover. If God did not at last try the nations, the nations would try\nHim. We are, therefore, ready for the announcement of the text. The\nworld never saw Christ except in disguise. If once when He was on\nearth He had let out His glory, instead of the blind eyes being\nhealed, all visions would have been extinguished. No human eye could\nhave endured it. And instead of bringing the dead to life, all around\nabout him would have been the slain under that overpowering\neffulgence. Disguise of human flesh. Disguise of seamless robe.\nDisguise of sandal. Disguise of voice. From Bethlehem caravansary to\nmausoleum in the rock, a complete disguise.\n\nBut on the day of which I speak the Son of Man will come in His glory.\nNo hiding of luster. No sheathing of strength. No suppression of\ngrandeur. No wrapping out of sight of the Godhead. Any fifty of the\nmost brilliant sunsets that you ever saw on land or sea would be dim\nas compared with the cerulean appearance on that day when Christ\nrolls through, and rolls on, and rolls down in His glory. The air will\nbe all abloom with His presence, and everything from horizon to\nhorizon aflame with His splendor.\n\nElijah rode up the sky-steep in a chariot, the wheels of whirling fire\nand the horses of galloping fire, and the charioteer drawing reins of\nfire on bits of fire; but Christ will need no such equipage, for the\nlaw of gravitation will be laid aside, and the natural elements will\nbe laid aside, and Christ will descend swiftly enough to make speedy\narrival, but slowly enough to allow the gaze of millions of\nspectators. In his glory! Glory of form, glory of omnipotence, glory\nof holiness, glory of justice, glory of love. In His glory! An\nunveiled, an uncovered God descending to meet the human race in an\ninterview which will be prolonged only for a few hours, and yet which\nshall settle all the past and all the present and all the future, and\nbe closed before the end of that day, which will close, not with\nsetting sun, but with the destruction of the planet as a snuffers\ntakes off the top of a burned wick.\n\nIt is a solemn time in a court-room when there is an important case on\nhand, and the judge of the Supreme Court enters, and he sits down, and\nwith gavel strikes on the desk commanding bar and jury and witnesses\nand audience into silence. All voices are hushed, all heads are\nuncovered. But how much more impressive when Christ shall take the\njudgment seat on the last day of the last week of the last month of\nthe last year of the world's existence, and with gavel of thunder-bolt\nshall smite the mountains, commanding all the land and all the sea\ninto silence.\n\nCan you have any doubt about who it is on the seat on the judgment\nday? Better make investigation, to see whether there are any scars\nabout Him that reveal His person. Apparel may change. You can not\nalways tell by apparel. But scars will tell the story after all else\nfails. I find under His left arm a scar, and on His right hand a scar,\nand on His left hand a scar, and on His right foot a scar, and on His\nleft foot a scar. Oh, yes, He is the Son of Man in His glory. Every\nmark of wound now a badge of victory, every ridge showing the fearful\ngash now telling the story of pain and sacrifice which He suffered in\nbehalf of the human race.\n\nBut what is all that commotion and flutter, and surging to and fro\nabove Him and on either side of Him? It is a detailed regiment of\nheaven, a constabulary angelic, sent forth to take part in that scene,\nand to execute the mandates that shall be issued. Ten regiments, a\nhundred regiments, a thousand regiments of angels; for on that day all\nheaven will be emptied of its inhabitants to let them attend the\nscene. All the holy angels. From what a center to what a\ncircumference. Widening out and widening out, and higher up and higher\nup. Wings interlocking wings. Galleries of cloud above galleries of\ncloud, all filled with the faces of angels come to listen and come to\nwatch, and come to help on that day for which all other days were\nmade. Who are those two taller and more conspicuous angels? The one is\nMichael, who is the commander of all those who come out to destroy\nsin. The other is Gabriel, who is announced as commander of all those\nwho come forth to help the righteous. Who is that mighty angel near\nthe throne? That is the resurrection angel, his lips still aquiver and\nhis cheek aflush with the blast that shattered the cemeteries and woke\nthe dead. Who is that other great angel, with dark and overshadowing\nbrow? That is the one who in one night, by one flap of his wing,\nturned one hundred and eighty-five thousand of Sennacherib's host into\ncorpses.\n\nWho are those bright immortals near the throne, their faces partly\nturned toward each other as though about to sing? Oh, they are the\nBethlehem chanters of the first Christmas night! Who are this other\ngroup standing so near the throne? They are the Saviour's especial\nbodyguard, which hovered over Him in the wilderness and administered\nto Him in the hour of martyrdom, and heaved away the rock of His\nsarcophagus, and escorted Him upward on Ascension Day, now\nappropriately escorting Him down. Divine glory flanked on both sides\nby angelic radiance.\n\nBut now lower your eye from the divine and angelic to the human. The\nentire human race is present. All nations, says my text. Before that\ntime the American Republic, the English Government, the French\nRepublic, all modern modes of government may be obliterated for\nsomething better; but all nations, whether dead or alive, will be\nbrought up into that assembly. Thebes and Tyre and Babylon and Greece\nand Rome as wide awake in that assembly as though they had never\nslumbered amid the dead nations. Europe, Asia, Africa, North and South\nAmerica, and all the nineteenth century, the eighteenth century, the\ntwelfth century, the tenth century, the fourth century--all centuries\npresent. Not one being that ever drew the breath of life but will be\nin that assembly.\n\nNo other audience a thousandth part as large. No other audience a\nmillionth part as large. No human eye could look across it. Wing of\nalbatross and falcon and eagle not strong enough to fly over it. A\ncongregation, I verily believe, not assembled on any continent,\nbecause no continent would be large enough to hold it. But, as the\nBible intimates, in the air. The law of gravitation unanchored, the\nworld moved out of its place. As now sometimes on earth a great tent\nis spread for some great convention, so over that great audience of\nthe judgment shall be lifted the blue canopy of the sky, and\nunderneath it for floor the air made buoyant by the hand of Almighty\nGod. An architecture of atmospheric galleries strong enough to hold up\nworlds. Surely the two arms of God's almightiness are two pillars\nstrong enough to hold up any auditorium.\n\nBut that audience is not to remain in session long. Most audiences on\nearth after an hour or two adjourn. Sometimes in court-rooms an\naudience will tarry four or five hours, but then it adjourns. So this\naudience spoken of in the text will adjourn. My text says, \"He will\nseparate them one from another as a shepherd divideth the sheep from\nthe goats.\"\n\n\"No,\" says my Universalist friend, \"let them all stay together.\" But\nthe text says, \"He shall separate them.\" \"No,\" say the kings of this\nworld, \"let men have their choice, and if they prefer monarchical\ninstitutions, let them go together, and if they prefer republican\ninstitutions, let them go together.\" \"No,\" say the conventionalities\nof this world, \"let all those who moved in what are called high\ncircles go together, and all those who on earth moved in low circles\ngo together. The rich together, the poor together, the wise together,\nthe ignorant together.\" Ah! no. Do you not notice in that assembly the\nking is without his scepter, and the soldier without his uniform, and\nthe bishop without his pontifical ring, and the millionaire without\nhis certificates of stock, and the convict without his chain, and the\nbeggar without his rags, and the illiterate without his bad\northography, and all of us without any distinction of earthly\ninequality? So I take it from that as well as from my text that the\nmere accident of position in this world will do nothing toward\ndeciding the questions of that very great day.\n\n\"He will separate them as a shepherd divideth the sheep from the\ngoats.\" The sheep, the cleanliest of creatures, here made a symbol of\nthose who have all their sins washed away in the fountain of redeeming\nmercy. The goat, one of the filthiest of creatures, here a type of\nthose who in the last judgment will be found never to have had any\ndivine ablution. Division according to character. Not only character\noutside, but character inside. Character of heart, character of\nchoice, character of allegiance, character of affection, character\ninside as well as character outside.\n\nIn many cases it will be a complete and immediate reversal of all\nearthly conditions. Some who in this world wore patched apparel will\ntake on raiment lustrous as a summer noon. Some who occupied a palace\nwill take a dungeon. Division regardless of all earthly caste, and\nsome who were down will be up, and some who were up will be down. Oh,\nwhat a shattering of conventionalities! What an upheaval of all social\nrigidities, what a turning of the wheel of earthly condition, a\nthousand revolutions in a second! Division of all nations, of all\nages, not by the figure 9, nor the figure 8, nor the figure 7, nor the\nfigure 6, nor the figure 5, nor the figure 4; but by the figure 2.\n\nTwo! Two characters, two destinies, two estates, two dominions, two\neternities, a tremendous, an all-comprehensive, an all-decisive, and\neverlasting two!\n\nI sometimes think that the figure of the book that shall be opened\nallows us to forget the thing signified by the symbol. Where is the\nbook-binder that could make a volume large enough to contain the names\nof all the people who have ever lived? Besides that, the calling of\nsuch a roll would take more than fifty years, more than a hundred\nyears, and the judgment is to be consummated in less time than passes\nbetween sunrise and sunset. Ah! my friends, the leaves of that book of\njudgment are not made out of paper, but of memory. One leaf in every\nhuman heart. You have known persons who were near drowning, but they\nwere afterward resuscitated, and they have told you that in the two or\nthree minutes between the accident and the resuscitation, all their\npast life flashed before them--all they had ever thought, all they had\never done, all they had ever seen, in an instant came to them. The\nmemory never loses anything. It is only a folded leaf. It is only a\nclosed book.\n\nThough you be an octogenarian, though you be a nonagenarian, all the\nthoughts and acts of your life are in your mind, whether you recall\nthem now or not, just as Macaulay's history is in two volumes,\nalthough the volumes may be closed, and you can not see a word of\nthem, and will not until they are opened. As in the case of the\ndrowning man, the volume of memory was partly open, or the leaf partly\nunrolled; in the case of the judgment the entire book will be opened,\nso that everything will be displayed from preface to appendix.\n\nYou have seen self-registering instruments which recorded how many\nrevolutions they had made and what work they had done, so the\nmanufacturer could come days after and look at the instrument and find\njust how many revolutions had been made, or how much work had been\naccomplished. So the human mind is a self-registering instrument, and\nit records all its past movements. Now that leaf, that\nall-comprehensive leaf in your mind and mine this moment, the leaf of\njudgment, brought out under the flash of the judgment throne, you can\neasily see how all the past of our lives in an instant will be seen.\nAnd so great and so resplendent will be the light of that throne that\nnot only this leaf in my heart and that leaf in your heart will be\nrevealed at a flash, but all the leaves will be opened, and you will\nread not only your own character and your own history, but the\ncharacter and history of others.\n\nIn a military encampment the bugle sounded in one way means one thing,\nand sounded in another way it means another thing. Bugle sounded in\none way means, \"Prepare for sudden attack.\" Bugle sounded in another\nway means, \"To your tents, and let all the lights be put out.\" I have\nto tell you, my brother, that the trumpet of the Old Testament, the\ntrumpet that was carried in the armies of olden times, and the trumpet\non the walls in olden times, in the last great day will give\nsignificant reverberation. Old, worn-out, and exhausted Time, having\nmarched across decades and centuries and ages, will halt, and the sun\nand the moon and the stars will halt with it. The trumpet! the\ntrumpet!\n\nPeal the first: Under its power the sea will stretch itself out dead,\nthe white foam on the lip, in its crystal sarcophagus, and the\nmountains will stagger and reel and stumble, and fall into the valleys\nnever to rise. Under one puff of that last cyclone all the candles of\nthe sky will be blown out. The trumpet! the trumpet!\n\nPeal the second: The alabaster halls of the air will be filled with\nthose who will throng up from all the cemeteries of all the ages--from\nGreyfriar's Churchyard and Roman Catacomb, from Westminster Abbey and\nfrom the coral crypts of oceanic cave, and some will rend off the\nbandage of Egyptian mummy, and others will remove from their brow the\ngarland of green sea-weed. From the north and the south and the east\nand the west they come. The dead! The trumpet! the trumpet!\n\nPeal the third: Amid surging clouds and the roar of attendant armies\nof heaven, the Lord comes through, and there are lightnings and\nthunder-bolts, and an earthquake, and a hallelujah, and a wailing. The\ntrumpet! the trumpet!\n\nPeal the fourth: All the records of human life will be revealed. The\nleaf containing the pardoned sin, the leaf containing the unpardoned\nsin. Some clapping hands with joy, some grinding their teeth with\nrage, and all the forgotten past becomes a vivid present. The trumpet!\nthe trumpet!\n\nPeal the last: The audience breaks up. The great trial is ended. The\nhigh court of heaven adjourns. The audience hie themselves to their\ntwo termini. They rise, they rise! They sink, they sink! Then the blue\ntent of the sky will be lifted and folded up and put away. Then the\nauditorium of atmospheric galleries will be melted. Then the folded\nwings of attendant angels will be spread for upward flight. The fiery\nthrone of judgment will become a dim and a vanishing cloud. The\nconflagration of divine and angelic magnificence will roll back and\noff. The day for which all other days are made has closed, and the\nworld has burned down, and the last cinder has gone out, and an angel\nflying on errand from world to world will poise long enough over the\ndead earth to chant the funeral litany as he cries, \"Ashes to ashes!\"\n\nThat judgment leaf in your heart I seize hold of this moment for\ncancellation. In your city halls the great book of mortgages has a\nlarge margin, so that when the mortgagor has paid the full amount to\nthe mortgagee, the officer of the law comes, and he puts down on that\nmargin the payment and the cancellation; and though that mortgage\ndemanded vast thousands before, now it is null and void. So I have to\ntell you that that leaf in my heart and in your heart, that leaf of\njudgment, that all-comprehensive leaf, has a wide margin for\ncancellation.\n\nThere is only one hand in all the universe that can touch that margin.\nThat hand this moment lifted to make the record null and void forever.\nIt may be a trembling hand, for it is a wounded hand, the nerves were\ncut and the muscles were lacerated. That record on that leaf was made\nin the black ink of condemnation; but if cancellation take place, it\nwill be made in the red ink of sacrifice. O judgment-bound brother and\nsister! let Christ this moment bring to that record complete and\nglorious cancellation. This moment, in an outburst of impassioned\nprayer, ask for it. You think it is the fluttering of your heart. Oh,\nno! it is the fluttering of that leaf, that judgment leaf.\n\nI ask you not to take from your iron safe your last will and\ntestament, but I ask for something of more importance than that. I ask\nyou not to take from your private papers that letter so sacred that\nyou have put it away from all human eyesight, but I ask you for\nsomething of more meaning than that. That leaf, that judgment leaf in\nmy heart, that judgment leaf in your heart, which will decide our\ncondition after this world shall have five thousand million years been\nswept out the heavens, an extinct planet, and time itself will be so\nlong past that on the ocean of eternity it will seem only as now seems\na ripple on the Atlantic.\n\nWhen the goats in vile herd start for the barren mountains of death,\nand the sheep in fleeces of snowy whiteness and bleating with joy move\nup the terraced hills to join the lambs already playing in the high\npastures of celestial altitude, oh, may you and I be close by the\nShepherd's crook! \"When the Son of Man shall come in His glory, and\nall the holy angels with Him, then shall He sit upon the throne of His\nglory; and before Him shall be gathered all nations; and He shall\nseparate them one from another, as a shepherd divideth the sheep from\nthe goats.\"\n\nOh, that leaf, that one leaf in my heart, that one leaf in your heart!\nThat leaf of judgment! Oh, those two tremendous words at the last,\n\"Come!\" \"Go!\" As though the overhanging heavens were the cup of a\ngreat bell, and all the stars were welded into a silvery tongue and\nswung from side to side until it struck, \"Come!\" As though all the\ngreat guns of eternal disaster were discharged at once, and they\nboomed forth in one resounding cannonade of \"Go!\" Arithmetical sum in\nsimple division. Eternity the dividend. The figure two the divisor.\nYour unalterable destiny the quotient.\n\n\n\n\nTHE ROAD TO THE CITY.\n\n    \"And an highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be\n    called the way of holiness; the unclean shall not pass over\n    it; but it shall be for those: the wayfaring men, though\n    fools, shall not err therein. No lion shall be there, nor any\n    ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it shall not be found\n    there; but the redeemed shall walk there; and the ransomed of\n    the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and\n    everlasting joy upon their heads: they shall obtain joy and\n    gladness, and sorrow and sighing shall flee away.\"--ISAIAH\n    xxxv: 8-10.\n\n\nThere are hundreds of people in this house this morning who want to\nfind the right road. You sometimes see a person halting at cross\nroads, and you can tell by his looks that he wishes to ask a question\nas to what direction he had better take. And I stand in your presence\nthis morning conscious of the fact that there are many of you here who\nrealize that there are a thousand wrong roads, but only one right one;\nand I take it for granted that you have come in to ask which one it\nis. Here is one road that opens widely, but I have not much faith in\nit. There are a great many expensive toll-gates scattered all along\nthat way. Indeed at every road you must pay in tears, or pay in\ngenuflexions, or pay in flagellations. On that road, if you get\nthrough it at all, you have to pay your own way; and since this\ndiffers so much from what I have heard in regard to the right way, I\nbelieve it is the wrong way.\n\nHere is another road. On either side of it are houses of sinful\nentertainment, and invitations to come in, and dine and rest; but,\nfrom the looks of the people who stand on the piazza I am very certain\nthat it is the wrong house and the wrong way. Here is another road. It\nis very beautiful and macadamized. The horses' hoofs clatter and ring,\nand they who ride over it spin along the highway, until suddenly they\nfind that the road breaks over an embankment, and they try to halt,\nand they saw the bit in the mouth of the fiery steed, and cry \"Ho!\nho!\" But it is too late, and--crash!--they go over the embankment. We\nshall turn, this morning, and see if we can not find a different kind\nof a road.\n\nYou have heard of the Appian Way. It was three hundred and fifty miles\nlong. It was twenty-four feet wide, and on either side the road was a\npath for foot passengers. It was made out of rocks cut in hexagonal\nshape and fitted together. What a road it must have been! Made of\nsmooth, hard rock, three hundred and fifty miles long. No wonder that\nin the construction of it the treasures of a whole empire were\nexhausted. Because of invaders, and the elements, and time--the old\nconqueror who tears up a road as he goes over it--there is nothing\nleft of that structure excepting a ruin. But I have this morning to\ntell you of a road built before the Appian Way, and yet it is as good\nas when first constructed. Millions of souls have gone over it.\nMillions more will come.\n\n    \"The prophets and apostles, too,\n      Pursued this road while here below;\n    We therefore will, without dismay\n      Still walk in Christ, the good old way.\"\n\n\"An highway shall be there, and a way, and it shall be called the way\nof holiness; the unclean shall not pass over it; but it shall be for\nthose: the wayfaring men, though fools, shall not err therein. No lion\nshall be there, nor any ravenous beast shall go up thereon, it shall\nnot be found there; but the redeemed shall walk there; and the\nransomed of the Lord shall return, and come to Zion with songs and\neverlasting joy upon their heads; they shall obtain joy and gladness,\nand sorrow and sighing shall flee away!\"\n\nI. First, this road of the text is the King's highway. In the\ndiligence you dash over the Bernard pass of the Alps, mile after mile,\nand there is not so much as a pebble to jar the wheels. You go over\nbridges which cross chasms that make you hold your breath; under\nprojecting rock; along by dangerous precipices; through tunnels adrip\nwith the meltings of the glaciers; and, perhaps for the first time,\nlearn the majesty of a road built and supported by government\nauthority. Well, my Lord the King decided to build a highway from\nearth to heaven. It should span all the chasms of human wretchedness;\nit should tunnel all the mountains of earthly difficulty; it should be\nwide enough and strong enough to hold fifty thousand millions of the\nhuman race, if so many of them should ever be born. It should be\nblasted out of the \"Rock of Ages,\" and cemented with the blood of the\nCross, and be lifted amid the shouting of angels and the execration of\ndevils.\n\nThe King sent His Son to build that road. He put head and hand and\nheart to it, and, after the road was completed, waved His blistered\nhand over the way, crying, \"It is finished!\" Napoleon paid fifteen\nmillion francs for the building of the Simplon Road, that his cannon\nmight go over for the devastation of Italy; but our King, at a greater\nexpense, has built a road for a different purpose, that the banners of\nheavenly dominion might come down over it, and all the redeemed of\nearth travel up over it.\n\nBeing a King's highway, of course it is well built. Bridges splendidly\narched and buttressed have given way and crushed the passengers who\nattempted to cross them. But Christ, the King, would build no such\nthing as that. The work done, He mounts the chariot of His love, and\nmultitudes mount with Him, and He drives on and up the steep of heaven\namid the plaudits of gazing worlds! The work is done--well\ndone--gloriously done--magnificently done.\n\nII. Still further: this road spoken of is a clean road.\n\nMany a fine road has become miry and foul because it has not been\nproperly cared for; but my text says the unclean shall not walk on\nthis one. Room on either side to throw away your sins. Indeed, if you\nwant to carry them along, you are not on the right road. That bridge\nwill break, those overhanging rocks will fall, the night will come\ndown, leaving you at the mercy of the mountain bandits, and at the\nvery next turn of the road you will perish. But if you are really on\nthis clean road of which I have been speaking, then you will stop\never and anon to wash in the water that stands in the basin of the\neternal rock. Ay, at almost every step of the journey you will be\ncrying out: \"Create within me a clean heart!\" If you have no such\naspirations as that, it proves that you have mistaken your way; and if\nyou will only look up and see the finger-board above your head, you\nmay read upon it the words: \"There is a way that seemeth right unto a\nman, but the end thereof is death.\" Without holiness no man shall see\nthe Lord; and if you have any idea that you can carry along your sins,\nyour lusts, your worldliness, and yet get to the end of the Christian\nrace, you are so awfully mistaken that, in the name of God, this\nmorning I shatter the delusion.\n\nIII. Still further, the road spoken of is a plain road. \"The wayfaring\nmen, though fools, shall not err therein.\" That is, if a man is three\nfourths an idiot, he can find this road just as well as if he were a\nphilosopher. The imbecile boy, the laughing-stock of the street, and\nfollowed by a mob hooting at him, has only just to knock once at the\ngate of heaven, and it swings open: while there has been many a man\nwho can lecture about pneumatics, and chemistry, and tell the story of\nFarraday's theory of electrical polarization, and yet has been shut\nout of heaven. There has been many a man who stood in an observatory\nand swept the heavens with his telescope, and yet has not been able to\nsee the Morning Star. Many a man has been familiar with all the higher\nbranches of mathematics, and yet could not do the simple sum, \"What\nshall it profit a man if he gain the whole world and lose his own\nsoul?\" Many a man has been a fine reader of tragedies and poems, and\nyet could not \"read his title clear to mansions in the skies.\" Many a\nman has botanized across the continent, and yet not know the \"Rose of\nSharon and the Lily of the Valley.\" But if one shall come in the right\nspirit, crying the way to heaven, he will find it a plain way. The\npardon is plain. The peace is plain. Everything is plain.\n\nHe who tries to get on the road to heaven through the New Testament\nteaching will get on beautifully. He who goes through philosophical\ndiscussion will not get on at all. Christ says: \"Come to Me, and I\nwill take all your sins away, and I will take all your troubles away.\"\nNow what is the use of my discussing it any more? Is not that plain?\nIf you wanted to go to Albany, and I pointed you out a highway\nthoroughly laid out, would I be wise in detaining you by a geological\ndiscussion about the gravel you will pass over, or a physiological\ndiscussion about the muscles you will have to bring into play? No.\nAfter this Bible has pointed you the way to heaven, is it wise for me\nto detain you with any discussion about the nature of the human will,\nor whether the atonement is limited or unlimited? There is the\nroad--go on it. It is a plain way.\n\n\"This is a faithful saying, and worthy of all acceptation, that Christ\nJesus came into the world to save sinners.\" And that is you and that\nis me. Any little child here can understand this as well as I can.\n\"Unless you become as a little child, you can not see the kingdom of\nGod.\" If you are saved, it will not be as a philosopher, it will be as\na little child. \"Of such is the kingdom of Heaven.\" Unless you get\nthe spirit of little children, you will never come out at their\nglorious destiny.\n\nIV. Still further: this road to heaven is a safe road. Sometimes the\ntraveler in those ancient highways would think himself perfectly\nsecure, not knowing there was a lion by the way, burying his head deep\nbetween his paws, and then, when the right moment came, under the\nfearful spring the man's life was gone, and there was a mauled carcass\nby the roadside. But, says my text, \"No lion shall be there.\" I wish I\ncould make you feel, this morning, your entire security. I tell you\nplainly that one minute after a man has become a child of God, he is\nas safe as though he had been ten thousand years in heaven. He may\nslip, he may slide, he may stumble; but he can not be destroyed. Kept\nby the power of God, through faith, unto complete salvation.\nEverlastingly safe.\n\nThe severest trial to which you can subject a Christian man is to kill\nhim, and that is glory. In other words, the worst thing that can\nhappen a child of God is heaven. The body is only the old slippers\nthat he throws aside just before putting on the sandals of light. His\nsoul, you can not hurt it. No fires can consume it. No floods can\ndrown it. No devils can capture it.\n\n    \"Firm and unmoved are they\n      Who rest their souls on God;\n    Fixed as the ground where David stood,\n      Or where the ark abode.\"\n\nHis soul is safe. His reputation is safe. Everything is safe. \"But,\"\nyou say, \"suppose his store burns up?\" Why, then, it will be only a\nchange of investments from earthly to heavenly securities. \"But,\" you\nsay, \"suppose his name goes down under the hoof of scorn and\ncontempt?\" The name will be so much brighter in glory. \"Suppose his\nphysical health fails?\" God will pour into him the floods of\neverlasting health, and it will not make any difference. Earthly\nsubtraction is heavenly addition. The tears of earth are the crystals\nof heaven. As they take rags and tatters and put them through the\npaper-mill, and they come out beautiful white sheets of paper, so,\noften, the rags of earthly destitution, under the cylinders of death,\ncome out a white scroll upon which shall be written eternal\nemancipation.\n\nThere was one passage of Scripture, the force of which I never\nunderstood until one day at Chamounix, with Mont Blanc on one side,\nand Montanvent on the other, I opened my Bible and read: \"As the\nmountains are around about Jerusalem, so the Lord is around about them\nthat fear Him.\" The surroundings were an omnipotent commentary.\n\n    \"Though troubles assail, and dangers affright;\n    Though friends should all fail, and foes all unite;\n    Yet one thing secures us, whatever betide,\n    The Scriptures assure us the Lord will provide.\"\n\nV. Still further: the road spoken of is a pleasant road. God gives a\nbond of indemnity against all evil to every man that treads it. \"All\nthings work together for good to those who love God.\" No weapon formed\nagainst them can prosper. That is the bond, signed, sealed, and\ndelivered by the President of the whole universe. What is the use of\nyour fretting, O child of God, about food? \"Behold the fowls of the\nair: for they sow not, neither do they reap, nor gather into barns;\nyet your heavenly Father feedeth them.\" And will He take care of the\nsparrow, will He take care of the hawk, and let you die? What is the\nuse of your fretting about clothes? \"Consider the lilies of the field.\nShall He not much more clothe you, O ye of little faith?\" What is the\nuse worrying for fear something will happen to your home? \"He blesseth\nthe habitation of the just.\" What is the use of your fretting lest you\nwill be overcome of temptations? \"God is faithful, who will not suffer\nyou to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation\nalso make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it.\"\n\nO this King's highway! Trees of life on either side, bending over\nuntil their branches interlock and drop midway their fruit and shade.\nHouses of entertainment on either side the road for poor pilgrims.\nTables spread with a feast of good things, and walls adorned with\napples of gold in pictures of silver. I start out on this King's\nhighway, and I find a harper, and I say: \"What is your name?\" The\nharper makes no response, but leaves me to guess, as, with his eyes\ntoward heaven and his hand upon the trembling strings this tune comes\nrippling on the air: \"The Lord is my light and my salvation. Whom\nshall I fear? The Lord is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be\nafraid?\" I go a little further on the same road and meet a trumpeter\nof heaven, and I say: \"Haven't you got some music for a tired\npilgrim?\" And wiping his lip and taking a long breath, he puts his\nmouth to the trumpet and pours forth this strain: \"They shall hunger\nno more, neither shall they thirst any more, neither shall the sun\nlight on them, nor any heat, for the Lamb which is in the midst of the\nthrone shall lead them to living fountains of water, and God shall\nwipe away all tears from their eyes.\" I go a little distance further\non the same road, and I meet a maiden of Israel. She has no harp, but\nshe has cymbals. They look as if they had rusted from sea-spray; and I\nsay to the maiden of Israel: \"Have you no song for a tired pilgrim?\"\nAnd like the clang of victors' shields the cymbals clap as Miriam\nbegins to discourse: \"Sing ye to the Lord, for He hath triumphed\ngloriously; the horse and the rider hath He thrown into the sea.\" And\nthen I see a white-robed group. They come bounding toward me, and I\nsay: \"Who are they? The happiest, and the brightest, and the fairest\nin all heaven--who are they?\" And the answer comes: \"These are they\nwho came out of great tribulations, and had their robes washed and\nmade white with the blood of the Lamb.\"\n\nI pursue this subject only one step further. What is the terminus? I\ndo not care how fine a road you may put me on, I want to know where it\ncomes out. My text declares it: \"The redeemed of the Lord come to\nZion.\" You know what Zion was. That was the King's palace. It was a\nmountain fastness. It was impregnable. And so heaven is the fastness\nof the universe. No howitzer has long enough range to shell those\ntowers. Let all the batteries of earth and hell blaze away; they can\nnot break in those gates. Gibraltar was taken, Sebastopol was taken,\nBabylon fell; but these walls of heaven shall never surrender either\nto human or Satanic besiegement. The Lord God Almighty is the defense\nof it. Great capital of the universe! Terminus of the King's highway!\n\nDoctor Dick said that, among other things, he thought in heaven we\nshould study chemistry, and geometry, and conic sections. Southey\nthought that in heaven he would have the pleasure of seeing Chaucer\nand Shakespeare. Now, Doctor Dick may have his mathematics for all\neternity, and Southey his Shakespeare. Give me Christ and my old\nfriends--that is all the heaven I want, that is heaven enough for me.\nO garden of light, whose leaves never wither, and whose fruits never\nfail! O banquet of God, whose sweetness never palls the taste, and\nwhose guests are kings forever! O city of light, whose walls are\nsalvation, and whose gates are praise! O palace of rest, where God is\nthe monarch and everlasting ages the length of His reign! O song\nlouder than the surf-beat of many waters, yet soft as the whisper of\ncherubim!\n\nO my heaven! When my last wound is healed, when the last heart-break\nis ended, when the last tear of earthly sorrow is wiped away, and when\nthe redeemed of the Lord shall come to Zion, then let all the harpers\ntake down their harps, and all the trumpeters take down their\ntrumpets, and all across heaven there be chorus of morning stars,\nchorus of white-robed victors, chorus of martyrs from under the\nthrone, chorus of ages, chorus of worlds, and there be but one song\nsung, and but one name spoken, and but one throne honored--that of\nJesus only.\n\n\n\n\nTHE RANSOMLESS.\n\n    \"Beware lest He take thee away with His stroke: then a great\n    ransom can not deliver thee.\"--JOB xxxvi: 18.\n\n\nTrouble makes some men mad. It was so with Job. He had lost his\nproperty, he had lost his physical health, he had lost his dear\nchildren, and the losses had led to exasperation instead of any\nspiritual profit. I suppose that he was in the condition that many are\nnow in who sit before me. There are those here whose fortunes have\nbegun to flap their wings, as though to fly away. There is a hollow\ncough in some of your dwellings. There is a subtraction of comfort and\nhappiness, and you feel disgusted with the world, and impatient with\nmany events that are transpiring in your history, and you are in the\ncondition in which Job was when the words of my text accosted him:\n\"Beware lest He take thee away with His stroke and then a ransom can\nnot deliver thee.\"\n\nI propose to show you that sometimes God suddenly removes from us our\ngospel opportunities, and that, when He has done so, our case is\nransomless. \"Beware lest He take thee away with His stroke: then a\ngreat ransom can not deliver thee.\"\n\nI. Sometimes the stroke comes in the removal of the intellect.\n\n\"Oh,\" says some man, \"as long as I keep my mind I can afford to\nadjourn religion.\" But suppose you do not keep it? A fever, the\nhurling of a missile, the falling of a brick from a scaffolding, the\naccidental discharge of a gun--and your mind is gone. If you have ever\nbeen in an anatomical room, and have examined the human brain, you\nknow what a delicate organ it is. And can it be possible that our\neternity is dependent upon the healthy action of that which can be so\neasily destroyed?\n\n\"Oh,\" says some one, \"you don't know how strong a mind I have.\" I\nreply: Losses, accident, bereavement, and sickness may shipwreck the\nbest physical or mental condition. There are those who have been ten\nyears in lunatic asylums who had as good a mind as you. While they had\ntheir minds they neglected God, and when their intellect went, with it\nwent their last opportunity for heaven. Now they are not responsible\nfor what they do, or for what they say; but in the last day they will\nbe held responsible for what they did when they were mentally well;\nand if, on that day, a soul should say: \"Oh, God, I was demented, and\nI had no responsibility,\" God will say: \"Yes, you were demented; but\nthere were long years when you were not demented. That was your chance\nfor heaven, and you missed it.\" Oh, better be, as the Scotch say, a\nlittle \"daft,\" nevertheless having grace in the heart; better be like\npoor Richard Hampson, the Cornish fool, whose biography has just\nappeared in England--a silly man he was, yet bringing souls to Jesus\nChrist by scores and scores--giving an account of his own conversion,\nwhen he said: \"The mob got after me, and I lost my hat, and climbed\nup by a meat-stand, in order that I might not be trampled under foot,\nand while I was there, my heart got on fire with love toward those who\nwere chasing me, and, springing to my feet, I began to exhort and to\npray.\" Oh, my God, let me be in the last, last day the Cornish fool,\nrather than have the best intellect God ever created unillumined by\nthe Gospel of Jesus Christ!\n\nConsider what an uncertain possession you have in your intellect, when\nthere are so many things around to destroy it; and beware, lest before\nyou use it in making the religious choice, God takes it away with a\nstroke. I know a good many of my friends who are putting off religion\nuntil the last hour. They say when they get sick they will attend to\nit, but generally the intellect is beclouded; and oh; what a doleful\nthing it is to stand by a dying bed, and talk to a man about his soul,\nand feel, from what you see of the motion of his head, and the glare\nof his eye, and from what you hear of the jargon of his lips, that he\ndoes not understand what you are saying to him. I have stood beside\nthe death-bed of a man who had lived a sinful life, and was as\nunprepared for eternity as it is possible for a man to be, and I tried\nto make him understand my pastoral errand; but all in vain. He could\nnot understand it, and so he died.\n\nOh! ye who are putting off until the sick hour preparation for\neternity, let me tell you that in all probability, you will not be\nable in your last hour to attend to it at all. There are a great many\npeople who say they will repent on the death-bed.\n\nI have no doubt there are many who have repented on the death-bed, but\nI think it is the exception. Albert Barnes, who was one of the coolest\nof men, and gave no rash statistics, said thus: that in a ministry of\nnearly half a century--he was over seventy when he went up to\nglory--he had known a great many people who said they repented on the\ndying bed, but, unexpectedly to themselves, got well; and he says, How\nmany of those, do you suppose, who thought it was their dying bed, and\nwho, after they repented on that dying bed, having got well, lived\nconsistently, showing that it was real repentance, and not mock\nrepentance--how many? not one! not one!\n\nII. Again: this stroke may come to you in the withdrawal of God's\nspirit.\n\nI see people before me who were, twenty years ago, serious about their\nsouls. They are not now. They have no interest in what I am saying.\nThey will never have any anxiety in what any minister of the Gospel\nsays about their souls. Their time seems to have passed. I know a man,\nseventy-five years of age, who, in early life, became almost a\nChristian, but grieved away the spirit of God, and he has never\nthought earnestly since, and he can not be roused. I do not believe he\nwill be roused until eternity flashes on his astonished vision.\n\nIt does seem as if sometimes, in quite early life, the Holy Spirit\nmoves upon a heart, and being grieved away and rejected, never comes\nback. You say that is all imaginary? A letter, the address of which I\nwill not give, dated last Monday morning, came to me on Tuesday,\nsaying this: \"Your sermon last night (that is, last Sabbath night)\ndid not fit my case, although I believe it did all others in the\nAcademy; but your sermon of a week ago did fit my case, for I am 'past\nfeeling.' I am not ashamed to be a Christian. I would as soon be known\nto be a Christian as anything else. Indeed, I wish I was, but I have\nnot the least power to become one. Don't you know that with some\npersons there is a tide in their spiritual natures which, if taken at\nthe flood, leads on to salvation? Such a tide I felt two years ago. I\nwant you to pray for me, not that I may be led to Christ--for that\nprayer would not be answered--but that I may be kept from the\ntemptation to suicide!\"\n\nWhat I had to say to the author of that I said in a private letter;\nbut what I have to say to this audience is: Beware lest you grieve the\nHoly Ghost, and He be gone, and never return. Next Wednesday, at two\nor three o'clock, a Cunard steamer will put out from Jersey City wharf\nfor Liverpool. After it has gone one hour, and the vessel is down by\nthe Narrows, or beyond, go out on the Jersey City wharf, and wave your\nhand, and shout, and ask that steamer to come back to the wharf. Will\nit? Yes, sooner than the Holy Ghost will come back when once He has\ntaken his final flight from thy soul. With that Holy Spirit some of\nyou have been in treaty, my dear friends.\n\nThe Holy Spirit said: \"Come, come to Christ.\" You said: \"No, I won't.\"\nThe Spirit said, more importunately: \"Come to Christ.\" You said:\n\"Well, I will after awhile, when I get my business fixed up; when my\nfriends consent to my coming; when they won't laugh at me--then I'll\ncome.\" But the Holy Spirit more emphatically said: \"Come now.\" You\nsaid: \"No, I can't. I can't come now.\" And that Holy Spirit stands in\nyour heart to-night, with His hand on the door of your soul, ready to\ncome out. Will you let Him depart? If so, then, with a pen of light,\ndipped in ink of eternal blackness, the sentence may be now writing:\n\"Ephraim is joined to his idols. Let him alone! Let him alone!\" When\nthat fatal record is made, you might as well brace yourselves up\nagainst the sorrows of the last day, against the anguish of an\nunforgiven death-bed, against the flame and the overthrow of an undone\neternity; for though you might live thirty years after that in the\nworld, your fate would be as certain as though you had already entered\nthe gates of darkness. That is the dead line. Look out how you cross\nit!\n\n    \"'There is a line by us unseen,\n      That crosses every path;\n    The hidden boundary between\n      God's patience and His wrath.'\"\n\nAnd some of you, to-night, have come up to that line. Ay, you have\nlifted your foot, and when you put it down, it will be on the other\nside! Look out how you cross it! Oh, grieve not the Spirit of God,\nlest He never come back!\n\nIII. This fatal stroke spoken of in the text may be our exit from this\nworld. I hear aged people sometimes saying: \"I can't live much\nlonger.\" But do you know the fact that there are a hundred young\npeople and middle-aged people who go out of this life to one aged\nperson, for the simple reason that there are not many aged people to\nleave life? The aged seem to stand around like stalks--separate stalks\nof wheat at the corner of the field; but when death goes a-mowing, he\nlikes to go down amid the thick of the harvest. What is more to the\npoint: a man's going out of this world is never in the way he\nexpects--it is never at the time he expects. The moment of leaving\nthis world is always a surprise. If you expect to go in the winter, it\nmay be in the summer; if in the summer, it may be in the winter; if in\nthe night, it maybe in the day-time; if you think to go in the\nday-time, it may be in the night. Suddenly the event will rush upon\nyou, and you will be gone. Where? If a Christian--into joy. If not a\nChristian--into suffering.\n\nThe Gospel call stops outside of the door of the sepulcher. The\nsleeper within can not hear it. If that call should be sounded out\nwith clarion voice louder than ever rang through the air, that sleeper\ncould not hear it. I suppose every hour of the day, and now, while I\nam speaking, there are souls rushing into eternity unprepared. They\nslide from the pillow, or they slip from the pavement, and in an\neye-twinkling they are gone. Elegant and eloquent funeral oration will\nnot do them any good. Epitaph, cut on polished Scotch granite, will\nnot do them any good. Wailing of beloved kindred can not call them\nback.\n\nBut, says some one: \"I'll keep out of peril; I will not go on the sea,\nI will not go into battle--I'll keep out of all danger.\" That is no\ndefense. Thousands of people, last night, on their couches, with the\nfront door locked, and no armed assassin anywhere around, surrounded\nby all defended circumstances, slipped out of this life into the\nnext. If time had been on one side of the shuttle and eternity on the\nother side of the shuttle, they could not have shot quicker across it.\nA man was saying: \"My father was lost at sea, and my grandfather, and\nmy great-grandfather. Wasn't it strange?\" A man, talking to him, said:\n\"You ought never to venture on the sea, lest you, yourself, be lost at\nsea.\" The man turned to the other, and said: \"Where did your father\ndie?\" He replied: \"In his bed.\" \"Where did your grandfather die?\" \"In\nhis bed.\" \"Where did your great-grandfather die?\" \"In his bed.\"\n\"Then,\" he said, \"be careful, lest some night, while you are asleep on\nyour couch, your time may come!\"\n\nDeath alone is sure. Suddenly, you and I will go out of life. I am not\nsaying anything to your soul that I am not going to say to my own\nsoul. We have got to go suddenly out of this life. If I am prepared\nfor that change, I do not care where my body is taken from--at what\npoint I am taken out of this life. If I am ready, all is well. If I am\nnot ready, though I might be at home, and though my loved ones might\nbe standing around me, and though there might be the best surgical and\nmedical ability in the room, I tell you, if I were not prepared, I\nwould be frightened more than tongue can tell. It may seem like\ncowardice, but I am not ashamed to say that I should have the most\nindescribable horror about going out of this world if I thought I was\nunprepared for the next--if I had no Christ in my soul; for it would\nbe a plunge compared with which a leap from the top of Mont Blanc\nwould be nothing.\n\nBut this brings me to the most tremendous thought of my text. The text\nsupposes that a man goes into ruin, and that an effort is made\nafterward for his rescue, and then says the thing can not be done. Is\nthat so? After death seizes upon that soul, is there no resurrection?\nIf a man topples off the edge of life, is there nothing to break his\nfall? If an impenitent man goes overboard, are there no\ngrappling-hooks to hoist him into safety? The text says distinctly:\n\"Then a great ransom can not deliver thee.\"\n\nI know there are people who call themselves \"Restorationists,\" and\nthey say a sinful man may go down into the world of the lost; he stays\nthere until he gets reformed, and then comes up into the world of\nlight and blessedness. It seems to me to be a most unreasonable\ndoctrine--as though the world of darkness were a place where a man\ncould get reformed. Is there anything in the society of the lost\nworld--the abandoned and the wretched of God's universe--to elevate a\nman's character and lift him at last to heaven? Can we go into\ncompanionship of the Neroes and the Herods, and the Jim Fisks, and\nspend a certain number of years in that lost world, and then by that\nsociety be purified and lifted up? Is that the kind of society that\nreforms a man and prepares him for heaven? Would you go to Shreveport\nor Memphis, with the yellow fever there, to get your physical health\nrestored? Can it be that a man may go down into the diseased world--a\nworld overwhelmed by an epidemic of transgressions--and by that\nprocess, and in that atmosphere, be lifted up to health and glory?\nYour common sense says: \"No! no!\" In such society as that, instead of\nbeing restored, you would go down worse and worse, plunging every hour\ninto deeper depths of suffering and darkness. What your common sense\nsays the Bible reaffirms, when it says: \"These shall go away into\nthree months of punishment.\" I have quoted it wrong. \"These shall go\naway into ten years of punishment.\" I have quoted it wrong. \"These\nshall go into a thousand years of punishment.\" I have quoted it wrong.\n\"These shall go into _everlasting_ punishment.\" And now I have quoted\nit right; or, if you prefer, in the words of my text: \"Then a great\nransom can not deliver thee.\"\n\nNow just suppose that a spirit should come down from heaven and knock\nat the gates of woe and say: \"Let that man out! Let me come in and\nsuffer in his stead. I will be the sacrifice. Let him come out.\" The\ngrim jailer would reply: \"No, you don't know what a place this is, or\nyou would not ask to come in; besides that, this man had full warning\nand full opportunity of escape. He did not take the warning, and now a\ngreat ransom shall not deliver him.\"\n\nSometimes men are sentenced to imprisonment for life. There comes\nanother judge on the bench, there comes another governor in the chair,\nand in three or four years you find the man who was sentenced for life\nin the street. You say: \"I thought you were sentenced for life.\" \"Oh!\"\nhe says, \"politics are changed, and I am now a free man.\" But it will\nnot be so for a soul at the last. There will be no new judge or new\ngovernor. If at the end of a century a soul might come out, it would\nnot be so bad. If at the end of a thousand years it might come out,\nit would not be so bad. If there were any time in all the future, in\nquadrillions and quadrillions of years, that the soul might come out,\nit would not be so bad; but if the Bible be true, it is a state of\nunending duration.\n\nFar on in the ages one lost soul shall cry out to another lost soul:\n\"How long have you been here?\" and the soul will reply: \"The years of\nmy ruin are countless. I estimated the time for thousands of years;\nbut what is the use of estimating when all these rolling cycles bring\nus no nearer the terminus.\" Ages! Ages! Ages! Eternity! Eternity!\nEternity! The wrath to come! The wrath to come! The wrath to come! No\nmedicine to cure that marasmus of the soul. No hammer to strike off\nthe handcuff of that incarceration. No burglar's key to pick the locks\nwhich the Lord hath fastened. Sir Francis Newport, in his last moment,\ncaught just one glimpse of that world. He had lived a sinful life.\nBefore he went into the eternal world he looked into it. The last\nwords he ever uttered were, as he gathered himself up on his elbows in\nthe bed: \"Oh, the insufferable pangs of hell!\" The lost soul will cry\nout: \"I can not stand this! I can not stand this! Is there no way\nout?\" and the echo will answer: \"No way out.\" And the soul will cry:\n\"Is this forever?\" and the echo will answer: \"Forever!\"\n\nIs it all true? \"These shall go away into everlasting punishment,\nwhile the righteous go into life eternal.\" Are there two destinies?\nand must all this audience share one or the other? Shall I give an\naccount for what I have told you to-night? Have I held back any truth,\nthough it were plain, though it were unpalatable? Must I meet you\nthere, oh, you dying but immortal auditory? I wish that my text, with\nall its uplifted hands of warning, could come upon your souls: \"Beware\nlest He take thee away with His stroke: then a great ransom can not\ndeliver thee.\"\n\nGlory be to God, there is a ransom that can now deliver you, braver\nthan Grace Darling putting out in a life-boat from Eddystone\nLight-house for the rescue of the crew of the Forfarshire\nsteamer--Christ the Lord launched from heaven, amid the shouting of\nthe angels. Thirty-three years afterward, Christ the Lord launched\nfrom earth to heaven, amid human and infernal execration; yet staying\nhere long enough to save all who will believe in Him. Do you hear\nthat? To save all who will believe in Him. Oh, that pierced side! Oh,\nthat bleeding brow! Oh, that crushed foot! Oh, that broken heart! That\nis your hope, sinner. That is your ransom from sin, and death, and\nhell.\n\nWhy have I told you all these things to-night, plainly and frankly? It\nis because I know there is redemption for you, and I would have you\nnow come and get it. Oh, men and women long prayed for, and striven\nwith, and coaxed of the mercy of God--have you concentrated all your\nphysical, mental, and spiritual energies in one awful determination to\nbe lost? Is there nothing in the value of your soul, in the\ngraciousness of Christ, in the thunders of the last day, in the\nblazing glories of heaven, and the surging wrath of an undone eternity\nto start you out of your indifference, and make you pray? Oh, must God\ncome upon you in some other way? Must He take another darling child\nfrom your household? Must He take another installment from your\nworldly estate? Must life come upon you with sorrow after sorrow, and\nsmite you down with sickness before you will be moved, and before you\nwill feel?\n\nOh, weep now, while Jesus will count the tears! Sigh, now in\nrepentance, while Jesus will hear the grief. Now clutch the cross of\nthe Son of God before it be swept away. Beware, lest the Holy Spirit\nleave thy heart. Beware, lest this night thy soul be required of thee.\n\"Beware, lest he take thee away with His stroke: then a great ransom\ncan not deliver thee.\" Oh, Lord God of Israel, see these impenitent\nsouls on the verge of death ready to topple over! See them! Is there\nno help? Is this plea all in vain? I can not believe it, blessed God.\nOh, thou mighty One, whose garments are red with the wine-press of\nThine own sufferings, in the greatness of Thy strength ride through\nthis audience, and may all this people fall into line, the willing\ncaptives of Thy grace. Men and women immortal! I lay hold of you\nto-night with both hands of entreaty and of prayer, and I beg of you,\nprepare for death, judgment, and eternity.\n\n\n\n\nTHE THREE GROUPS.\n\n    \"And they sat down in ranks by hundreds and by fifties.\"--MARK\n    vi: 40.\n\n\nThe sun was far down in the west, night was coming on, and there were\nfive thousand people tired, hungry, shelterless. You know how\nWashington felt at Valley Forge, when his army was starving and\nfreezing. You may imagine how any great-hearted general would feel\nwhile his troops were suffering. Imagine, then, how Christ, with His\ngreat heart, must have felt as He saw these five thousand\nhunger-bitten people. Yes, I suppose there were ten thousand there,\nfor the Bible says there were five thousand men, besides women and\nchildren. The case is put in that way, not because the women and\nchildren were of less importance than the men, but because they would\neat less; and the whole force of the miracle turns on the amount of\nfood required.\n\nHow shall this great multitude be supplied? I see a selfish man in\nthat crowd pulling a luncheon out of his own pocket, and saying: \"Let\nthe people starve. They had no business to come out here in the desert\nwithout any provisions. They are improvident, and the improvident\nought to suffer.\" There is another man, not quite so heartless, who\nsays: \"Go up into the village and buy bread.\" What a foolish\nproposition! There is not enough food in all the village for this\ncrowd; besides that, who has the money to pay for it? Xerxes' army,\none million strong, was fed by a private individual of great wealth\nfor only one day, but it broke him. Who, then, shall feed this\nmultitude?\n\nI see a man rising in that great crowd and asking: \"Is there any one\nhere who has bread or meat?\" A kind of moan goes through the whole\nthrong. \"No bread--no meat.\" But just at that time a lad steps up. You\nknow when a great crowd goes off upon an excursion, there are always\nmen and boys to go along for the purpose of merchandise and to strike\na bargain: and so, I suppose, this boy had gone along for the purpose\nof merchandise; but he was nearly all sold out, having only five\nloaves and two fishes left. He is a generous boy, and he turns them\nover to Christ.\n\nBut these loaves would not feed twenty people, how much less ten\nthousand! Though the action was so generous on the part of the boy, so\nfar as satisfying the multitude, it was a dead failure. Then Jesus\ncomes to the rescue. He is apt to come when there is a dead lift. He\ncommands the people that they sit down \"in ranks, by hundreds and by\nfifties,\" as much as to say: \"Order! order! so that none be missed.\"\nIt was fortunate that that arrangement was made; otherwise, at the\nvery first appearance of bread, the strong ones would have clutched\nit, while the feeble and the modest would have gone unsupplied.\n\nI suppose it was no easy work to get that crowd seated, for they all\nwanted to be in the front row, lest the bread give out before their\nturn come. No sooner are they seated than there comes a great hush\nover all the people. Jesus stands there, His light complexion and\nauburn locks illumined by the setting sun. Every eye is on Him. They\nwonder what He will do next. He takes one of the loaves that the boy\nfurnished and breaks off it a piece, which immediately grows to as\nlarge a size as the original loaf, the original loaf staying as large\nas it was before the piece was broken off. And they leaned forward\nwith intense scrutiny, saying: \"Look! look!\" When some one, anxious to\nsee more minutely what is going on, rises in front, they cry: \"Sit\ndown in front! Let us look for ourselves.\"\n\nAnd then, when the bread is passed around, they taste of it\nskeptically and inquiringly, as much as to say: \"Is it bread? Really,\nis it bread?\" Yes, the best bread that was ever made, for Christ made\nit. Bread for the first fifty and second fifty. Bread for the first\nhundred and the second hundred. Bread for the first thousand and the\nsecond thousand. Pass it all around the circle: there, where that aged\nman sits leaning on his staff, and where that woman sits with the\nchild in her arms. Pass it all around. Are you all fed? \"Ay! ay!\"\nrespond the ten thousand voices; \"all fed.\" One basket would have held\nthe loaves before the miracle; it takes twelve baskets now. Sound it\nthrough all the ages of earth and heaven, that Christ the Lord comes\nto our suffering race with the bread of this life in one hand, and the\nbread of eternal life in the other hand.\n\nYou have all immediately run out the analogy between that scene and\nthis. There were thousands there; there are thousands here. They were\nin the desert; many of you are in the desert of trouble and sin. No\nhuman power could feed them; no human power can feed you. Christ\nappeared to them; Christ appears to you. Bread enough for all in the\ndesert; bread enough for all who are here. And, as on that occasion,\nso in this: we have the people \"sit down in ranks by hundreds and by\nfifties;\" for the fact that many of you stand is no fault of ours, for\nwe have tried to give you seats. As Christ divided that company into\ngroups, so I divide this audience into three groups: the pardoned, the\nseeking, the careless.\n\nI. And, first, I speak to the pardoned.\n\nIt is with some of you half past five in the morning, and some faint\nstreaks of light. With others it is seven o'clock, and thus full dawn.\nWith others it is twelve o'clock at noon, and you sit in full blaze of\nGospel pardon. I bring you congratulation. Joseph delivered from\nPotiphar's dungeon; Daniel lifted from the lion's den; Saul arrested\nand unhorsed on the road to Damascus. Oh, you delivered captives, how\nyour eyes should gleam, and your souls should bound, and your lips\nshould sing in this pardon! From what land did you come? A land of\ndarkness. What is to be your destiny? A land of light. Who got you\nout? Christ, the Lord. Can you sit so placidly and unmoved while all\nheaven comes to your soul with congratulation, and harps are strung,\nand crowns are lifted, and a great joy swings round the heavens at the\nnews of your disinthrallment? If you could realize out of what a pit\nyou have been dug, to what height you are to be raised, and to what\nglory you are destined, you would spring to your feet with \"Hosanna!\"\n\nIn 1808 there was a meeting of the emperors of France and Russia at\nErfurt. There were distinguished men there also from other lands. It\nwas so arranged that when any of the emperors arrived at the door of\nthe reception-room, the drum should beat three times; but when a\nlesser dignitary should come, then the drum would sound but twice.\nAfter awhile the people in the audience-chamber heard two taps of the\ndrum. They said: \"A prince is coming.\" But after awhile there were\nthree taps, and they cried: \"The emperor!\" Oh, there is a more\nglorious arrival at your soul to-night! The drum beats twice at the\ncoming in of the lesser joys and congratulations of your soul; but it\nbeats once, twice, thrice at the coming in of a glorious King--Jesus\nthe Saviour, Jesus the God! I congratulate you. All are yours--things\npresent and things to come.\n\nII. I come now to speak of the second division--those who are seeking;\nsome of you with more earnestness, some of you with less earnestness.\nBut I believe that to-night, if I should ask all those who wish to\nfind the way to heaven to rise, and the world did not scoff at you,\nand your own proud heart did not keep you down, there would be a\nthousand souls who would cry out as they rose up: \"Show me the way to\nheaven!\" That young man who smiled to the one next to him, as though\nhe cared for none of these things, would be on his knees crying for\nmercy. Why this anxious look? Why this deep disquietude in the soul?\nWhy, at the beginning of this service, did you do what you have not\ndone for years--bow your head in prayer? You are seeking.\n\n\"I am a gambler,\" says one man. There is mercy for you. \"I am a\nlibertine,\" says another. There is mercy for you. \"I have plunged into\nevery abomination.\" Mercy for you. The door of grace does not stand\najar to-night, nor half swung around on the hinges. It is wide, wide\nopen; and there is nothing in the Bible, or in Christ, or God, or\nearth, or heaven, or hell, to keep you out of the door of safety, if\nyou want to go in. Christ has borne your burdens, fought your battles,\nsuffered for your sins. The debt is paid, and the receipt is handed to\nyou, written in the blood of the Son of God--will you have it? Oh,\ndecide the matter now! Decide it here! Fling your exhausted soul down\nat the feet of an all-compassionate, all-sympathizing, all-pitying,\nall-pardoning Jesus. The laceration on His brow, the gash in His side,\nthe torn muscles and nerves of His feet beg you to come.\n\nBut remember that one inch outside the door of pardon, and you are in\nas much peril as though you were a thousand miles away. Many a\nshipwrecked sailor has got almost to the beach, but did not get on it.\nThere are thousands in the world of the lost who came very near being\nsaved--perhaps as near as you are to-night--but were not saved.\n\nOn the eastern coast of England, a few weeks ago, in a\nfishing-village, there was a good deal of excitement. While people\nwere in church, the sailors and fishermen hearing the Gospel on the\nSabbath, there was a cry: \"To the beach!\" and the minister closed the\nBible, and with his congregation went out to help, and they saw in the\noffing a ship in trouble; but there was some disorder amid the\nfishing-smacks, and amid all the boats, and it was almost impossible\nto get anything launched. But after awhile they did, and they pulled\naway for the wreck, and came almost up, when suddenly the distressed\nbark in the offing capsized, and they all went down. Oh, if the\nlifeboats had only been ten minutes quicker! And how many a life-boat\nhas been launched from the Gospel shore! It has come almost up to the\ndrowning, and yet, after all, they were not rescued. Somehow they did\nnot get into it!\n\nI suppose there are people who have asked for our prayers, and I\nsuppose there were some in the side room, last Sabbath night, talking\nabout their souls, who will miss heaven. They do not take the last\nstep, and all the other steps go for nothing until you have taken the\nlast step, for I have here, in the presence of God and this people, to\nannounce the solemn truth, that to be almost saved is to be lost\nforever. That is all I have to say to the second division.\n\nIII. I come now to speak to the careless. You look indifferent, and I\nsuppose you are indifferent. You say: \"I came in here because a friend\ninvited me to see what is going on, but with no serious intentions\nabout my soul. I have so much work, and so much pleasure on hand,\ndon't bother me about religion.\" And yet you are gentlemanly, and you\nare lady-like, in your behavior, and, therefore, I know that you will\nlisten respectfully if I talk courteously. Christian people are\nsometimes afraid to talk to men and women of the world lest they be\ninsulted. If they talk courteously to people of the world, they will\nlisten courteously. So now I try to come in that way, and in that\nspirit, and talk to those of you who tell me that you are careless\nabout your soul.\n\nThen you have a soul, have you? Yes, precious, with infinite capacity\nfor joy or suffering, winged for flight somewhere. Beckoned upward,\nbeckoned downward. Fought after by angels and by fiends. Immortal!\n\n    \"The sun is but a spark of fire,\n      A transient meteor in the sky:\n    The soul, immortal as its Sire,\n      Can never die.\"\n\nYour body will soon be taken down, the castle will be destroyed, the\ntower will be in the dust, the windows will be broken out, and the\nplace where your body sleeps will be forgotten; but your soul, after\nthat, will be living, acting, feeling, thinking--where? where? Oh,\nthere must be something of incomputable worth in that for which heaven\ngave up its best inhabitant, and Christ went into martyrdom, and at\nthe coming of which angels chant an eternal litany and devils rush to\nthe gate. When everything above you, and beneath you, and around you,\nis intent upon that soul, you can not afford to be careless,\nespecially when I think, this moment while I speak, there are\nthousands of souls in heaven rejoicing that they attended to this\nmatter in time, while at this very instant there are souls in the lost\nworld mourning that they did not attend to it in time. Hark to the\nhowling of the damned!\n\nOh, if this room could be vacated of this audience, and you were all\ngone, and the wan spirits of the lost could come up and occupy this\nplace, and I could stand before them with offers of pardon through\nJesus Christ, and then ask them if they would accept it, there would\ncome up an instantaneous, multitudinous, overwhelming cry: \"Yes! yes!\nyes! yes!\" No such fortune for them. They had their day of grace, and\nsacrificed it. You have yours; will you sacrifice it? I wish that I\ncould have you see these things as you will one day see them.\n\nSuppose, on your way home, a runaway horse should dash across the\nstreet, or between the dock and the boat you should accidentally slip,\nwhere would you be at twelve o'clock to-night or seven o'clock\nto-morrow morning? Or for all eternity where would you be? I do not\nanswer the question. I just leave it to you to answer.\n\nBut suppose you escape fatal accident. Suppose you go out by the\nordinary process of sickness. I will just suppose now that your last\nhour has come. The doctor says, as he goes out of the room: \"Can't get\nwell.\" There is something in the faces of those who stand around you\nthat prophesies that you can not get well. You say within yourself: \"I\ncan't get well.\" Where are your comrades now? Oh, they are off to the\ngay party that very night! They dance as well as they ever did. They\ndrink as much wine. They laugh as loud as though you were not dying.\nThey destroyed your soul, but do not come to help you die.\n\nWell, there are father and mother in the room. They are very quiet,\nbut occasionally they go out into the next room and weep bitterly. The\nbed is very much disheveled. They have not been able to make it up\nfor two or three days. There are four or five pillows lying around,\nbecause they have been trying to make you as easy as they could. On\nthe one side of your bed are all the past years of your life--the\nBibles, the sermons, the communion-tables, the offers of mercy. You\nsay: \"Take them away.\" Your mother thinks you are delirious. She says:\n\"There is nothing there, my dear, nothing there.\" There is something\nthere! It is your wasted opportunities. It is your procrastinations.\nIt is those years you gave to the world that you ought to have given\nto Christ. They are there; and some of them put their fingers on your\naching temples, and some of them feel for the strings of your heart,\nand some put more thorns in your tumbled pillow, and you say: \"Turn me\nover.\" And they turn you over, but, alas! there is a more appalling\nvision. You say: \"Take that away!\" They say: \"There is nothing there,\nnothing there.\" There is--an open grave there! the judgment is there!\na lost eternity is there! Take it away! They can not take it away.\n\nYou say: \"How dark it is getting in the room!\" Why, the burners are\nall lighted. Your family come up one by one, and tenderly kiss you\ngood-bye. Your feet are cold, and the hands are cold, and the lips are\ncold, and they take a small mirror and they put it over your mouth to\nsee if there is any breathing, and that mirror is taken away without a\nsingle blur upon it; and they whisper through the room: \"She is gone.\"\nAnd then the door of the body opens and the soul flashes out. Make\nroom for the destroyed spirit.\n\nPush back that door! Lost! Let it come into its eternal residence.\nWoe! woe! No cup of merriment now, but cup of the wrath of Almighty\nGod. The last chance for heaven gone. The door of mercy shut. The doom\nsealed. The blackness of darkness forever!\n\nVoltaire is there. Herod is there. Robespierre is there. The\ndebauchees are there. The murderers are there. All the rejectors of\nJesus Christ are there. And you will be there unless you repent. You\ncan not say, my dear brother, that you were not warned. This sermon\nwould be a witness against you. You can not say that God's Holy Spirit\nnever strove with your heart. He is striving now. You can not say that\nyou had no chance for heaven, for the Omnipotent Son of God offers you\nHis rescue. You can not say: \"I had no warning about that world; I\ndidn't know there was any such place,\" for the Bible distinctly rings\nin your ears to-day, saying: \"At the end of the world the angels shall\nseparate the wicked from among the just, and shall cast them into a\nfurnace of fire.\" And again that book says: \"The wicked shall be\nturned into hell, and all the nations that forget God.\" And again it\nsays: \"The smoke of their torment ascendeth for ever and ever.\"\n\nYou can not say that you did not hear about heaven, the other\nalternative, for you hear of it now: \"The Lamb which is in the midst\nof the throne shall lead them to living fountains of water, and God\nshall wipe away all tears from their eyes.\" No sorrow, no suffering,\nno death. Oh, will you be careless any longer, when I tell you that\nChrist, the Conqueror of earth and hell, offers you now escape from\nall peril, and offers to introduce you this very hour into the peace\nand pardon of the Gospel, preparing you for that good land? The sides\nof Calvary run blood for you. Jesus, who had not where to lay His\nhead, offers you His heart as a pillow of rest. Christ offers with His\nown body to bridge over the chasm of death, saying: \"Walk over Me; I\nam the way.\"\n\nO suffering Jesus! the thief scoffed at Thee, and the malefactor spat\non Thee, and the soldiers stabbed Thee; but these who sit before Thee\nto-day have no heart to do that. O Jesus! tell them of Thy love, tell\nthem of Thy sympathy, tell them of the rewards Thou wilt give them in\nthe better land. Groan again, O blessed Jesus! groan again, and\nperhaps when the rocks fall, their hard hearts may break.\n\n    \"Nothing brought Him from above,\n     Nothing but redeeming love.\"\n\nThe promise is all free, the path all clear. Come, Mary, and sit\nto-night at the feet of Jesus. Come, Bartimeus, and have your eyes\nopened. Come, O prodigal! and sit at thy father's table. Come, O you\nsuffering, sinning, dying the soul! and find rest on the heart of\nJesus. The Spirit and Bride say \"Come,\" and Churches militant and\ntriumphant say \"Come,\" and all the voices of the past, mingling with\nall the voices of the future, in one great thunder of emphasis, bid\nyou \"Come now!\" Are not those of you who are in the third class ready\nto pass over into the second division, and become seekers after\nChrist? Ay, are you not ready to pass over into the first division,\nand become the pardoned sons and daughters of the Lord Almighty? I\ncan do no more than offer you, through Jesus Christ, peace on earth\nand everlasting residence in His presence.\n\n    \"When God makes up His last account\n    Of natives in His holy mount,\n    'Twill be an honor to appear\n    As one new-born and nourished there.\"\n\nGood-night! The Lord bless you! Go to your homes seeking after Christ.\nSleep not until you have made your peace with God. Good-night--a deep,\nhearty, loving, Christian good-night!\n\n\n\n\nTHE INSIGNIFICANT.\n\n    \"And she went, and came, and gleaned in the field after the\n    reapers: and her hap was to light on a part of the field\n    belonging unto Boaz, who was of the kindred of\n    Elimelech.\"--RUTH ii: 3.\n\n\nThe time that Ruth and Naomi arrive at Bethlehem is harvest-time. It\nwas the custom when a sheaf fell from a load in the harvest-field for\nthe reapers to refuse to gather it up: that was to be left for the\npoor who might happen to come along that way. If there were handfuls\nof grain scattered across the field after the main harvest had been\nreaped, instead of raking it, as farmers do now, it was, by the custom\nof the land, left in its place, so that the poor, coming along that\nway, might glean it and get their bread. But, you say, \"What is the\nuse of all these harvest-fields to Ruth and Naomi? Naomi is too old\nand feeble to go out and toil in the sun; and can you expect that\nRuth, the young and the beautiful, should tan her cheeks and blister\nher hands in the harvest-field?\"\n\nBoaz owns a large farm, and he goes out to see the reapers gather in\nthe grain. Coming there, right behind the swarthy, sun-browned\nreapers, he beholds a beautiful woman gleaning--a woman more fit to\nbend to a harp or sit upon a throne than to stoop among the sheaves.\nAh, that was an eventful day!\n\nIt was love at first sight. Boaz forms an attachment for the womanly\ngleaner--an attachment full of undying interest to the Church of God\nin all ages; while Ruth, with an ephah, or nearly a bushel of barley,\ngoes home to Naomi to tell her the successes and adventures of the\nday. That Ruth, who left her native land of Moab in darkness, and\ntraveled through an undying affection for her mother-in-law, is in the\nharvest-field of Boaz, is affianced to one of the best families in\nJudah, and becomes in after-time the ancestress of Jesus Christ, the\nLord of glory! Out of so dark a night did there ever dawn so bright a\nmorning?\n\nI. I learn, in the first place, from this subject how trouble develops\ncharacter. It was bereavement, poverty, and exile that developed,\nillustrated, and announced to all ages the sublimity of Ruth's\ncharacter. That is a very unfortunate man who has no trouble. It was\nsorrow that made John Bunyan the better dreamer, and Doctor Young the\nbetter poet, and O'Connell the better orator, and Bishop Hall the\nbetter preacher, and Havelock the better soldier, and Kitto the better\nencyclop\u00e6dist, and Ruth the better daughter-in-law.\n\nI once asked an aged man in regard to his pastor, who was a very\nbrilliant man, \"Why is it that your pastor, so very brilliant, seems\nto have so little heart and tenderness in his sermons?\" \"Well,\" he\nreplied, \"the reason is, our pastor has never had any trouble. When\nmisfortune comes upon him, his style will be different.\" After awhile\nthe Lord took a child out of that pastor's house; and though the\npreacher was just as brilliant as he was before, oh, the warmth, the\ntenderness of his discourses! The fact is, that trouble is a great\neducator. You see sometimes a musician sit down at an instrument, and\nhis execution is cold and formal and unfeeling. The reason is that all\nhis life he has been prospered. But let misfortune or bereavement come\nto that man, and he sits down at the instrument, and you discover the\npathos in the first sweep of the keys.\n\nMisfortune and trials are great educators. A young doctor comes into a\nsick-room where there is a dying child. Perhaps he is very rough in\nhis prescription, and very rough in his manner, and rough in the\nfeeling of the pulse, and rough in his answer to the mother's anxious\nquestion; but years roll on, and there has been one dead in his own\nhouse; and now he comes into the sick-room, and with tearful eye he\nlooks at the dying child, and he says, \"Oh, how this reminds me of my\nCharlie!\" Trouble, the great educator. Sorrow--I see its touch in the\ngrandest painting; I hear its tremor in the sweetest song; I feel its\npower in the mightiest argument.\n\nGrecian mythology said that the fountain of Hippocrene was struck out\nby the foot of the winged horse Pegasus. I have often noticed in life\nthat the brightest and most beautiful fountains of Christian comfort\nand spiritual life have been struck out by the iron-shod hoof of\ndisaster and calamity. I see Daniel's courage best by the flash of\nNebuchadnezzar's furnace. I see Paul's prowess best when I find him on\nthe foundering ship under the glare of the lightning in the breakers\nof Melita. God crowns His children amid the howling of wild beasts and\nthe chopping of blood-splashed guillotine and the crackling fires of\nmartyrdom. It took the persecutions of Marcus Aurelius to develop\nPolycarp and Justin Martyr. It took the pope's bull and the cardinal's\ncurse and the world's anathema to develop Martin Luther. It took all\nthe hostilities against the Scotch Covenanters and the fury of Lord\nClaverhouse to develop James Renwick, and Andrew Melville, and Hugh\nMcKail, the glorious martyrs of Scotch history. It took the stormy\nsea, and the December blast, and the desolate New England coast, and\nthe war-whoop of savages, to show forth the prowess of the Pilgrim\nFathers--\n\n    \"When amid the storms they sung,\n      And the stars heard, and the sea,\n    And the sounding aisles of the dim wood\n      Rang to the anthems of the free.\"\n\nIt took all our past national distresses, and it takes all our present\nnational sorrows, to lift up our nation on that high career where it\nwill march along after the foreign aristocracies that have mocked and\nthe tyrannies that have jeered, shall be swept down under the\nomnipotent wrath of God, who hates despotism, and who, by the strength\nof His own red right arm, will make all men free. And so it is\nindividually, and in the family, and in the Church, and in the world,\nthat through darkness and storm and trouble men, women, churches,\nnations, are developed.\n\nII. Again, I see in my text the beauty of unfaltering friendship. I\nsuppose there were plenty of friends for Naomi while she was in\nprosperity; but of all her acquaintances, how many were willing to\ntrudge off with her toward Judah, when she had to make that lonely\njourney? One--the heroine of my text. One--absolutely one. I suppose\nwhen Naomi's husband was living, and they had plenty of money, and all\nthings went well, they had a great many callers; but I suppose that\nafter her husband died, and her property went, and she got old and\npoor, she was not troubled very much with callers. All the birds that\nsung in the bower while the sun shone have gone to their nests, now\nthe night has fallen.\n\nOh, these beautiful sun-flowers that spread out their color in the\nmorning hour! but they are always asleep when the sun is going down!\nJob had plenty of friends when he was the richest man in Uz; but when\nhis property went and the trials came, then there were none so much\nthat pestered as Eliphaz the Temanite, and Bildad the Shuhite, and\nZophar the Naamathite.\n\nLife often seems to be a mere game, where the successful player pulls\ndown all the other men into his own lap. Let suspicions arise about a\nman's character, and he becomes like a bank in a panic, and all the\nimputations rush on him and break down in a day that character which\nin due time would have had strength to defend itself. There are\nreputations that have been half a century in building, which go down\nunder some moral exposure, as a vast temple is consumed by the touch\nof a sulphurous match. A hog can uproot a century plant.\n\nIn this world, so full of heartlessness and hypocrisy, how thrilling\nit is to find some friend as faithful in days of adversity as in days\nof prosperity! David had such a friend in Hushai; the Jews had such a\nfriend in Mordecai, who never forgot their cause; Paul had such a\nfriend in Onesiphorus, who visited him in jail; Christ had such in\nthe Marys, who adhered to Him on the cross; Naomi had such a one in\nRuth, who cried out: \"Entreat me not to leave thee, or to return from\nfollowing after thee; for whither thou goest, I will go; and where\nthou lodgest, I will lodge; thy people shall be my people, and thy God\nmy God; where thou diest will I die, and there will I be buried: the\nLord do so to me, and more also, if aught but death part thee and me.\"\n\nIII. Again, I learn from this subject that paths which open in\nhardship and darkness often come out in places of joy. When Ruth\nstarted from Moab toward Jerusalem, to go along with her\nmother-in-law, I suppose the people said: \"Oh, what a foolish creature\nto go away from her father's house, to go off with a poor old woman\ntoward the land of Judah! They won't live to get across the desert.\nThey will be drowned in the sea, or the jackals of the wilderness will\ndestroy them.\" It was a very dark morning when Ruth started off with\nNaomi; but behold her in my text in the harvest-field of Boaz, to be\naffianced to one of the lords of the land, and become one of the\ngrandmothers of Jesus Christ, the Lord of glory. And so it often is\nthat a path which often starts very darkly ends very brightly.\n\nWhen you started out for heaven, oh, how dark was the hour of\nconviction--how Sinai thundered, and devils tormented, and the\ndarkness thickened! All the sins of your life pounced upon you, and it\nwas the darkest hour you ever saw when you first found out your sins.\nAfter awhile you went into the harvest-field of God's mercy; you\nbegan to glean in the fields of divine promise, and you had more\nsheaves than you could carry, as the voice of God addressed you,\nsaying: \"Blessed is the man whose transgressions are forgiven, and\nwhose sins are covered.\" A very dark starting in conviction, a very\nbright ending in the pardon and the hope and the triumph of the\nGospel!\n\nSo, very often in our worldly business or in our spiritual career, we\nstart off on a very dark path. We must go. The flesh may shrink back,\nbut there is a voice within, or a voice from above, saying, \"You must\ngo;\" and we have to drink the gall, and we have to carry the cross,\nand we have to traverse the desert and we are pounded and flailed of\nmisrepresentation and abuse, and we have to urge our way through ten\nthousand obstacles that have been slain by our own right arm. We have\nto ford the river, we have to climb the mountain, we have to storm the\ncastle; but, blessed be God, the day of rest and reward will come. On\nthe tip-top of the captured battlements we will shout the victory; if\nnot in this world, then in that world where there is no gall to drink,\nno burdens to carry, no battles to fight. How do I know it? Know it! I\nknow it because God says so: \"They shall hunger no more, neither\nthirst any more, neither shall the sun light on them, nor any heat,\nfor the Lamb which is in the midst of the throne shall lead them to\nliving fountains of water, and God shall wipe all tears from their\neyes.\"\n\nIt was very hard for Noah to endure the scoffing of the people in his\nday, while he was trying to build the ark, and was every morning\nquizzed about his old boat that would never be of any practical use;\nbut when the deluge came, and the tops of the mountains disappeared\nlike the backs of sea-monsters, and the elements, lashed up in fury,\nclapped their hands over a drowned world, then Noah in the ark\nrejoiced in his own safety and in the safety of his family, and looked\nout on the wreck of a ruined earth.\n\nChrist, hounded of persecutors, denied a pillow, worse maltreated than\nthe thieves on either side of the cross, human hate smacking its lips\nin satisfaction after it had been draining His last drop of blood, the\nsheeted dead bursting from the sepulchers at His crucifixion. Tell me,\nO Gethsemane and Golgotha! were there ever darker times than those?\nLike the booming of the midnight sea against the rock, the surges of\nChrist's anguish beat against the gates of eternity, to be echoed back\nby all the thrones of heaven and all the dungeons of hell. But the day\nof reward comes for Christ; all the pomp and dominion of this world\nare to be hung on His throne, uncrowned heads are to bow before Him on\nwhose head are many crowns, and all the celestial worship is to come\nup at His feet, like the humming of the forest, like the rushing of\nthe waters, like the thundering of the seas, while all heaven, rising\non their thrones, beat time with their scepters: \"Hallelujah, for the\nLord God omnipotent reigneth! Hallelujah, the kingdoms of this world\nhave become the kingdoms of our Lord Jesus Christ!\"\n\n    \"That song of love, now low and far,\n    Ere long shall swell from star to star;\n    That light, the breaking day which tips\n    The golden-spired Apocalypse.\"\n\nIV. Again, I learn from my subject that events which seem to be most\ninsignificant may be momentous. Can you imagine anything more\nunimportant than the coming of a poor woman from Moab to Judah? Can\nyou imagine anything more trivial than the fact that this Ruth just\nhappened to alight--as they say--just happened to alight on that field\nof Boaz? Yet all ages, all generations, have an interest in the fact\nthat she was to become an ancestor of the Lord Jesus Christ, and all\nnations and kingdoms must look at that one little incident with a\nthrill of unspeakable and eternal satisfaction. So it is in your\nhistory and in mine: events that you thought of no importance at all\nhave been of very great moment. That casual conversation, that\naccidental meeting--you did not think of it again for a long while;\nbut how it changed all the phase of your life!\n\nIt seemed to be of no importance that Jubal invented rude instruments\nof music, calling them harp and organ; but they were the introduction\nof all the world's minstrelsy; and as you hear the vibration of a\nstringed instrument, even after the fingers have been taken away from\nit, so all music now of lute and drum and cornet is only the\nlong-continued strains of Jubal's harp and Jubal's organ. It seemed to\nbe a matter of very little importance that Tubal Cain learned the uses\nof copper and iron; but that rude foundry of ancient days has its echo\nin the rattle of Birmingham machinery, and the roar and bang of\nfactories on the Merrimac.\n\nIt seemed to be a matter of no importance that Luther found a Bible in\na monastery; but as he opened that Bible, and the brass-bound lids\nfell back, they jarred everything, from the Vatican to the furthest\nconvent in Germany, and the rustling of the wormed leaves was the\nsound of the wings of the angel of the Reformation. It seemed to be a\nmatter of no importance that a woman, whose name has been forgotten,\ndropped a tract in the way of a very bad man by the name of Richard\nBaxter. He picked up the tract and read it, and it was the means of\nhis salvation.\n\nIn after-days that man wrote a book called \"The Call to the\nUnconverted,\" that was the means of bringing a multitude to God, among\nothers Philip Doddridge. Philip Doddridge wrote a book called \"The\nRise and Progress of Religion,\" which has brought thousands and tens\nof thousands into the kingdom of God, and among others the great\nWilberforce. Wilberforce wrote a book called \"A Practical View of\nChristianity,\" which was the means of bringing a great multitude to\nChrist, among others Legh Richmond. Legh Richmond wrote a tract called\n\"The Dairyman's Daughter,\" which has been the means of the salvation\nof unconverted multitudes. And that tide of influence started from the\nfact that one Christian woman dropped a Christian tract in the way of\nRichard Baxter--the tide of influence rolling on through Richard\nBaxter, through Philip Doddridge, through the great Wilberforce,\nthrough Legh Richmond, on, on, on, forever, forever. So the\ninsignificant events of this world seem, after all, to be most\nmomentous. The fact that you came up that street or this street seemed\nto be of no importance to you, and the fact that you went inside of\nsome church may seem to be a matter of very great insignificance to\nyou, but you will find it the turning-point in your history.\n\nV. Again, I see in my subject an illustration of the beauty of female\nindustry.\n\nBehold Ruth toiling in the harvest-field under the hot sun, or at noon\ntaking plain bread with the reapers, or eating the parched corn which\nBoaz handed to her. The customs of society, of course, have changed,\nand without the hardships and exposure to which Ruth was subjected,\nevery intelligent woman will find something to do.\n\nI know there is a sickly sentimentality on this subject. In some\nfamilies there are persons of no practical service to the household or\ncommunity; and though there are so many woes all around about them in\nthe world, they spend their time languishing over a new pattern, or\nbursting into tears at midnight over the story of some lover who shot\nhimself! They would not deign to look at Ruth carrying back the barley\non her way home to her mother-in-law, Naomi. All this fastidiousness\nmay seem to do very well while they are under the shelter of their\nfather's house; but when the sharp winter of misfortune comes, what of\nthese butterflies? Persons under indulgent parentage may get upon\nthemselves habits of indolence; but when they come out into practical\nlife their soul will recoil with disgust and chagrin. They will feel\nin their hearts what the poet so severely satirized when he said:\n\n    \"Folks are so awkward, things so impolite,\n    They're elegantly pained from morning until night.\"\n\nThrough that gate of indolence how many men and women have marched,\nuseless on earth, to a destroyed eternity! Spinola said to Sir Horace\nVere: \"Of what did your brother die?\" \"Of having nothing to do,\" was\nthe answer. \"Ah!\" said Spinola, \"that's enough to kill any general of\nus.\" Oh! can it be possible in this world, where there is so much\nsuffering to be alleviated, so much darkness to be enlightened, and so\nmany burdens to be carried, that there is any person who cannot find\nanything to do?\n\nMadame de Sta\u00ebl did a world of work in her time; and one day, while\nshe was seated amid instruments of music, all of which she had\nmastered, and amid manuscript books which she had written, some one\nsaid to her: \"How do you find time to attend to all these things?\"\n\"Oh,\" she replied, \"these are not the things I am proud of. My chief\nboast is in the fact that I have seventeen trades, by any one of which\nI could make a livelihood if necessary.\" And if in secular spheres\nthere is so much to be done, in spiritual work how vast the field! How\nmany dying all around about us without one word of comfort! We want\nmore Abigails, more Hannahs, more Rebeccas, more Marys, more Deborahs\nconsecrated--body, mind, soul--to the Lord who bought them.\n\nVI. Once more I learn from my subject the value of gleaning.\n\nRuth going into that harvest-field might have said: \"There is a straw,\nand there is a straw, but what is a straw? I can't get any barley for\nmyself or my mother-in-law out of these separate straws.\" Not so said\nbeautiful Ruth. She gathered two straws, and she put them together,\nand more straws, until she got enough to make a sheaf. Putting that\ndown, she went and gathered more straws, until she had another sheaf,\nand another, and another, and another, and then she brought them all\ntogether, and she threshed them out, and she had an ephah of barley,\nnigh a bushel. Oh, that we might all be gleaners!\n\nElihu Burritt learned many things while toiling in a blacksmith's\nshop. Abercrombie, the world-renowned philosopher, was a philosopher\nin Scotland, and he got his philosophy, or the chief part of it,\nwhile, as a physician, he was waiting for the door of the sick-room to\nopen. Yet how many there are in this day who say they are so busy they\nhave no time for mental or spiritual improvement; the great duties of\nlife cross the field like strong reapers, and carry off all the hours,\nand there is only here and there a fragment left, that is not worth\ngleaning. Ah, my friends, you could go into the busiest day and\nbusiest week of your life and find golden opportunities, which,\ngathered, might at last make a whole sheaf for the Lord's garner. It\nis the stray opportunities and the stray privileges which, taken up\nand bound together and beaten out, will at last fill you with much\njoy.\n\nThere are a few moments left worth the gleaning. Now, Ruth, to the\nfield! May each one have a measure full and running over! Oh, you\ngleaners, to the field! And if there be in your household an aged one\nor a sick relative that is not strong enough to come forth and toil in\nthis field, then let Ruth take home to feeble Naomi this sheaf of\ngleaning: \"He that goeth forth and weepeth, bearing precious seed,\nshall doubtless come again with rejoicing, bringing his sheaves with\nhim.\" May the Lord God of Ruth and Naomi be our portion forever!\n\n\n\n\nTHE THREE RINGS.\n\n    \"Put a ring on his hand.\"--LUKE xv: 22.\n\n\nI will not rehearse the familiar story of the fast young man of the\nparable. You know what a splendid home he left. You know what a hard\ntime he had. And you remember how after that season of vagabondage and\nprodigality he resolved to go and weep out his sorrows on the bosom of\nparental forgiveness. Well, there is great excitement one day in front\nof the door of the old farmhouse. The servants come rushing up and\nsay: \"What's the matter? What _is_ the matter?\" But before they quite\narrive, the old man cries out: \"Put a ring on his hand.\" What a\nseeming absurdity! What can such a wretched mendicant as this fellow\nthat is tramping on toward the house want with a ring? Oh, he is the\nprodigal son. No more tending of the swine-trough. No more longing for\nthe pods of the carob-tree. No more blistered feet. Off with the rags!\nOn with the robe! Out with the ring! Even so does God receive every\none of us when we come back. There are gold rings, and pearl rings,\nand carnelian rings, and diamond rings; but the richest ring that ever\nflashed on the vision is that which our Father puts upon a forgiven\nsoul.\n\nI know that the impression is abroad among some people that religion\nbemeans and belittles a man; that it takes all the sparkle out of his\nsoul; that he has to exchange a roistering independence for an\necclesiastical strait-jacket. Not so. When a man becomes a Christian,\nhe does not go down, he starts upward. Religion multiplies one by ten\nthousand. Nay, the multiplier is in infinity. It is not a blotting\nout--it is a polishing, it is an arborescence, it is an efflorescence,\nit is an irradiation. When a man comes into the kingdom of God he is\nnot sent into a menial service, but the Lord God Almighty from the\npalaces of heaven calls upon the messenger angels that wait upon the\nthrone to fly and \"put a ring on his hand.\" In Christ are the largest\nliberty, and brightest joy, and highest honor, and richest adornment.\n\"Put a ring on his hand.\"\n\nI remark, in the first place, that when Christ receives a soul into\nHis love, He puts upon him the ring of adoption. Eight or ten years\nago, in my church in Philadelphia, there came the representative of\nthe Howard Mission of New York. He brought with him eight or ten\nchildren of the street that he had picked up, and he was trying to\nfind for them Christian homes; and as the little ones stood on the\npulpit and sung, our hearts melted within us. At the close of the\nservices a great-hearted wealthy man came up and said: \"I'll take this\nlittle bright-eyed girl, and I'll adopt her as one of my own\nchildren;\" and he took her by the hand, lifted her into his carriage,\nand went away.\n\nThe next day, while we were in the church gathering up garments for\nthe poor of New York, this little child came back with a bundle under\nher arm, and she said: \"There's my old dress; perhaps some of the\npoor children would like to have it,\" while she herself was in bright\nand beautiful array, and those who more immediately examined her said\nthat she had a ring on her hand. It was a ring of adoption.\n\nThere are a great many persons who pride themselves on their ancestry,\nand they glory over the royal blood that pours through their arteries.\nIn their line there was a lord, or a duke, or a prime minister, or a\nking. But when the Lord, our Father, puts upon us the ring of His\nadoption, we become the children of the Ruler of all nations. \"Behold\nwhat manner of love the Father hath bestowed upon us, that we should\nbe called the sons of God.\" It matters not how poor our garments may\nbe in this world, or how scant our bread, or how mean the hut we live\nin, if we have that ring of Christ's adoption upon our hand we are\nassured of eternal defenses.\n\nAdopted! Why, then, we are brothers and sisters to all the good of\nearth and heaven. We have the family name, the family dress, the\nfamily keys, the family wardrobe. The Father looks after us, robes us,\ndefends us, blesses us. We have royal blood in our veins, and there\nare crowns in our line. If we are His children, then princes and\nprincesses. It is only a question of time when we get our coronet.\nAdopted! Then we have the family secrets. \"The secret of the Lord is\nwith them that fear Him.\" Adopted! Then we have the family\ninheritance, and in the day when our Father shall divide the riches of\nheaven we shall take our share of the mansions and palaces and\ntemples. Henceforth let us boast no more of an earthly ancestry. The\ninsignia of eternal glory is our coat of arms. This ring of adoption\nputs upon us all honor and all privilege. Now we can take the words of\nCharles Wesley, that prince of hymn-makers, and sing:\n\n    \"Come, let us join our friends above,\n      Who have obtained the prize,\n    And on the eagle wings of love\n      To joy celestial rise.\n\n    \"Let all the saints terrestrial sing\n      With those to glory gone;\n    For all the servants of our King,\n      In heaven and earth, are one.\"\n\nI have been told that when any of the members of any of the great\nsecret societies of this country are in a distant city and are in any\nkind of trouble, and are set upon by enemies, they have only to give a\ncertain signal and the members of that organization will flock around\nfor defense. And when any man belongs to this great Christian\nbrotherhood, if he gets in trouble, in trial, in persecution, in\ntemptation, he has only to show this ring of Christ's adoption, and\nall the armed cohorts of heaven will come to his rescue.\n\nStill further, when Christ takes a soul into His love He puts upon it\na marriage-ring. Now, that is not a whim of mine: \"And I will betroth\nthee unto Me forever; yea, I will betroth thee unto Me in\nrighteousness, and in judgment, and in loving-kindness, and in\nmercies.\" (Hosea ii: 19.) At the wedding altar the bridegroom puts a\nring upon the hand of the bride, signifying love and faithfulness.\nTrouble may come upon the household, and the carpets may go, the\npictures may go, the piano may go, everything else may go--the last\nthing that goes is that marriage-ring, for it is considered sacred. In\nthe burial hour it is withdrawn from the hand and kept in a casket,\nand sometimes the box is opened on an anniversary day, and as you look\nat that ring you see under its arch a long procession of precious\nmemories. Within the golden circle of that ring there is room for a\nthousand sweet recollections to revolve, and you think of the great\ncontrast between the hour when, at the close of the \"Wedding March,\"\nunder the flashing lights and amid the aroma of orange-blossoms, you\nset that ring on the round finger of the plump hand, and that other\nhour when, at the close of the exhaustive watching, when you knew that\nthe soul had fled, you took from the hand, which gave back no\nresponsive clasp, from that emaciated finger, the ring that she had\nworn so long and worn so well.\n\nOn some anniversary day you take up that ring, and you repolish it\nuntil all the old luster comes back, and you can see in it the flash\nof eyes that long ago ceased to weep. Oh, it is not an unmeaning thing\nwhen I tell you that when Christ receives a soul into His keeping He\nputs on it a marriage-ring. He endows you from that moment with all\nHis wealth. You are one--Christ and the soul--one in sympathy, one in\naffection, one in hope.\n\nThere is no power in earth or hell to effect a divorcement after\nChrist and the soul are united. Other kings have turned out their\ncompanions when they got weary of them, and sent them adrift from the\npalace gate. Ahasuerus banished Vashti; Napoleon forsook Josephine;\nbut Christ is the husband that is true forever. Having loved you once,\nHe loves you to the end. Did they not try to divorce Margaret, the\nScotch girl, from Jesus? They said: \"You must give up your religion.\"\nShe said: \"I can't give up my religion.\" And so they took her down to\nthe beach of the sea, and they drove in a stake at low-water mark, and\nthey fastened her to it, expecting that as the tide came up her faith\nwould fail. The tide began to rise, and came up higher and higher, and\nto the girdle, and to the lip, and in the last moment, just as the\nwave was washing her soul into glory, she shouted the praises of\nJesus.\n\nOh, no, you can not separate a soul from Christ! It is an everlasting\nmarriage. Battle and storm and darkness can not do it. Is it too much\nexultation for a man, who is but dust and ashes like myself, to cry\nout this morning: \"I am persuaded that neither height, nor depth, nor\nprincipalities, nor powers, nor things present, nor things to come,\nnor any other creature shall separate me from the love of God which is\nin Christ Jesus my Lord\"? Glory be to God that when Christ and the\nsoul are married they are bound by a chain, a golden chain--if I might\nsay so--a chain with one link, and that one link the golden ring of\nGod's everlasting love.\n\nI go a step further, and tell you that when Christ receives a soul\ninto His love He puts on him the ring of festivity. You know that it\nhas been the custom in all ages to bestow rings on very happy\noccasions. There is nothing more appropriate for a birthday gift than\na ring. You delight to bestow such a gift upon your children at such\na time. It means joy, hilarity, festivity. Well, when this old man of\nthe text wanted to tell how glad he was that his boy had got back, he\nexpressed it in this way. Actually, before he ordered sandals to be\nput on his bare feet; before he ordered the fatted calf to be killed\nto appease the boy's hunger, he commanded: \"Put a ring on his hand.\"\n\nOh, it is a merry time when Christ and the soul are united! Joy of\nforgiveness! What a splendid thing it is to feel that all is right\nbetween me and God. What a glorious thing it is to have God just take\nup all the sins of my life and put them in one bundle, and then fling\nthem into the depths of the sea, never to rise again, never to be\ntalked of again. Pollution all gone. Darkness all illumined. God\nreconciled. The prodigal home. \"Put a ring on his hand.\"\n\nEvery day I find happy Christian people. I find some of them with no\nsecond coat, some of them in huts and tenement houses, not one earthly\ncomfort afforded them; and yet they are as happy as happy can be. They\nsing \"Rock of Ages\" as no other people in the world sing it. They\nnever wore any jewelry in their life but one gold ring, and that was\nthe ring of God's undying affection. Oh, how happy religion makes us!\nDid it make you gloomy and sad? Did you go with your head cast down? I\ndo not think you got religion, my brother. That is not the effect of\nreligion. True religion is a joy. \"Her ways are ways of pleasantness,\nand all her paths are peace.\"\n\nWhy, religion lightens all our burdens. It smooths all our way. It\ninterprets all our sorrows. It changes the jar of earthly discord for\nthe peal of festal bells. In front of the flaming furnace of trial it\nsets the forge on which scepters are hammered out. Would you not like\nto-day to come up from the swine-feeding and try this religion? All\nthe joys of heaven would come out and meet you, and God would cry from\nthe throne: \"Put a ring on his hand.\"\n\nYou are not happy. I see it. There is no peace, and sometimes you\nlaugh when you feel a great deal more like crying. The world is a\ncheat. It first wears you down with its follies, then it kicks you out\ninto darkness. It comes back from the massacre of a million souls to\nattempt the destruction of your soul to-day. No peace out of God, but\nhere is the fountain that can slake the thirst. Here is the harbor\nwhere you can drop safe anchorage.\n\nWould you not like, I ask you--not perfunctorily, but as one brother\nmight talk to another--would you not like to have a pillow of rest to\nput your head on? And would you not like, when you retire at night, to\nfeel that all is well, whether you wake up to-morrow morning at six\no'clock, or sleep the sleep that knows no waking? Would you not like\nto exchange this awful uncertainty about the future for a glorious\nassurance of heaven? Accept of the Lord Jesus to-day, and all is well.\nIf on your way home some peril should cross the street and dash your\nlife out, it would not hurt you. You would rise up immediately. You\nwould stand in the celestial streets. You would be amid the great\nthrong that forever worship and are forever happy. If this day some\nsudden disease should come upon you, it would not frighten you. If you\nknew you were going you could give a calm farewell to your beautiful\nhome on earth, and know that you are going right into the\ncompanionship of those who have already got beyond the toiling and the\nweeping.\n\nYou feel on Saturday night different from the way you feel any other\nnight of the week. You come home from the bank, or the store, or the\nshop, and you say: \"Well, now my week's work is done, and to-morrow is\nSunday.\" It is a pleasant thought. There is refreshment and\nreconstruction in the very idea. Oh, how pleasant it will be, if, when\nwe get through the day of our life, and we go and lie down in our bed\nof dust, we can realize: \"Well, now the work is all done, and\nto-morrow is Sunday--an everlasting Sunday.\"\n\n    \"Oh, when, thou city of my God,\n      Shall I thy courts ascend?\n    Where congregations ne'er break up,\n      And Sabbaths have no end.\"\n\nThere are people in this house to-day who are very near the eternal\nworld. If you are Christians, I bid you be of good cheer. Bear with\nyou our congratulations to the bright city. Aged men, who will soon be\ngone, take with you our love for our kindred in the better land, and\nwhen you see them, tell them that we are soon coming. Only a few more\nsermons to preach and hear. Only a few more heart-aches. Only a few\nmore toils. Only a few more tears. And then--what an entrancing\nspectacle will open before us!\n\n    \"Beautiful heaven, where all is light,\n    Beautiful angels clothed in white,\n    Beautiful strains that never tire,\n    Beautiful harps through all the choir;\n    There shall I join the chorus sweet,\n    Worshiping at the Saviour's feet.\"\n\nI stand before you on this Sabbath, the last Sabbath preceding the\ngreat feast-day in this Church. On the next Lord's-day the door of\ncommunion will be open, and you will all be invited to come in. And so\nI approach you now with a general invitation, not picking out here and\nthere a man, or here and there a woman, or here and there a child; but\ngiving you an unlimited invitation, saying: \"Come, for all things are\nnow ready.\" We invite you to the warm heart of Christ, and the\ninclosure of the Christian Church. I know a great many think that the\nChurch does not amount to much--that it is obsolete; that it did its\nwork and is gone now, so far as all usefulness is concerned. It is the\nhappiest place I have ever been in except my own home.\n\nI know there are some people who say they are Christians who seem to\nget along without any help from others, and who culture solitary\npiety. They do not want any ordinances. I do not belong to that class.\nI can not get along without them. There are so many things in this\nworld that take my attention from God, and Christ, and heaven, that I\nwant all the helps of all the symbols and of all the Christian\nassociations; and I want around about me a solid phalanx of men who\nlove God and keep His commandments. Are there any here who would like\nto enter into that association? Then by a simple, child-like faith,\napply for admission into the visible Church, and you will be received.\nNo questions asked about your past history or present surroundings.\nOnly one test--do you love Jesus?\n\nBaptism does not amount to anything, say a great many people; but the\nLord Jesus declared, \"He that believeth and is baptized shall be\nsaved,\" putting baptism and faith side by side. And an apostle\ndeclares, \"Repent and be baptized, every one of you.\" I do not stickle\nfor any particular mode of baptism, but I put great emphasis on the\nfact that you ought to be baptized. Yet no more emphasis than the Lord\nJesus Christ, the Great Head of the Church, puts upon it.\n\nThe world is going to lose a great many of its votaries next Sabbath.\nWe give you warning. There is a great host coming in to stand under\nthe banner of the Lord Jesus Christ. Will you be among them? It is\ngoing to be a great harvest-day. Will you be among the gathered\nsheaves?\n\nSome of you have been thinking on this subject year after year. You\nhave found out that this world is a poor portion. You want to be\nChristians. You have come almost into the kingdom of God; but there\nyou stop, forgetful of the fact that to be almost saved is not to be\nsaved at all. Oh, my brother, after having come so near to the door of\nmercy, if you turn back, you will never come at all. After all you\nhave heard of the goodness of God, if you turn away and die, it will\nnot be because you did not have a good offer.\n\n    \"God's spirit will not always strive\n      With hardened, self-destroying man;\n    Ye who persist His love to grieve\n      May never hear his voice again.\"\n\nMay God Almighty this hour move upon your soul and bring you back from\nthe husks of the wilderness to the Father's house, and set you at the\nbanquet, and \"put a ring on your hand.\"\n\n\n\n\nHOW HE CAME TO SAY IT.\n\n    \"If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be\n    Anathema Maranatha.\"--I COR. xvi: 22.\n\n\nThe smallest lad in the house knows the meaning of all those words\nexcept the last two, Anathema Maranatha. Anathema, to cut off.\nMaranatha, at His coming. So the whole passage might be read: \"If any\nman love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be cut off at His coming.\"\nWell, how could the tender-hearted Paul say that? We have seen him\nwith tears discoursing about human want, and flushed with excitement\nabout human sorrow; and now he throws those red-hot iron words into\nthis letter to the Corinthians. Had he lost his patience? Ok, no. Had\nhe resigned his confidence in the Christian religion? Oh, no. Had the\nworld treated him so badly that he had become its sworn enemy? Oh, no.\nIt needs some explanation, I confess, and I shall proceed to show by\nwhat process Paul came to the vehement utterance of my text. Before I\nclose, if God shall give His Spirit, you shall cease to be surprised\nat the exclamation of the Apostle, and you yourselves will employ the\nsame emphasis, declaring, \"If any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ,\nlet him be Anathema Maranatha.\"\n\nIf the photographic art had been discovered early enough, we should\nhave had the facial proportions of Christ--the front face, the side\nface, Jesus sitting, Jesus standing--provided He had submitted to that\nart; but since the sun did not become a portrait painter until\neighteen centuries after Christ, our idea about the Saviour's personal\nappearance is all guess work. Still, tradition tells us that He was\nthe most infinitely beautiful being that ever walked our small earth.\nIf His features had been rugged, and His gait had been ungainly, that\nwould not have hindered Him from being attractive. Many men you have\nknown and loved have had few charms of physiognomy. Wilberforce was\nnot attractive in face. Socrates was repulsive. Suwarrow, the great\nRussian hero, looked almost an imbecile. And some whom you have known,\nand honored, and loved, have not had very great attractiveness of\npersonal appearance. The shape of the mouth, and the nose, and the\neyebrow, did not hinder the soul from shining through the cuticle of\nthe face in all-powerful irradiation.\n\nBut to a lovely exterior Christ joined all loveliness of disposition.\nRun through the galleries of heaven, and find out that He is _a\nnon-such_. The sunshine of His love mingling with the shadows of His\nsorrows, crossed by the crystalline stream of His tears and the\ncrimson flowing forth of His blood, make a picture worthy of being\ncalled the masterpiece of the eternities. Hung on the wall of heaven,\nthe celestial population would be enchanted but for the fact that they\nhave the grand and magnificent original, and they want no picture. But\nChrist having gone away from earth, we are dependent upon four\nindistinct pictures. Matthew took one, Mark another, Luke another,\nand John another. I care not which picture you take, it is lovely.\nLovely? He was altogether lovely.\n\nHe had a way of taking up a dropsical limb without hurting it, and of\nremoving the cataract from the eye without the knife, and of starting\nthe circulation through the shrunken arteries without the shock of the\nelectric battery, and of putting intelligence into the dull stare of\nlunacy, and of restringing the auditory nerve of the deaf ear, and of\nstriking articulation into the stiff tongue, and of making the\nstark-naked madman dress himself and exchange tombstone for ottoman,\nand of unlocking from the skeleton grip of death the daughter of\nJairus to embosom her in her glad father's arms. Oh, He was\nlovely--sitting, standing, kneeling, lying down--always lovely.\n\nLovely in His sacrifice. Why, He gave up everything for us. Home,\ncelestial companionship, music of seraphic harps, balmy breath of\neternal summer, all joy, all light, all music, and heard the gates\nslam shut behind Him as He came out to fight for our freedom, and with\nbare feet plunged on the sharp javelins of human and satanic hate,\nuntil His blood spurted into the faces of those who slew Him. You want\nthe soft, low, minor key of sweetest music to describe the pathos; but\nit needs an orchestra, under swinging of an archangel's baton,\nreaching from throne to manger, to drum and trumpet the doxologies of\nHis praise. He took everybody's trouble--the leper's sickness, the\nwidow's dead boy, the harlot's shame, the Galilean fisherman's poor\nluck, the invalidism of Simon's mother-in-law, the sting of Malchus'\namputated ear.\n\nSome people cry very easily, and for some it is very difficult to cry.\nA great many tears on some cheeks do not mean so much as one tear on\nanother cheek. What is it that I see glittering in the mild eye of\nJesus? It was all the sorrows of earth, and the woes of hell, from\nwhich He had plucked our souls, accreted into one transparent drop,\nlingering on the lower eyelash until it fell on a cheek red with the\nslap of human hands--just one salt, bitter, burning tear of Jesus. No\nwonder the rock, the sky, and the cemetery were in consternation when\nHe died! No wonder the universe was convulsed! It was the Lord God\nAlmighty bursting into tears. Now, suppose that, notwithstanding all\nthis, a man can not have any affection for Him. What ought to be done\nwith such hard behavior?\n\nIt seems to me that there ought to be some chastisement for a man who\nwill not love such a Christ. Does it not make your blood tingle to\nthink of Jesus coming over the tens of thousands of miles that seem to\nseparate God from us, and then to see a man jostle Him out, and push\nHim back, and shut the door in His face, and trample upon His\nentreaties? While you may not be able to rise up to the towering\nexcitement of the Apostle in my text, you can at any rate somewhat\nunderstand his feelings when he cried out: \"After all this, 'if a man\nlove not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha.'\"\n\nJust look at the injustice of not loving Him. Now, there is nothing\nthat excites a man like injustice. You go along the street, and you\nsee your little child buffeted, or a ruffian comes and takes a boy's\nhat and throws it into the ditch. You say: \"What great meanness, what\ninjustice that is!\" You can not stand injustice. I remember, in my\nboyhood days, attending a large meeting in Tripler Hall, New York.\nThousands of people were huzzaing, and the same kind of audiences were\nassembled at the same time in Boston, Edinburgh, and London. Why?\nBecause the Madaii family, in Italy, had been robbed of their Bible.\n\"A little thing,\" you say. Ah, that injustice was enough to arouse the\nindignation of a world. But while we are so sensitive about injustice\nas between man and man, how little sensitive we are about injustice\nbetween man and God. If there ever was a fair and square purchase of\nanything, then Christ purchased us. He paid for us, not in shekels,\nnot in ancient coins inscribed with effigies of Hercules, or \u00c6gina's\ntortoise, or lyre of Mitylene, but in two kinds of coin--one red, the\nother glittering--blood and tears! If anything is purchased and paid\nfor, ought not the goods to be delivered? If you have bought property\nand given the money, do you not want to come into possession of it?\n\"Yes,\" you say, \"I will have it. I bought and paid for it.\" And you\nwill go to law for it, and you will denounce the man as a defrauder.\nAy, if need be, you will hurl him into jail. You will say: \"I am bound\nto get that property. I bought it. I paid for it!\"\n\nNow, transpose the case. Suppose Jesus Christ to be the wronged\npurchaser on the one side, and the impenitent soul on the other,\ntrying to defraud Him of that which He bought at such an exorbitant\nprice, how do you feel about that injustice? How do you feel toward\nthat spiritual fraud, turpitude and perfidy? A man with an ardent\ntemperament rises and he says that such injustice as between man and\nman is bad enough, but between man and God it is reprehensible and\nintolerable, and he brings his fist down on the pew, and he says: \"I\ncan stand this injustice no longer. After all this purchase, 'if any\nman love not the Lord Jesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha'!\"\n\nI go still further, and show you how suicidal it is for a man not to\nlove Christ. If a man gets in trouble, and he can not get out, we have\nonly one feeling toward him--sympathy and a desire to help him. If he\nhas failed for a vast amount of money, and can not pay more than ten\ncents on a dollar--ay, if he can not pay anything--though his\ncreditors may come after him like a pack of hounds, we sympathize with\nhim. We go to his store, or house, and we express our condolence. But\nsuppose the day before that man failed, William E. Dodge had come into\nhis store and said: \"My friend, I hear you are in trouble. I have come\nto help you. If ten thousand dollars will see you through your\nperplexity, I have a loan of that amount for you. Here is a check for\nthe amount of that loan.\" Suppose the man said: \"With that ten\nthousand dollars I could get through until next spring, and then\neverything will be all right; but, Mr. Dodge, I don't want it; I won't\ntake it; I would rather fail than take it; I don't even thank you for\noffering it.\" Your sympathy for that man would cease immediately. You\nwould say: \"He had a fair offer; he might have got out; he wants to\nfail; he refuses all help; now let him fail.\" There is no one in all\nthis house who would have any sympathy for that man.\n\nBut do not let us be too hasty. Christ hears of our spiritual\nembarrassments, he finds that we are on the very verge of eternal\ndefalcation. He finds the law knocking at our door with this dun: \"Pay\nme what thou owest.\"\n\nWe do not know which way to turn. Pay? We can not pay a farthing of\nall the millions of obligation. Well, Christ comes in and says: \"Here\nis My name; you can use My name. Your name would be worthless, but My\nred handwriting on the back of this obligation will get you through\nanywhere.\" Now suppose the soul says: \"I know I am in debt; I can't\nmeet these obligations either in time or eternity; but, oh, Christ, I\nwant not Thy help; I ask not Thy rescue. Go away from me.\" You would\nsay: \"That man, why, he deserves to die. He had the offer of help; he\nwould not take it. He is a free agent; he ought to have what he wants;\nhe chooses death rather than life. Ought you not give him freedom of\nchoice?\" Though awhile ago there was only one ardent man who\nunderstood the Apostle, now there are hundreds in the house who can\nsay, and do say within themselves: \"After all this ingratitude, and\nrejection, and obstinacy, 'if any man love not the Lord Jesus Christ,\nlet him be Anathema Maranatha.'\"\n\nI go a step further, and say it is most cruel for a man not to love\nJesus. The meanest thing I could do for you would be needlessly to\nhurt your feelings. Sharp words sometimes cut like a dagger. An unkind\nlook will sometimes rive like the lightning. An unkind deed may\novermaster a sensitive spirit, and if you have made up your mind that\nyou have done wrong to any one, it does not take you two minutes to\nmake up your mind to go and apologize. Now, Christ is a bundle of\ndelicacy and sensitiveness. How you have shocked His nerves! How you\nhave broken His heart!\n\nDid you, my brother, ever measure the meaning of that one passage:\n\"Behold, I stand at the door and knock\"? It never came to me as it did\nthis morning while I was thinking on this subject. \"Behold, I stand at\nthe door and knock.\" Some January day, the thermometer five degrees\nbelow zero, the wind and sleet beating mercilessly against you, you go\nup the steps of a house where you have a very important errand. You\nknock with one knuckle. No answer. You are very earnest, and you are\nfreezing. The next time you knock harder. After awhile with your fist\nyou beat against the door. You must get in, but the inmate is careless\nor stubborn, and he does not want you in. Your errand is a failure.\nYou go away.\n\nThe Lord Jesus Christ comes up on the steps of your heart, and with\nvery sore hand he knocks hard at the door of your soul. He is standing\nin the cold blasts of human suffering. He knocks. He says: \"Let me in.\nI have come a great way. I have come all the way from Nazareth, from\nBethlehem, from Golgotha. Let Me in. I am shivering and blue with the\ncold. Let Me in. My feet are bare but for their covering of blood. My\nhead is uncovered but for a turban of brambles. By all these wounds of\nfoot, and head, and heart, I beg you to let Me in. Oh, I have been\nhere a great while, and the night is getting darker. I am faint with\nhunger. I am dying to get in. Oh, lift the latch--shove back the\nbolt! Won't you let Me in? Won't you? 'Behold, I stand at the door and\nknock!'\"\n\nBut after awhile, my brother, the scene will change. It will be\nanother door, but Christ will be on the other side of it. He will be\non the inside, and the rejected sinner will be on the outside, and the\nsinner will come up and knock at the door, and say: \"Let me in, let me\nin. I have come a great way. I came all the way from earth. I am sick\nand dying. Let me in. The merciless storm beats my unsheltered head.\nThe wolves of a great night are on my track. Let me in. With both\nfists I beat against this door. Oh, let me in. Oh, Christ, let me in.\nOh, Holy Ghost, let me in. Oh, God, let me in. Oh, my glorified\nkindred, let me in.\" No answer save the voice of Christ, who shall\nsay: \"Sinner, when I stood at your door you would not let Me in, and\nnow you are standing at My door, and I can not let you in. The day of\nyour grace is past. Officer of the law, seize him.\" And while the\narrest is going on, all the myriads of heaven rise on gallery and\nthrone, and cry with loud voice, that makes the eternal city quake\nfrom capstone to foundation, saying: \"If any man love not the Lord\nJesus Christ, let him be Anathema Maranatha.\"\n\nSabbath audience in the Brooklyn Tabernacle, and all to whom these\nwords shall come on both sides the sea, notice here the tremendous\nalternative: it is not whether you live in Pierrepont Street or\nCarlton Avenue, walk Trafalgar Square or the \"Canongate;\" nor whether\nyour dress shall be black or brown; nor whether you shall be robust\nor an invalid; nor whether you shall live on the banks of the Hudson,\nthe Shannon, the Seine, the Thames, the Tiber; but it is a question\nwhether you will love Christ or suffer banishment; whether you will\ngive yourselves to Him who owns you or fall under the millstone;\nwhether you will rise to glories that have no terminus or plunge to a\ndepth which has no bottom. I do not see how you can take the\nten-thousandth part of a second to decide it, when there are two\nworlds fastened at opposite ends of a swivel, and the swivel turns on\none point, and that point is now, now. Is it not fair that you love\nHim? Is it not right that you love Him? Is it not imperative that you\nlove Him? What is it that keeps you from rushing up and throwing the\narms of your affection about His neck?\n\nMy text pronounces Anathema Maranatha upon all those who refuse to\nlove Christ. Anathema--cut off. Cut off from light, from hope, from\npeace, from heaven. Oh, sharp, keen, sword-like words! Cut off!\nEverlastingly cut off! Behold, therefore, the goodness and severity of\nGod: on them which fell, severity; but toward thee, goodness, if thou\ncontinue in His goodness; otherwise thou also shalt be cut off.\nMaranatha--that is the other word. \"When he comes\" is the meaning of\nit.\n\nWill He come? I see no signs of it. I looked into the sky as I rode\ndown to church. I saw no signs of the coming. No signal of God's\nappearance. The earth stands solid on its foundation. No cry of\nwelcome or of woe. Will He come! He will. Maranatha! Hear it ye\nmountains, and prepare to fall. Ye cities, and prepare to burn. Ye\nrighteous, and prepare to reign. Ye wicked, and prepare to die.\nMaranatha! Maranatha!\n\nBut, oh, my brother, I am not so aroused by that coming as I am by a\nprevious coming, and that is the coming of our death hour, which will\nfix everything for us. I can not help now, while preaching, asking\nmyself the question--Am I ready for that? If I am ready for the first\nI will be ready for the next. Are you ready for the emergency? Shall I\ntell you when your death hour will come? \"Oh, no,\" says some one, \"I\ndon't want to know. I would rather not know.\" Some one says: \"I would\nrather know, if you can tell me.\" I will tell you. It will be at the\nmost unexpected moment, when you are most busy, and when you think you\ncan be least spared. I can not exactly say whether it will be in the\nnoon, or at the sundown when people are coming home, or in the morning\nwhen the world is waking up, or while the clock is striking twelve at\nnight. But I tell you what I think, that with some of you it will be\nbefore next Saturday night.\n\nA minister of the Gospel said to an audience: \"Before next Sabbath\nsome of you will be gone.\" And a man said during the week: \"I shall\nwatch now, and if no one dies in our congregation during this week I\nshall go and tell the minister his falsehood.\" A man standing next to\nhim said: \"Why, it may be yourself.\" \"Oh, no,\" he replied; \"I shall\nlive on to be an old man.\" That night he breathed his last.\n\nStanding before some who shall be launched into the great eternity,\nwhat are your equipments? About to jump, where will you land? Oh, the\nsubject is overwhelming to me; and when I say these things to you, I\nsay them to myself. \"Lord, is it I? Is it I?\" Some of us part to-night\nnever to meet again. If never before, I now here commit my soul into\nthe keeping of the Lord Jesus Christ. I throw my sinful heart upon His\ninfinite mercy. But some of you will not do that. You will go over to\nthe store to-morrow, and your comrades will say: \"Where were you\nyesterday?\" You will say: \"I heard Talmage preach, and I don't believe\nwhat he preaches.\" And you will go on and die in your sins.\n\nFeeling that you are bound unto death eternal I solemnly take leave of\nyou. Be careful of your health, for when your respiration gives out\nall your good times will have ended. Be careful in walking near a\nscaffold, for one falling brick or stone might usher you into the\ngreat eternity for which you have no preparation. A few months, or\nweeks, or days, or hours will pass on, and then you will see the last\nlight, and hear the last music, and have the last pleasant emotion,\nand a destroyed eternity will rush upon you. Farewell, oh, doomed\nspirit! As you shove off from hope, I wave you this last salutation.\nOh, it is hard to part forever and forever! I bid you one long, last,\nbitter, eternal adieu!\n\n\n\n\nCASTLE JESUS.\n\n    \"Who have fled for refuge.\"--HEB. vi: 18.\n\n\nPaul is here speaking of the consolations of Christians. He styles\nthem these \"who have fled for refuge.\"\n\nMoses established six cities of refuge--three on the east side of the\nriver Jordan, and three on the west. When a man had killed any one\naccidentally he fled to one of these cities. The roads leading to them\nwere kept perfectly good, so that when a man started for the refuge\nnothing might impede him. Along the cross-roads, and wherever there\nmight be any mistake about the way, there were signs put up pointing\nin the right way, with the word \"Refuge.\" Having gained the limits of\none of these cities the man was safe, and the mothers of the priests\nprovided for him.\n\nSome of us have seen our peril, and have fled to Christ, and feel that\nwe shall never be captured. We are among those \"who have fled for\nrefuge.\" Christ is represented in the Bible as a Tower, a High Rock, a\nFortress, and a Shelter. If you have seen any of the ancient castles\nof Europe, you know that they are surrounded by trenches, across which\nthere is a draw-bridge. If an enemy approach, the people, for defense,\nwould get into the castle, have the trenches filled with water, and\nlift up the draw-bridge. Whether to a city of safety, or a tower,\nPaul refers, I know not, and care not, for in any case he means\nChrist, the safety of the soul.\n\nBut why talk of refuge? Who needs it, if the refuge spoken of be a\ncity or a castle, into which men fly for safety? It is all sunlight\nhere. No sound of war in our streets. We do not hear the rush of armed\nmen against the doors of our dwellings. We do not come with weapons to\nchurch. Our lives are not at the mercy of an assassin. Why, then, talk\nof refuge?\n\nAlas! I stand before a company of imperiled men. No flock of sheep was\never so threatened or endangered of a pack of wolves; no ship was ever\nso beaten of a storm; no company of men were ever so environed of a\nband of savages. A refuge you must have, or fall before an\nall-devouring destruction. There are not so many serpents in Africa;\nthere are not so many hyenas in Asia; there are not so many panthers\nin the forest, as there are transgressions attacking my soul. I will\ntake the best unregenerated man anywhere, and say to him, You are\nutterly corrupt. If all the sins of your past life were marshaled in\nsingle file, they would reach from here to hell. If you have escaped\nall other sins, the fact that you have rejected the mission of the Son\nof God is enough to condemn you forever, pushing you off into\nbottomless darkness, struck by ten thousand hissing thunder-bolts of\nOmnipotent wrath.\n\nYou are a sinner. The Bible says it, and your conscience affirms it.\nNot a small sinner, or a moderate sinner, or a tolerable sinner, but a\ngreat sinner, a protracted sinner, a vile sinner, an outrageous\nsinner, a condemned sinner. As God, with His all-scrutinizing gaze,\nlooks upon you to-day, He can not find one sound spot in your soul.\nSin has put scales on your eyes, and deadened your ear with an awful\ndeafness, and palsied your right arm, and stunned your sensibilities,\nand blasted you with an infinite blasting. The Bible, which you admit\nto be true, affirms that you are diseased from the crown of your head\nto the sole of your foot. You are unclean; you are a leper. Believe\nnot me, but believe God's Word, that over and over again announces, in\nlanguage that a fool might understand, the total and complete\ndepravity of the unchanged heart: \"The heart is deceitful above all\nthings, and desperately wicked.\"\n\nIn addition to the sins of your life there are uncounted troubles in\npursuit of you. Bereavements, losses, disappointments are a flock of\nvultures ever on the wing. Did you get your house built, and\nfurnished, and made comfortable any sooner than misfortune came in\nwithout knocking, and sat beside you--a skeleton apparition? Have not\npains shot their poisoned arrows, and fevers kindled their fire in\nyour brain? Many of you, for years, have walked on burning marl. You\nstepped out of one disaster into another. You may, like Job, have\ncursed the day in which you were born. This world boils over with\ntrouble for you, and you are wondering where the next grave will gape,\nand where the next storm will burst. Oh, ye pursued, sinning, dying,\ntroubled, exhausted souls, are you not ready now to hear me while I\ntell you of Christ, the Refuge?\n\nA soldier, during the war, heard of the sickness of his wife and\nasked for a furlough. It was denied him, and he ran away. He was\ncaught, brought back, and sentenced to be shot as a deserter. The\nofficer took from his pocket a document that announced his death on\nthe following morning. As the document was read, the man flinched not\nand showed no sorrow or anxiety. But the officer then took from his\npocket another document that contained the prisoner's pardon. Then he\nbroke down with deep emotion at the thought of the leniency that had\nbeen extended. Though you may not appear moved while I tell you of the\nlaw that thundered its condemnation, while I tell you of the pardon\nand the peace of the Gospel I wonder if they will not overcome you.\n\nJesus is a safe refuge. Fort Hudson, Fort Pulaski, Fort Moultrie, Fort\nSumter, Gibraltar, Sebastopol were taken. But Jesus is a castle into\nwhich the righteous runneth and is safe. No battering-ram can demolish\nits wall. No sappers or miners can explode its ramparts, no storm-bolt\nof perdition leap upon its towers. The weapons that guard this fort\nare omnipotent. Hell shall unlimber its great guns as death only to\nhave them dismantled. In Christ our sins are pardoned, discomforted,\nblotted out, forgiven. An ocean can not so easily drown a fly as the\nocean of God's forgiveness swallow up, utterly and forever, our\ntransgressions. He is able to save unto the uttermost.\n\nYou who have been so often overcome in a hand-to-hand fight with the\nworld, the flesh, and devil, try this fortress. Once here, you are\nsafe forever. Satan may charge up the steep, and shout amid the uproar\nof the fight, Forward, to his battalions of darkness; but you will\nstand in the might of the great God, your Redeemer, safe in the\nrefuge. The troubles of life, that once overwhelmed you, may come on\nwith their long wagon-trains laden with care and worryment; and you\nmay hear in their tramp the bereavements that once broke your heart;\nbut Christ is your friend, Christ your sympathizer, Christ your\nreward. Safe in the refuge!\n\nDeath at last may lay the siege to your spirit, and the shadows of the\nsepulcher may shake their horrors in the breeze, and the hoarse howl\nof the night wind may be mingled with the cry of despair, yet you will\nshout in triumph from the ramparts, and the pale horse shall be hurled\nback on his haunches. Safe in the refuge! To this castle I fly. This\nlast fire shall but illumine its towers; and the rolling thunders of\nthe judgment will be the salvo of its victory.\n\nJust after Queen Victoria had been crowned--she being only nineteen or\ntwenty years of age--Wellington handed her a death-warrant for her\nsignature. It was to take the life of a soldier in the army. She said\nto Wellington: \"Can there nothing good be said of this man?\" He said:\n\"No; he is a bad soldier, and deserves to die.\" She took up the\ndeath-warrant, and it trembled in her hand as she again asked: \"Does\nno one know anything good of this man?\" Wellington said: \"I have heard\nthat at his trial a man said that he had been a good son to his old\nmother.\" \"Then let his life be spared,\" said the queen, and she\nordered his sentence commuted.\n\nChrist is on a throne of grace. Our case is brought before him. The\nquestion is asked: \"Is there any good about this man?\" The law says:\n\"None.\" Justice says: \"None.\" Our own conscience says: \"None.\"\nNevertheless, Christ hands over our pardon, and asks us to take it.\nOh, the height and depth, the length and breadth of his mercy!\n\nAgain, Christ is a near refuge. When we are attacked, what advantage\nis there in having a fortress on the other side of the mountain? Many\nan army has had an intrenchment, but could not get to it before the\nbattle opened. Blessed be God, it is no long march to our castle. We\nmay get off, with all our troops, from the worst earthly defeat in\nthis stronghold. In a moment we may step from the battle into the\ntower. I sing of a Saviour near.\n\nDuring the late war the forts of the North were named after the\nNorthern generals, and the forts of the South were named after the\nSouthern generals. This fortress of our soul I shall call Castle\nJesus. I have seen men pursued of sins that chased them with feet of\nlightning, and yet with one glad leap they bounded into the tower. I\nhave seen troubles, with more than the speed and terror of a cavalry\ntroop, dash after a retreating soul, yet were hurled back in defeat\nfrom the bulwarks. Jesus near! A child's cry, a prisoner's prayer, a\nsailor's death-shriek, a pauper's moan reaches him. No pilgrimages on\nspikes. No journeying with a huge pack on your back. No kneeling in\npenance in cold vestibule of mercy. But an open door! A compassionate\nSaviour! A present salvation! A near refuge! Castle Jesus!\n\nOh, why do you not put out your arm and reach it? Why do you not fly\nto it? Why be riddled, and shelled, and consumed under the rattling\nbombardment of perdition, when one moment's faith would plant you in\nthe glorious refuge? I preach a Jesus here; a Jesus now; a fountain\nclose to your feet; a fiery pillar right over your head; bread already\nbroken for your hunger; a crown already gleaming for your brow. Hark\nto the castle gates rattling back for your entrance! Hear you not the\nwelcome of those who have fled for refuge to lay hold upon the hope\nset before us?\n\nAgain, it is a universal refuge. A fortress is seldom large enough to\nhold a whole army. I look out upon fourteen hundred millions of the\nrace; and then I look at this fortress, and I say that there is room\nenough for all. If it had been possible, this salvation would have\nbeen monopolized. Men would have said: \"Let us have all this to\nourselves--no publicans, no plebeians, no lazzaroni, no converted\npickpockets. We will ride toward heaven on fierce chargers, our feet\nin golden stirrups. Grace for lords, and dukes, and duchesses, and\ncounts. Let Napoleon and his marshals come in, but not the common\nsoldier that fought under him. Let the Girards and the Barings come\nin, but not the stevedores that unloaded their cargoes, or the men who\nkept their books.\" Heaven would have been a glorified Windsor Castle,\nor Tuileries, or Vatican; and exclusive aristocrats would have\nstrutted through the golden streets to all eternity.\n\nThank God, there is mercy for the poor! The great Doctor John Mason\npreached over a hundred times the same sermon; and the text was: \"To\nthe poor the Gospel is preached.\" Lazarus went up, while Dives went\ndown; and there are candidates for Imperial splendors in the back\nalley, and by the peat-fire of the Irish shanty. King Jesus set up His\nthrone in a manger, and made a resurrection day for the poor widow of\nNain, and sprung the gate of heaven wide open, so that all the\nbeggars, and thieves, and scoundrels of the universe may come in if\nthey will only repent. I can snatch the knife from the murderer's hand\nwhile it is yet dripping with the blood of his victim, and tell him of\nthe grace that is sufficient to pardon his soul. Do you say that I\nswing open the gate of heaven too far? I swing it open no wider than\nChrist, when He says: \"Whosoever will, let him come.\" Don't you want\nto go in with such a rabble? Then you can stay out.\n\nThe whole world will yet come into this refuge. The windows of heaven\nwill be opened; God's trumpet of salvation will sound, and China will\ncome from its tea-fields and rice-harvests, and lift itself up into\nthe light. India will come forth, the chariots of salvation jostling\nto pieces her Juggernauts. Freezing Greenland, and sweltering\nAbyssinia, will, side by side, press into the kingdom; and transformed\nBornesian cannibal preach of the resurrection of the missionary he has\nslain. The glory of Calvary will tinge the tip of the Pyrenees; and\nLebanon cedars shall clap their hands; and by one swing of the sickle\nChrist shall harvest nations for the skies.\n\nI sing a world redeemed. In the rush of the winds that set the forest\nin motion, like giants wrestling on the hills, I see the tossing up of\nthe triumphal branches that shall wave all along the line of our King\nas He comes to take empire. In the stormy diapason of the ocean's\norgan, and the more gentle strains that in the calm come sounding up\nfrom the crystal and jasper keys at the beach, I hear the prophecy:\n\"The earth shall be filled with the knowledge of God as the waters\nfill the sea.\"\n\nThe gospel morning will come like the natural morning. At first it\nseems only like another hue of the night. Then a pallor strikes\nthrough the sky, as though a company of ministering spirits, pale with\ntedious watching through the night, had turned in their flight upward\nto look back upon the earth. Then a faint glow of fire, as though on a\nbarren beach a wrecked mariner was kindling a flickering flame. Then\nchariots and horses of fire racing up and down the heavens; then\nperfect day: \"Who is she that cometh forth as the morning?\"\n\nCome in, black Hottentot and snow-white Caucasian, come in, mitered\nofficial and diseased beggar; let all the world come in. Room in\nCastle Jesus! Sound it through all lands; sound it by all tongues. Let\nsermons preach it, and bells chime it, and pencils sketch it, and\nprocessions celebrate it, and bells ring it: Room in Castle Jesus!\n\nAgain, Christ is the only refuge. If you were very sick, and there was\nonly one medicine that would cure you, how anxious you would be to get\nthat medicine. If you were in a storm at sea, and you found that the\nship could not weather it, and there was only one harbor, how anxious\nyou would be to get into that harbor. Oh, sin-sick soul, Christ is the\nonly medicine; oh, storm-tossed soul, Christ is the only harbor. Need\nI tell a cultured audience like this that there is no other name given\namong men by which ye can be saved? That if you want the handcuffs\nknocked from your wrists, and the hopples from your feet, and the icy\nbands from your heart, there is just one Almighty arm in all the\nuniverse to do everything? There are other fortresses to which you\nmight fly, and other ramparts behind which you might hide, but God\nwill cut to pieces, with the hail of His vengeance, all these refuges\nof lies.\n\nSome of you are foundering in terrible Euroclydon. Hark to the howling\nof the gale, and the splintering of the spars, and the starting of the\ntimbers, and the breaking of the billow, clear across the hurricane\ndeck. Down she goes! Into the life-boat! Quick! One boat! One shore!\nOne oarsman! One salvation! You are polluted; there is but one well at\nwhich you can wash clean. You are enslaved; there is but one\nproclamation that can emancipate. You are blind; there is but one\nsalve that can kindle your vision. You are dead; there is but one\ntrumpet that can burst the grave.\n\nI have seen men come near the refuge but not make entrance. They came\nup, and fronted the gate, and looked in, but passed on, and passed\ndown; and they will curse their folly through all eternity, that they\ndespised the only refuge. Oh! forget everything else I have said, if\nyou will but remember that there is but one atonement, one sacrifice,\none justification, one faith, one hope, one Jesus, one refuge. There\nis that old Christian. Many a scar on his face tells where trouble\nlacerated him. He has fought with wild beasts at Ephesus. He has had\nenough misfortune to shadow his countenance with perpetual despair.\nYet he is full of hope. Has he found any new elixir? \"No,\" he says; \"I\nhave found Jesus the refuge.\"\n\nChrist is our only defense at the last. John Holland, in his\nconcluding moment, swept his hand over the Bible, and said: \"Come, let\nus gather a few flowers from this garden.\" As it was even-time he said\nto his wife: \"Have you lighted the candles?\" \"No,\" she said; \"we have\nnot lighted the candles.\" \"Then,\" said he, \"it must be the brightness\nof the face of Jesus that I see.\"\n\nAsk that dying Christian woman the source of her comfort. Why that\nsupernatural glow on the curtains of the death-chamber; and the\ntossing out of one hand, as if to wave the triumph, and the reaching\nup of the other, as if to take a crown? Hosanna on the tongue. Glory\nbeaming from the forehead. Heaven in the eyes. Spirit departing. Wings\nto bear it. Anthems to charm it. Open the gates to receive it.\nHallelujah! Speak, dying Christian--what light do you see? What sounds\ndo you hear? The thin lips part. The pale hand is lifted. She says:\n\"Jesus the refuge!\" Let all in the death-chamber stop weeping now.\nCelebrate the triumph. Take up a song. Clap your hands. Shout it.\nHallelujah! Hallelujah!\n\nBut this refuge will be of no worth to you unless you lay hold of it.\nThe time will come when you will wish that you had done so. It will\ncome soon. At an unexpected moment it will come. The castle bridge\nwill be drawn up and the fortress closed. When you see this\ndiscomfiture, and look back, and look up at the storm gathering, and\nthe billowy darkness of death has rolled upon the sheeted flash of\nthe storm, you will discover the utter desolation of those who are\noutside of the refuge.\n\nWhat you propose to do in this matter you had better do right away. A\nmistake this morning may never be corrected. Jesus, the Great Captain\nof salvation, puts forth his wounded hand to-day to cheer you on the\nrace to heaven. If you despise it, the ghastliest vision that will\nhaunt the eternal darkness of your soul will be the gaping, bleeding\nwounds of the dying Redeemer.\n\nJesus is to be crucified to-day. Think not of it as a day that is\npast. He comes before you to-day weary and worn. Here is the cross,\nand here is the victim. But there are no nails, and there are no\nthorns, and there are no hammers. Who will furnish these? A man out\nyonder says: \"I will furnish with my sins the nails!\" Now we have the\ncross, and the victim, and the nails. But we have no thorns. Who will\nfurnish the thorns? A man in the audience says: \"With my sins I will\nfurnish the thorns!\" Now we have the cross, the victim, the nails, and\nthe thorns. But we have no hammers. Who will furnish the hammers? A\nvoice in the audience says: \"My hard heart shall be the hammer!\"\nEverything is ready now. The crucifixion goes out! See Jesus dying!\n\"Behold the Lamb of God, that taketh away the sins of the world.\"\n\n\n\n\nSTRIPPING THE SLAIN.\n\n    \"And it came to pass on the morrow, when the Philistines came\n    to strip the slain, that they found Saul and his three sons\n    fallen in Mount Gilboa.\"--I. SAM. xxxi: 8.\n\n\nSome of you were at South Mountain, or Shiloh, or Ball's Bluff, or\nGettysburg, and I ask you if there is any sadder sight than a\nbattle-field after the guns have stopped firing? I walked across the\nfield of Antietam just after the conflict. The scene was so sickening\nI shall not describe it. Every valuable thing had been taken from the\nbodies of the dead, for there are always vultures hovering over and\naround about an army, and they pick up the watches, and the memorandum\nbooks, and the letters, and the daguerreotypes, and the hats, and the\ncoats, applying them to their own uses. The dead make no resistance.\nSo there are always camp followers going on and after an army, as when\nScott went down into Mexico, as when Napoleon marched up toward\nMoscow, as when Von Moltke went to Sedan. There is a similar scene in\nmy text.\n\nSaul and his army had been horribly cut to pieces. Mount Gilboa was\nghastly with the dead. On the morrow the stragglers came on to the\nfield, and they lifted the latchet of the helmet from under the chin\nof the dead, and they picked up the swords and bent them on their\nknee to test the temper of the metal, and they opened the wallets and\ncounted the coin. Saul lay dead along the ground, eight or nine feet\nin length, and I suppose the cowardly Philistines, to show their\nbravery, leaped upon the trunk of his carcass, and jeered at the\nfallen slain, and whistled through the mouth of the helmet. Before\nnight those cormorants had taken everything valuable from the field:\n\"And it came to pass on the morrow, when the Philistines came to strip\nthe slain, that they found Saul and his three sons fallen in Mount\nGilboa.\"\n\nBefore I get through to-day I will show you that the same process is\ngoing on all the world over, and every day, and that when men have\nfallen, Satan and the world, so far from pitying them or helping them,\ngo to work remorselessly to take what little is left, thus stripping\nthe slain.\n\nThere are tens of thousands of young men every year coming from the\ncountry to our great cities. They come with brave hearts and grand\nexpectations. They think they will be Rufus Choates in the law, or\nDrapers in chemistry, or A.T. Stewarts in merchandise. The country\nlads sit down in the village grocery, with their feet on the iron rod\naround the red-hot stove, in the evening, talking over the prospects\nof the young man who has gone off to the city. Two or three of them\nthink that perhaps he may get along very well and succeed, but the\nmost of them prophesy failure; for it is very hard to think that those\nwhom we knew in boyhood will ever make any stir in the world.\n\nBut our young man has a fine position in a dry-goods store. The month\nis over. He gets his wages. He is not accustomed to have so much money\nbelonging to himself. He is a little excited, and does not know\nexactly what to do with it, and he spends it in some places where he\nought not. Soon there come up new companions and acquaintances from\nthe bar-rooms and the saloons of the city. Soon that young man begins\nto waver in the battle of temptation, and soon his soul goes down. In\na few months, or few years, he has fallen. He is morally dead. He is a\nmere corpse of what he once was. The harpies of sin snuff up the taint\nand come on the field. His garments gradually give out. He has pawned\nhis watch. His health is failing him. His credit perishes. He is too\npoor to stay in the city, and he is too poor to pay his way home to\nthe country. Down! down! Why do the low fellows of the city now stick\nto him so closely? Is it to help him back to a moral and spiritual\nlife? Oh, no! I will tell you why they stay; they are the Philistines\nstripping the slain.\n\nDo not look where I point, but yonder stands a man who once had a\nbeautiful home in this city. His house had elegant furniture, his\nchildren were beautifully clad, his name was synonymous with honor and\nusefulness; but evil habit knocked at his front door, knocked at his\nback door, knocked at his parlor door, knocked at his bedroom door.\nWhere is the piano? Sold to pay the rent. Where is the hat-rack? Sold\nto meet the butcher's bill. Where are the carpets? Sold to get bread.\nWhere is the wardrobe? Sold to get rum. Where are the daughters?\nWorking their fingers off in trying to keep the family together.\nWorse and worse, until everything is gone. Who is that going up the\nfront steps of that house? That is a creditor, hoping to find some\nchair or bed that has not been levied upon. Who are those two\ngentlemen now going up the front steps? The one is a constable, the\nother is the sheriff. Why do they go there? The unfortunate is morally\ndead, socially dead, financially dead. Why do they go there? I will\ntell you why the creditors, and the constables, and the sheriffs go\nthere. They are, some on their own account, and some on account of the\nlaw, stripping the slain.\n\nAn ex-member of Congress, one of the most eloquent men that ever stood\nin the House of Representatives, said in his last moments: \"This is\nthe end. I am dying--dying on a borrowed bed, covered by a borrowed\nsheet, in a house built by public charity. Bury me under that tree in\nthe middle of the field, where I shall not be crowded, for I have been\ncrowded all my life.\" Where were the jolly politicians and the\ndissipating comrades who had been with him, laughing at his jokes,\napplauding his eloquence, and plunging him into sin? They have left.\nWhy? His money is gone, his reputation is gone, his wit is gone, his\nclothes are gone, everything is gone. Why should they stay any longer?\nThey have completed their work. They have stripped the slain.\n\nThere is another way, however, of doing that same work. Here is a man\nwho, through his sin, is prostrate. He acknowledges that he has done\nwrong. Now is the time for you to go to that man and say: \"Thousands\nof people have been as far astray as you are, and got back.\" Now is\nthe time for you to go to that man and tell him of the omnipotent\ngrace of God, that is sufficient for any poor soul. Now is the time to\ngo to tell him how swearing John Bunyan, through the grace of God,\nafterward came to the celestial city. Now is the time to go to that\nman and tell him how profligate Newton came, through conversion, to be\na world-renowned preacher of righteousness. Now is the time to tell\nthat man that multitudes who have been pounded with all the flails of\nsin and dragged through all the sewers of pollution at last have risen\nto positive dominion of moral power.\n\nYou do not tell him that, do you? No. You say to him: \"Loan you money?\nNo. You are down. You will have to go to the dogs. Lend you a\nshilling? I would not lend you five cents to keep you from the\ngallows. You are debauched! Get out of my sight, now! Down; you will\nhave to stay down!\" And thus those bruised and battered men are\nsometimes accosted by those who ought to lift them up. Thus the last\nvestige of hope is taken from them. Thus those who ought to go and\nlift and save them are guilty of stripping the slain.\n\nThe point I want to make is this: sin is hard, cruel, and merciless.\nInstead of helping a man up it helps him down; and when, like Saul and\nhis comrades, you lie on the field, it will come and steal your sword\nand helmet and shield, leaving you to the jackal and the crow.\n\nBut the world and Satan do not do all their work with the outcast and\nabandoned. A respectable, impenitent man comes to die. He is flat on\nhis back. He could not get up if the house were on fire. Adroitest\nmedical skill and gentlest nursing have been a failure. He has come to\nhis last hour. What does Satan do for such a man? Why, he fetches up\nall the inapt, disagreeable, and harrowing things in his life. He\nsays: \"Do you remember those chances you had for heaven, and missed\nthem? Do you remember all those lapses in conduct? Do you remember all\nthose opprobrious words and thoughts and actions? Don't remember them,\neh? I'll make you remember them.\" And then he takes all the past and\nempties it on that death-bed, as the mail-bags are emptied on the\npost-office floor. The man is sick. He can not get away from them.\n\nThen the man says to Satan: \"You have deceived me. You told me that\nall would be well. You said there would be no trouble at the last. You\ntold me if I did so and so, you would do so and so. Now you corner me,\nand hedge me up, and submerge me in everything evil.\" \"Ha! ha!\" says\nSatan, \"I was only fooling you. It is mirth for me to see you suffer.\nI have been for thirty years plotting to get you just where you are.\nIt is hard for you now--it will be worse for you after awhile. It\npleases me. Lie still, sir. Don't flinch or shudder. Come now, I will\ntear off from you the last rag of expectation. I will rend away from\nyour soul the last hope. I will leave you bare for the beating of the\nstorm. It is my business to strip the slain.\"\n\nWhile men are in robust health, and their digestion is good, and their\nnerves are strong, they think their physical strength will get them\nsafely through the last exigency. They say it is only cowardly women\nwho are afraid at the last, and cry out for God. \"Wait till I come to\ndie. I will show you. You won't hear me pray, nor call for a minister,\nnor want a chapter read me from the Bible.\" But after the man has been\nthree weeks in a sick-room his nerves are not so steady, and his\nworldly companions are not anywhere near to cheer him up, and he is\npersuaded that he must quit life: his physical courage is all gone.\n\nHe jumps at the fall of a teaspoon in a saucer. He shivers at the idea\nof going away. He says: \"Wife, I don't think my infidelity is going to\ntake me through. For God's sake don't bring up the children to do as I\nhave done. If you feel like it, I wish you would read a verse or two\nout of Fannie's Sabbath-school hymn-book or New Testament.\" But Satan\nbreaks in, and says: \"You have always thought religion trash and a\nlie; don't give up at the last. Besides that, you can not, in the hour\nyou have to live, get off on that track. Die as you lived. With my\ngreat black wings I shut out that light. Die in darkness. I rend away\nfrom you that last vestige of hope. It is my business to strip the\nslain.\"\n\nA man who had rejected Christianity and thought it all trash, came to\ndie. He was in the sweat of a great agony, and his wife said: \"We had\nbetter have some prayer.\" \"Mary, not a breath of that,\" he said. \"The\nlightest word of prayer would roll back on me like rocks on a drowning\nman. I have come to the hour of test. I had a chance, and I forfeited\nit. I believed in a liar, and he has left me in the lurch. Mary, bring\nme Tom Paine, that book that I swore by and lived by, and pitch it in\nthe fire, and let it burn and burn as I myself shall soon burn.\" And\nthen, with the foam on his lip and his hands tossing wildly in the\nair, he cried out: \"Blackness of darkness! Oh, my God, too late!\" And\nthe spirits of darkness whistled up from the depth, and wheeled around\nand around him, stripping the slain.\n\nSin is a luxury now; it is exhilaration now; it is victory now. But\nafter awhile it is collision; it is defeat; it is extermination; it is\njackalism; it is robbing the dead; it is stripping the slain. Give it\nup to-day--give it up! Oh, how you have been cheated on, my brother,\nfrom one thing to another! All these years you have been under an evil\nmastery that you understood not. What have your companions done for\nyou? What have they done for your health? Nearly ruined it by\ncarousal. What have they done for your fortune? Almost scattered it by\nspendthrift behavior. What have they done for your reputation? Almost\nruined it with good men. What have they done for your immortal soul?\nAlmost insured its overthrow.\n\nYou are hastening on toward the consummation of all that is sad.\nTo-day you stop and think, but it is only for a moment, and then you\nwill tramp on, and at the close of this service you will go out, and\nthe question will be: \"How did you like the sermon?\" And one man will\nsay: \"I liked it very well,\" and another man will say: \"I didn't like\nit at all;\" but neither of the answers will touch the tremendous fact\nthat, if impenitent, you are going at eighteen knots an hour toward\nshipwreck! Yea, you are in a battle where you will fall; and while\nyour surviving relatives will take your remaining estate, and the\ncemetery will take your body, the messengers of darkness will take\nyour soul, and come and go about you for the next ten million years,\nstripping the slain.\n\nMany are crying out: \"I admit I am slain, I admit it!\" On what\nbattle-field, my brothers? By what weapon? \"Polluted imagination,\"\nsays one man; \"Intoxicating liquor,\" says another man; \"My own hard\nheart,\" says another man. Do you realize this? Then I come to tell you\nthat the omnipotent Christ is ready to walk across this battle-field,\nand revive, and resuscitate, and resurrect your dead soul. Let Him\ntake your hand and rub away the numbness; your head, and bathe off the\naching; your heart, and stop its wild throb. He brought Lazarus to\nlife; He brought Jairus' daughter to life; He brought the young man of\nNain to life, and these are three proofs anyhow that he can bring you\nto life.\n\nWhen the Philistines came down on the field, they stepped between the\ncorpses, and they rolled over the dead, and they took away everything\nthat was valuable; and so it was with the people that followed after\nour army at Chancellorsville, and at Pittsburg Landing, and at Stone\nRiver, and at Atlanta, stripping the slain; but the Northern and\nSouthern women--God bless them!--came on the field with basins, and\npads, and towels, and lint, and cordials, and Christian encouragement;\nand the poor fellows that lay there lifted up their arms and said:\n\"Oh, how good that does feel since you dressed it!\" and others looked\nup and said: \"Oh, how you make me think of my mother!\" and others\nsaid: \"Tell the folks at home I died thinking about them;\" and another\nlooked up and said: \"Miss, won't you sing me a verse of 'Home, Sweet\nHome,' before I die?\" And then the tattoo was sounded, and the hats\nwere off, and the service was read: \"I am the resurrection and the\nlife;\" and in honor of the departed the muskets were loaded, and the\ncommand given: \"Take aim--fire!\" And there was a shingle set up at the\nhead of the grave, with the epitaph of \"Lieutenant ---- in the\nFourteenth Massachusetts Regulars,\" or \"Captain ---- in the Fifteenth\nRegiment of South Carolina Volunteers.\" And so to-night, across this\ngreat field of moral and spiritual battle, the angels of God come\nwalking among the slain, and there are voices of comfort, and voices\nof hope, and voices of resurrection, and voices of heaven.\n\nChrist is ready to give life to the dead. He will make the deaf ear to\nhear, the blind eye to see, the pulseless heart to beat, and the damp\nwalls of your spiritual charnel-house will crash into ruin at His cry:\n\"Come forth!\" I verily believe there are souls in this house who are\nnow dead in sin, who in half an hour will be alive forever. There was\na thrilling dream, a glorious dream--you may have heard of it. Ezekiel\nclosed his eyes, and he saw two mountains, and a valley between the\nmountains. That valley looked as though there had been a great battle\nthere, and a whole army had been slain, and they had been unburied;\nand the heat of the land, and the vultures coming there, soon the\nbones were exposed to the sun, and they looked like thousands of\nsnow-drifts all through the valley. Frightful spectacle! The bleaching\nskeletons of a host!\n\nBut Ezekiel still kept his eyes shut; and lo! there were four\ncurrents of wind that struck the battle-field, and when those four\ncurrents of wind met, the bones began to rattle; and the foot came to\nthe ankle, and the hand came to the wrist, and the jaws clashed\ntogether, and the spinal column gathered up the ganglions and the\nnervous fiber, and all the valley wriggled and writhed, and throbbed,\nand rocked, and rose up. There, a man coming to life. There, a hundred\nmen. There, a thousand; and all falling into line, waiting for the\nshout of their commander. Ten thousand bleached skeletons springing up\ninto ten thousand warriors, panting for the fray. I hope that instead\nof being a dream it may be a prophecy of what we shall see here\nto-day. Let this north wall be one of the mountains, and the south\nwall be taken for another of the mountains, and let all the aisles and\nthe pews be the valley between, for there are thousands here to-day\nwithout one pulsation of spiritual life.\n\nI look off in one direction, and they are dead. I look off in another\ndirection, and they are dead. Who will bring them to life? Who shall\nrouse them up? If I should halloo at the top of my voice I could not\nwake them. Wait a moment! Listen! There is a rustling. There is a gale\nfrom heaven. It comes from the north, and from the south, and from the\neast, and from the west. It shuts us in. It blows upon the slain.\nThere a soul begins to move in spiritual life; there, ten souls;\nthere, a score of souls; there, a hundred souls. The nostrils\nthrobbing in divine respiration, the hands lifted as though to take\nhold of heaven, the tongue moving as in prayer and adoration. Life!\nimmortal life coming into the slain. Ten men for God--fifty--a\nhundred--a regiment--an army for God! Oh, that we might have such a\nscene here to-day! In Ezekiel's words, and in almost a frenzy of\nprayer, I cry: \"Come from the four winds, O Breath! and breathe upon\nthe slain.\"\n\nYou will have to surrender your heart to-day to God. You can not take\nthe responsibility of fighting against the Spirit in this crisis which\nwill decide whether you are to go to heaven or to hell--to join the\nhallelujahs of the saved, or the lamentations of the lost. You must\npray. You must repent. You must this day fling your sinful soul on the\npardoning mercy of God. You must! I see your resolution against God\ngiving way, your determination wavering. I break through the breach in\nthe wall and follow up the advantage gained, hoping to rout your last\nopposition to Christ, and to make you \"ground arms\" at the feet of the\nDivine Conqueror. Oh, you must! You must!\n\nThe moon does not ask the tides of the Atlantic Ocean to rise. It only\nstoops down with two great hands of light, the one at the European\nbeach, and the other at the American beach, and then lifts the great\nlayer of molten silver. And God, it seems to me, is now going to lift\nthis audience to newness of life. Do you not feel the swellings of the\ngreat oceanic tides of Divine mercy? My heart is in anguish to have\nyou saved. For this I pray, and preach, and long, glad to be called a\nfool for Christ's sake, and your salvation.\n\nSome one replies: \"Dear me, I do wish I could have these matters\narranged with my God. I want to be saved. God knows I want to be\nsaved; but you stand there talking about this matter, and you don't\nshow me how.\" My dear brother, the work has all been done. Christ did\nit with His own torn hand, and lacerated foot, and bleeding side. He\ntook your place, and died your death, if you will only believe\nit--only accept Him as your substitute.\n\nWhat an amazing pity that any man should go from this house unblessed,\nwhen such a large blessing is offered him at less cost than you would\npay for a pin--\"without money and without price.\" I have driven down\nto-day with the Lord's ambulance to the battle-field where your soul\nlies exposed to the darkness and the storm, and I want to lift you in,\nand drive off with you toward heaven. Oh, Christians, by your prayers\nhelp to lift these wounded souls into the ambulance! God forbid that\nany should be left on the field, and that at last eternal sorrow, and\nremorse, and despair should come up around their soul like the bandit\nPhilistines to the field of Gilboa, stripping the slain.\n\n\n\n\nSOLD OUT.\n\n    \"Ye have sold yourselves for nought; and ye shall be redeemed\n    without money.\"--ISA. lii: 3.\n\n\nThe Jews had gone headlong into sin, and as a punishment they had been\ncarried captive to Babylon. They found that iniquity did not pay.\nCyrus seized Babylon, and felt so sorry for these poor captive Jews\nthat, without a dollar of compensation, he let them go home. So that,\nliterally, my text was fulfilled: \"Ye have sold yourselves for nought;\nand ye shall be redeemed without money.\"\n\nThere is enough Gospel in this text for fifty sermons; though I never\nheard of its being preached on. There are persons in this house who\nhave, like the Jews of the text, sold out. You do not seem to belong\neither to yourselves or to God. The title-deeds have been passed over\nto \"the world, the flesh, and the devil,\" but the purchaser has never\npaid up. \"Ye have sold yourselves for nought.\"\n\nWhen a man passes himself over to the world he expects to get some\nadequate compensation. He has heard the great things that the world\ndoes for a man, and he believes it. He wants two hundred and fifty\nthousand dollars. That will be horses, and houses, and a\nsummer-resort, and jolly companionship. To get it he parts with his\nphysical health by overwork. He parts with his conscience. He parts\nwith much domestic enjoyment. He parts with opportunities for literary\nculture. He parts with his soul. And so he makes over his entire\nnature to the world. He does it in four installments. He pays down the\nfirst installment, and one fourth of his nature is gone. He pays down\nthe second installment, and one half of his nature is gone. He pays\ndown the third installment, and three quarters of his nature are gone;\nand after many years have gone by he pays down the fourth installment,\nand, lo! his entire nature is gone. Then he comes up to the world and\nsays: \"Good-morning. I have delivered to you the goods. I have passed\nover to you my body, my mind, and my soul, and I have come now to\ncollect the two hundred and fifty thousand dollars.\" \"Two hundred and\nfifty thousand dollars?\" says the world. \"What do you mean?\" \"Well,\"\nyou say, \"I come to collect the money you owe me, and I expect you now\nto fulfill your part of the contract.\" \"But,\" says the world, \"_I have\nfailed. I am bankrupt._ I can not possibly pay that debt. I have not\nfor a long while expected to pay it.\" \"Well,\" you then say, \"give me\nback the goods.\" \"Oh, no,\" says the world, \"they are all gone. I can\nnot give them back to you.\" And there you stand on the confines of\neternity, your spiritual character gone, staggering under the\nconsideration that \"you have sold yourself for nought.\"\n\nI tell you the world is a liar; it does not keep its promises. It is a\ncheat, and it fleeces everything it can put its hands on. It is a\nbogus world. It is a six-thousand-year-old swindle. Even if it pays\nthe two hundred and fifty thousand dollars for which you contracted,\nit pays them in bonds that will not be worth anything in a little\nwhile. Just as a man may pay down ten thousand dollars in hard cash\nand get for it worthless scrip--so the world passes over to you the\ntwo hundred and fifty thousand dollars in that shape which will not be\nworth a farthing to you a thousandth part of a second after you are\ndead. \"Oh,\" you say, \"it will help to bury me, anyhow.\" Oh, my\nbrother! you need not worry about that. The world will bury you soon\nenough, from sanitary considerations. After you have been deceased for\nthree or four days you will compel the world to bury you.\n\nPost-mortem emoluments are of no use to you. The treasures of this\nworld will not pass current in the future world; and if all the wealth\nof the Bank of England were put in the pocket of your shroud, and you\nin the midst of the Jordan of death were asked to pay three cents for\nyour ferriage, you could not do it. There comes a moment in your\nexistence beyond which all earthly values fail; and many a man has\nwakened up in such a time to find that he has sold out for eternity,\nand has nothing to show for it. I should as soon think of going to\nChatham Street to buy silk pocket-handkerchiefs with no cotton in\nthem, as to go to this world expecting to find any permanent\nhappiness. It has deceived and deluded every man that has ever put his\ntrust in it.\n\nHistory tells us of one who resolved that he would have all his senses\ngratified at one and the same time, and he expended thousands of\ndollars on each sense. He entered a room, and there were the first\nmusicians of the land pleasing his ear, and there were fine pictures\nfascinating his eye, and there were costly aromatics regaling his\nnostril, and there were the richest meats, and wines, and fruits, and\nconfections pleasing the appetite, and there was a soft couch of\nsinful indulgence on which he reclined; and the man declared afterward\nthat he would give ten times what he had given if he could have one\nweek of such enjoyment, even though he lost his soul by it. Ah! that\nwas the rub. He did lose his soul by it! Cyrus the Conqueror thought\nfor a little while that he was making a fine thing out of this world,\nand yet before he came to his grave he wrote out this pitiful epitaph\nfor his monument: \"I am Cyrus. I occupied the Persian Empire. I was\nking over Asia. Begrudge me not this monument.\" But the world in after\nyears plowed up his sepulcher.\n\nThe world clapped its hands and stamped its feet in honor of Charles\nLamb; but what does he say? \"I walk up and down, thinking I am happy,\nbut feeling I am not.\" Call the roll, and be quick about it. Samuel\nJohnson, the learned! Happy? \"No. I am afraid I shall some day get\ncrazy.\" William Hazlitt, the great essayist! Happy? \"No. I have been\nfor two hours and a half going up and down Paternoster Row with a\nvolcano in my breast.\" Smollett, the witty author! Happy? \"No. I am\nsick of praise and blame, and I wish to God that I had such\ncircumstances around me that I could throw my pen into oblivion.\"\nBuchanan, the world-renowned writer, exiled from his own country,\nappealing to Henry VIII. for protection! Happy? \"No. Over mountains\ncovered with snow, and through valleys flooded with rain, I come a\nfugitive.\" Moli\u00e8re, the popular dramatic author! Happy? \"No. That\nwretch of an actor just now recited four of my lines without the\nproper accent and gesture. To have the children of my brain so hung,\ndrawn, and quartered, tortures me like a condemned spirit.\"\n\nI went to see a worldling die. As I went into the hall I saw its floor\nwas tessellated, and its wall was a picture-gallery. I found his\ndeath-chamber adorned with tapestry until it seemed as if the clouds\nof the setting sun had settled in the room. The man had given forty\nyears to the world--his wit, his time, his genius, his talent, his\nsoul. Did the world come in to stand by his death-bed, and clearing\noff the vials of bitter medicine, put down any compensation? Oh, no!\nThe world does not like sick and dying people, and leaves them in the\nlurch. It ruined this man, and then left him. He had a magnificent\nfuneral. All the ministers wore scarfs, and there were forty-three\ncarriages in a row; but the departed man appreciated not the\nobsequies.\n\nI want to persuade my audience that this world is a poor investment;\nthat it does not pay ninety per cent. of satisfaction, nor eighty per\ncent., nor twenty per cent., nor two per cent., nor one; that it gives\nno solace when a dead babe lies on your lap; that it gives no peace\nwhen conscience rings its alarm; that it gives no explanation in the\nday of dire trouble; and at the time of your decease it takes hold of\nthe pillow-case, and shakes out the feathers, and then jolts down in\nthe place thereof sighs, and groans, and execrations, and then makes\nyou put your head on it. Oh, ye who have tried this world, is it a\nsatisfactory portion? Would you advise your friends to make the\ninvestment? No. \"Ye have sold yourselves for nought.\" Your conscience\nwent. Your hope went. Your Bible went. Your heaven went. Your God\nwent. When a sheriff under a writ from the courts sells a man out, the\nofficer generally leaves a few chairs and a bed, and a few cups and\nknives; but in this awful vendue in which you have been engaged the\nauctioneer's mallet has come down upon body, mind, and soul: Going!\nGone! \"Ye have sold yourselves for nought.\"\n\nHow could you do so? Did you think that your soul was a mere trinket\nwhich for a few pennies you could buy in a toy shop? Did you think\nthat your soul, if once lost, might be found again if you went out\nwith torches and lanterns? Did you think that your soul was\nshort-lived, and that, panting, it would soon lie down for extinction?\nOr had you no idea what your soul was worth? Did you ever put your\nforefingers on its eternal pulses? Have you never felt the quiver of\nits peerless wing? Have you not known that, after leaving the body,\nthe first step of your soul reaches to the stars, and the next step to\nthe furthest outposts of God's universe, and that it will not die\nuntil the day when the everlasting Jehovah expires? Oh, my brother,\nwhat possessed you that you should part with your soul so cheap? \"Ye\nhave sold yourselves for nought.\"\n\nBut I have some good news to tell you. I want to engage in a\nlitigation for the recovery of that soul of yours. I want to show that\nyou have been cheated out of it. I want to prove, as I will, that you\nwere crazy on that subject, and that the world, under such\ncircumstances, has no right to take the title-deed from you; and if\nyou will join me I shall get a decree from the High Chancery Court of\nHeaven reinstating you into the possession of your soul. \"Oh,\" you\nsay, \"I am afraid of lawsuits; they are so expensive, and I can not\npay the cost.\" Then have you forgotten the last half of my text? \"Ye\nhave sold yourselves for nought; and ye shall be redeemed without\nmoney.\"\n\nMoney is good for a great many things, but it can not do anything in\nthis matter of the soul. You can not buy your way through. Dollars and\npounds sterling mean nothing at the gate of mercy. If you could buy\nyour salvation, heaven would be a great speculation, an extension of\nWall Street. Bad men would go up and buy out the place, and leave us\nto shift for ourselves. But as money is not a lawful tender, what is?\nI will answer: Blood! Whose? Are we to go through the slaughter? Oh,\nno; it wants richer blood than ours. It wants a king's blood. It must\nbe poured from royal arteries. It must be a sinless torrent. But where\nis the king? I see a great many thrones and a great many occupants,\nyet none seem to be coming down to the rescue. But after awhile the\nclock of night in Bethlehem strikes twelve, and the silver pendulum of\na star swings across the sky, and I see the King of Heaven rising up,\nand He descends, and steps down from star to star, and from cloud to\ncloud, lower and lower, until He touches the sheep-covered hills, and\nthen on to another hill, this last skull-covered, and there, at the\nsharp stroke of persecution, a rill incarnadine trickles down, and we\nwho could not be redeemed by money are redeemed by precious and\nimperial blood.\n\nWe have in this day professed Christians who are so rarefied and\netherealized that they do not want a religion of blood. What do you\nwant? You seem to want a religion of brains. The Bible says: \"In the\nblood is the life.\" No atonement without blood. Ought not the apostle\nto know? What did he say? \"Ye are redeemed not with corruptible\nthings, such as silver and gold, but by the precious blood of Christ.\"\nYou put your lancet into the arm of our holy religion and withdraw the\nblood, and you leave it a mere corpse, fit only for the grave. Why did\nGod command the priests of old to strike the knife into the kid, and\nthe goat, and the pigeon, and the bullock, and the lamb? It was so\nthat when the blood rushed out from these animals on the floor of the\nancient tabernacle the people should be compelled to think of the\ncoming carnage of the Son of God. No blood, no atonement.\n\nI think that God intended to impress us with the vividness of that\ncolor. The green of the grass, the blue of the sky, would not have\nstartled and aroused us like this deep crimson. It is as if God had\nsaid: \"Now, sinner, wake up and see what the Saviour endured for you.\nThis is not water. This is not wine. It is blood. It is the blood of\nmy own Son. It is the blood of the Immaculate. It is the blood of\nGod.\" Without the shedding of blood is no remission. There has been\nmany a man who in courts of law has pleaded \"not guilty,\" who\nnevertheless has been condemned because there was blood found on his\nhands, or blood found in his room; and what shall we do in the last\nday if it be found that we have recrucified the Lord of Glory and have\nnever repented of it? You must believe in the blood or die. No\nescape. Unless you let the sacrifice of Jesus go in your stead you\nyourself must suffer. It is either Christ's blood or your blood.\n\n\"Oh,\" says some one, \"the thought of blood sickens me.\" Good. God\nintended it to sicken you with your sin. Do not act as though you had\nnothing to do with that Calvarian massacre. You had. Your sins were\nthe implements of torture. Those implements were not made of steel,\nand iron, and wood, so much as out of your sins. Guilty of this\nhomicide, and this regicide, and this deicide, confess your guilt\nto-day. Ten thousand voices of heaven bring in the verdict against you\nof guilty, guilty. Prepare to die, or believe in that blood. Stretch\nyourself out for the sacrifice, or accept the Saviour's sacrifice. Do\nnot fling away your one chance.\n\nIt seems to me as if all heaven were trying to bid in your soul. The\nfirst bid it makes is the tears of Christ at the tomb of Lazarus; but\nthat is not a high enough price. The next bid heaven makes is the\nsweat of Gethsemane; but it is too cheap a price. The next bid heaven\nmakes seems to be the whipped back of Pilate's hall; but it is not a\nhigh enough price. Can it be possible that heaven can not buy you in?\nHeaven tries once more. It says: \"I bid this time for that man's soul\nthe tortures of Christ's martyrdom, the blood on His temple, the blood\non His cheek, the blood on His chin, the blood on His hand, the blood\non His side, the blood on His knee, the blood on His foot--the blood\nin drops, the blood in rills, the blood in pools coagulated beneath\nthe cross; the blood that wet the tips of the soldiers' spears, the\nblood that plashed warm in the faces of His enemies.\" Glory to God,\nthat bid wins it! The highest price that was ever paid for anything\nwas paid for your soul. Nothing could buy it but blood! The estranged\nproperty is bought back. Take it. \"You have sold yourselves for\nnought; and ye shall be redeemed without money.\" O atoning blood,\ncleansing blood, life-giving blood, sanctifying blood, glorifying\nblood of Jesus! Why not burst into tears at the thought that for thee\nHe shed it--for thee the hard-hearted, for thee the lost?\n\n\"No,\" says some one; \"I will have nothing to do with it except that,\nlike the Jews, I put both my hands into that carnage and scoop up both\npalms full, and throw it on my head and cry: 'His blood be on us and\non our children!'\" Can you do such a shocking thing as that? Just rub\nyour handkerchief across your brow and look at it. It is the blood of\nthe Son of God whom you have despised and driven back all these years.\nOh, do not do that any longer! Come out frankly and boldly and\nhonestly, and tell Christ you are sorry. You can not afford to so\nroughly treat Him upon whom everything depends.\n\nI do not know how you will get away from this subject. You see that\nyou are sold out, and that Christ wants to buy you back. There are\nthree persons who come after you to-night: God the Father, God the\nSon, and God the Holy Ghost. They unite their three omnipotences in\none movement for your salvation. You will not take up arms against the\nTriune God, will you? Is there enough muscle in your arm for such a\ncombat? By the highest throne in heaven, and by the deepest chasm in\nhell, I beg you look out. Unless you allow Christ to carry away your\nsins, they will carry you away. Unless you allow Christ to lift you\nup, they will drag you down. There is only one hope for you, and that\nis the blood. Christ, the sin-offering, bearing your transgressions.\nChrist, the surety, paying your debts. Christ, the divine Cyrus,\nloosening your Babylonish captivity.\n\nWould you not like to be free? Here is the price of your\nliberation--not money, but blood. I tremble from head to foot, not\nbecause I fear your presence, for I am used to that, but because I\nfear that you will miss your chance for immortal rescue, and die. This\nis the alternative divinely put: \"He that believeth on the Son shall\nhave everlasting life; and he that believeth not on the Son shall not\nsee life, but the wrath of God abideth on him.\" In the last day, if\nyou now reject Christ, every drop of that sacrificial blood, instead\nof pleading for your release as it would have pleaded if you had\nrepented, will plead against you. It will seem to say: \"They refused\nthe ransom; they chose to die; let them die; they must die. Down with\nthem to the weeping and the wailing. Depart! go away from me. You\nwould not have me, now I will not have you. Sold out for eternity.\"\n\nO Lord God of the judgment day! avert that calamity! Let us see the\nquick flash of the cimeter that slays the sin but saves the sinner.\nStrike, omnipotent God, for the soul's deliverance! Beat, O eternal\nsea! with all thy waves against the barren beach of that rocky soul,\nand make it tremble. Oh! the oppressiveness of the hour, the minute,\nthe second, on which the soul's destiny quivers, and this is that\nhour, that minute, that second!\n\nI wonder what proportion of this audience will be saved? What\nproportion will be lost? When the \"Schiller\" went down, out of three\nhundred and eighty people only forty were saved. When the \"Ville du\nHavre\" went down, out of three hundred and forty about fifty were\nsaved. Out of this audience to-day, how many will get to the shore of\nheaven? It is no idle question for me to ask, for many of you I shall\nnever see again until the day when the books are open.\n\nSome years ago there came down a fierce storm on the sea-coast, and a\nvessel got in the breakers and was going to pieces. They threw up some\nsignal of distress, and the people on the shore saw them. They put out\nin a life-boat. They came on, and they saw the poor sailors, almost\nexhausted, clinging to a raft; and so afraid were the boatmen that the\nmen would give up before they got to them, they gave them three rounds\nof cheers, and cried: \"Hold on, there! Hold on! We'll save you!\" After\nawhile the boat came up. One man was saved by having the boat-hook put\nin the collar of his coat; and some in one way, and some in another;\nbut they all got into the boat. \"Now,\" says the captain, \"for the\nshore. Pull away now, pull!\" The people on the land were afraid the\nlife-boat had gone down. They said: \"How long the boat stays. Why, it\nmust have been swamped, and they have all perished together.\"\n\nAnd there were men and women on the pier-heads and on the beach\nwringing their hands; and while they waited and watched, they saw\nsomething looming up through the mist, and it turned out to be the\nlife-boat. As soon as it came within speaking distance the people on\nthe shore cried out: \"Did you save any of them? Did you save any of\nthem?\" And as the boat swept through the boiling surf and came to the\npier-head, the captain waved his hand over the exhausted sailors that\nlay flat on the bottom of the boat, and cried: \"All saved! Thank God!\nAll saved!\" So may it be to-day. The waves of your sin run high, the\nstorm is on you, the danger is appalling. Oh! shipwrecked soul, I have\ncome for you. I cheer you with this Gospel hope. God grant that within\nthe next ten minutes we may row with you into the harbor of God's\nmercy. And when these Christian men gather around to see the result of\nthis service, and the glorified gathering on the pier-heads of heaven\nto watch and to listen, may we be able to report all saved! Young and\nold, good and bad! All saved! Saved from sin, and death, and hell.\nSaved for time. Saved for eternity. \"And so it came to pass that they\nall escaped safe to land.\"\n\n\n\n\nSUMMER TEMPTATIONS.\n\n    \"Come ye yourselves apart unto a desert place and rest\n    awhile.\"--MARK vi: 31.\n\n\nHere Christ advises His apostles to take a vacation. They have been\nliving an excited as well as a useful life, and He advises that they\nget out into the country. When, six weeks ago, standing in this place,\nI advocated, with all the energy I could command, the Saturday\nafternoon holiday, I did not think the people would so soon get that\nrelease. By divine fiat it has come, and I rejoice that more people\nwill have opportunity of recreation this summer than in any previous\nsummer. Others will have whole weeks and months of rest. The railway\ntrains are being laden with passengers and baggage on their way to the\nmountains and the lakes and the sea-shore. Multitudes of our citizens\nare packing their trunks for a restorative absence.\n\nThe city heats are pursuing the people with torch and fear of\nsunstroke. The long silent halls of sumptuous hotels are all abuzz\nwith excited arrivals. The crystalline surface of Winnipiseogee is\nshattered with the stroke of steamer, laden with excursionists. The\nantlers of Adirondack deer rattle under the shot of city sportsmen.\nThe trout make fatal snaps at the hook of adroit sportsmen and toss\ntheir spotted brilliance into the game-basket. Already the baton of\nthe orchestral leader taps the music-stand on the hotel green, and\nAmerican life puts on festal array, and the rumbling of the tenpin\nalley, and the crack of the ivory balls on the green-baized billiard\ntables, and the jolting of the bar-room goblets, and the explosive\nuncorking of champagne bottles, and the whirl and the rustle of the\nball-room dance, and the clattering hoofs of the race-courses, attest\nthat the season for the great American watering-places is fairly\ninaugurated. Music--flute and drum and cornet-\u00e0-piston and clapping\ncymbals--will wake the echoes of the mountains.\n\nGlad I am that fagged-out American life for the most part will have an\nopportunity to rest, and that nerves racked and destroyed will find a\nBethesda. I believe in watering-places. Let not the commercial firm\nbegrudge the clerk, or the employer the journeyman, or the patient the\nphysician, or the church its pastor, a season of inoccupation. Luther\nused to sport with his children; Edmund Burke used to caress his\nfavorite horse; Thomas Chalmers, in the dark hours of the church's\ndisruption, played kite for recreation--as I was told by his own\ndaughter--and the busy Christ said to the busy apostles: \"Come ye\napart awhile into the desert and rest yourselves.\" And I have observed\nthat they who do not know how to rest do not know how to work.\n\nBut I have to declare this truth to-day, that some of our fashionable\nwatering-places are the temporal and eternal destruction of \"a\nmultitude that no man can number,\" and amid the congratulations of\nthis season and the prospect of the departure of many of you for the\ncountry I must utter a note of warning--plain, earnest, and\nunmistakable.\n\nI. The first temptation that is apt to hover in this direction is to\nleave your piety all at home. You will send the dog and cat and canary\nbird to be well cared for somewhere else; but the temptation will be\nto leave your religion in the room with the blinds down and the door\nbolted, and then you will come back in the autumn to find that it is\nstarved and suffocated, lying stretched on the rug stark dead. There\nis no surplus of piety at the watering-places. I never knew any one to\ngrow very rapidly in grace at the Catskill Mountain House, or Sharon\nSprings, or the Falls of Montmorency. It is generally the case that\nthe Sabbath is more of a carousal than any other day, and there are\nSunday walks and Sunday rides and Sunday excursions.\n\nElders and deacons and ministers of religion who are entirely\nconsistent at home, sometimes when the Sabbath dawns on them at\nNiagara Falls or the White Mountains take the day to themselves. If\nthey go to the church, it is apt to be a sacred parade, and the\ndiscourse, instead of being a plain talk about the soul, is apt to be\nwhat is called _a crack sermon_--that is, some discourse picked out of\nthe effusions of the year as the one most adapted to excite\nadmiration; and in those churches, from the way the ladies hold their\nfans, you know that they are not so much impressed with the heat as\nwith the picturesqueness of half-disclosed features. Four puny souls\nstand in the organ-loft and squall a tune that nobody knows, and\nworshipers, with two thousand dollars' worth of diamonds on the right\nhand, drop a cent into the poor-box, and then the benediction is\npronounced and the farce is ended.\n\nThe toughest thing I ever tried to do was to be good at a\nwatering-place. The air is bewitched with \"the world, the flesh, and\nthe devil.\" There are Christians who in three or four weeks in such a\nplace have had such terrible rents made in their Christian robe that\nthey had to keep darning it until Christmas to get it mended! The\nhealth of a great many people makes an annual visit to some mineral\nspring an absolute necessity; but, my dear people, take your Bible\nalong with you, and take an hour for secret prayer every day, though\nyou be surrounded by guffaw and saturnalia. Keep holy the Sabbath,\nthough they denounce you as a bigoted Puritan. Stand off from those\ninstitutions which propose to imitate on this side the water the\niniquities of Baden-Baden. Let your moral and your immortal health\nkeep pace with your physical recuperation, and remember that all the\nwaters of Hathorne and sulphur and chalybeate springs can not do you\nso much good as the mineral, healing, perennial flood that breaks\nforth from the \"Rock of Ages.\" This may be your last summer. If so,\nmake it a fit vestibule of heaven.\n\nII. Another temptation around nearly all our watering-places is the\nhorse-racing business. We all admire the horse. There needs to be a\nredistribution of coronets among the brute creation. For ages the lion\nhas been called the king of beasts. I knock off its coronet and put\nthe crown upon the horse, in every way nobler, whether in shape or\nspirit or sagacity or intelligence or affection or usefulness. He is\nsemi-human, and knows how to reason on a small scale. The centaur of\nolden times, part horse and part man, seems to be a suggestion of the\nfact that the horse is something more than a beast.\n\nJob sets forth his strength, his beauty, his majesty, the panting of\nhis nostril, the pawing of his hoof, and his enthusiasm for the\nbattle. What Rosa Bonheur did for the cattle, and what Landseer did\nfor the dog, Job, with mightier pencil, does for the horse.\nEighty-eight times does the Bible speak of him. He comes into every\nkingly procession and into every great occasion and into every\ntriumph. It is very evident that Job and David and Isaiah and Ezekiel\nand Jeremiah and John were fond of the horse. He came into much of\ntheir imagery. A red horse--that meant war; a black horse--that meant\nfamine; a pale horse--that meant death; a white horse--that meant\nvictory.\n\nAs the Bible makes a favorite of the horse, the patriarch and the\nprophet and the evangelist and the apostle, stroking his sleek hide,\nand patting his rounded neck, and tenderly lifting his exquisitely\nformed hoof, and listening with a thrill to the champ of his bit, so\nall great natures in all ages have spoken of him in encomiastic terms.\nVirgil in his Georgics almost seems to plagiarize from the description\nof Job. The Duke of Wellington would not allow any one irreverently to\ntouch his old war-horse, Copenhagen, on whom he had ridden fifteen\nhours without dismounting at Waterloo; and when old Copenhagen died,\nhis master ordered a military salute fired over his grave. John\nHoward showed that he did not exhaust all his sympathies in pitying\nthe human race, for when sick he writes home: \"Has my old chaise-horse\nbecome sick or spoiled?\"\n\nBut we do not think that the speed of the horse should be cultured at\nthe expense of human degradation. Horse-races, in olden times, were\nunder the ban of Christian people, and in our day the same institution\nhas come up under fictitious names, and it is called a \"Summer\nMeeting,\" almost suggestive of positive religious exercises. And it is\ncalled an \"Agricultural Fair,\" suggestive of everything that is\nimproving in the art of farming. But under these deceptive titles are\nthe same cheating and the same betting, the same drunkenness and the\nsame vagabondage and the same abominations that were to be found under\nthe old horse-racing system.\n\nI never knew a man yet who could give himself to the pleasures of the\nturf for a long reach of time, and not be battered in morals. They\nhook up their spanking team, and put on their sporting-cap, and light\ntheir cigar, and take the reins, and dash down the road to perdition.\nThe great day at Saratoga, and Long Branch, and Cape May, and nearly\nall the other watering-places, is the day of the races. The hotels are\nthronged, nearly every kind of equipage is taken up at an almost\nfabulous price, and there are many respectable people mingling with\njockeys, and gamblers, and libertines, and foul-mouthed men and flashy\nwomen. The bar-tender stirs up the brandy-smash. The bets run high.\nThe greenhorns, supposing all is fair, put in their money soon enough\nto lose it. Three weeks before the race takes place the struggle is\ndecided, and the men in the secret know on which steed to bet their\nmoney. The two men on the horses riding around long before arranged\nwho shall beat.\n\nLeaning from the stand or from the carriage are men and women so\nabsorbed in the struggle of bone and muscle and mettle that they make\na grand harvest for the pickpockets, who carry off the pocket-books\nand portemonnaies. Men looking on see only two horses with two riders\nflying around the ring; but there is many a man on that stand whose\nhonor and domestic happiness and fortune--white mane, white foot,\nwhite flank--are in the ring, racing with inebriety, and with fraud,\nand with profanity, and with ruin--black neck, black foot, black\nflank. Neck and neck they go in that moral Epsom.\n\nAh, my friends, have nothing to do with horse-racing dissipations this\nsummer. Long ago the English government got through looking to the\nturf for the dragoon and light-cavalry horse. They found the turf\ndepreciates the stock, and it is yet worse for men. Thomas Hughes, the\nmember of parliament and the author, known all the world over, hearing\nthat a new turf enterprise was being started in this country, wrote a\nletter, in which he said: \"Heaven help you, then; for of all the\ncankers of our old civilization there is nothing in this country\napproaching in unblushing meanness, in rascality holding its head\nhigh, to this belauded institution of the British turf.\" Another\nfamous sportsman writes: \"How many fine domains have been shared among\nthese hosts of rapacious sharks during the last two hundred years; and\nunless the system be altered, how many more are doomed to fall into\nthe same gulf!\" The Duke of Hamilton, through his horse-racing\nproclivities, in three years got through his entire fortune of\n\u00a370,000, and I will say that some of you are being undermined by it.\nWith the bull-fights of Spain and the bear-baitings of the pit may the\nLord God annihilate the infamous and accursed horse-racing of England\nand America.\n\nIII. I go further, and speak of another temptation that hovers over\nthe watering-places; and this is the temptation to sacrifice physical\nstrength. The modern Bethesda was intended to recuperate the physical\nhealth; and yet how many come from the watering-places, their health\nabsolutely destroyed! New York and Brooklyn idiots boasting of having\nimbibed twenty glasses of Congress water before breakfast. Families\naccustomed to going to bed at ten o'clock at night gossiping until one\nor two o'clock in the morning. Dyspeptics, usually very cautious about\ntheir health, mingling ice-creams, and lemons, and lobster-salads, and\ncocoa-nuts, until the gastric juices lift up all their voices of\nlamentation and protest. Delicate women and brainless young men\nchassezing themselves into vertigo and catalepsy. Thousands of men and\nwomen coming back from our watering-places in the autumn with the\nfoundations laid for ailments that will last them all their life long.\nYou know as well as I do that this is the simple truth.\n\nIn the summer you say to your good health: \"Good-bye, I am going to\nhave a good time for a little while. I will be very glad to see you\nagain in the autumn.\" Then in the autumn, when you are hard at work in\nyour office, or store, or shop, or counting-room, Good Health will\ncome and say: \"Good-bye, I am going.\" You say: \"Where are you going?\"\n\"Oh,\" says Good Health, \"I am going to take a vacation!\" It is a poor\nrule that will not work both ways, and your good health will leave you\ncholeric and splenetic and exhausted. You coquetted with your good\nhealth in the summer-time, and your good health is coquetting with you\nin the winter-time. A fragment of Paul's charge to the jailer would be\nan appropriate inscription for the hotel-register in every\nwatering-place: \"Do thyself no harm.\"\n\nIV. Another temptation hovering around the watering-place is to the\nformation of hasty and life-long alliances. The watering-places are\nresponsible for more of the domestic infelicities of this country than\nall the other things combined. Society is so artificial there that no\nsure judgment of character can be formed. Those who form\ncompanionships amid such circumstances go into a lottery where there\nare twenty blanks to one prize. In the severe tug of life you want\nmore than glitter and splash. Life is not a ball-room where the music\ndecides the step, and bow and prance and graceful swing of long trail\ncan make up for strong common sense. You might as well go among the\ngayly painted yachts of a summer regatta to find war vessels as to go\namong the light spray of the summer watering-place to find character\nthat can stand the test of the great struggle of human life. Ah, in\nthe battle of life you want a stronger weapon than a lace fan or a\ncroquet mallet! The load of life is so heavy that in order to draw it,\nyou want a team stronger than one made up of a masculine grasshopper\nand a feminine butterfly.\n\nIf there is any man in the community that excites my contempt, and\nthat ought to excite the contempt of every man and woman, it is the\nsoft-handed, soft-headed fop, who, perfumed until the air is actually\nsick, spends his summer in taking killing attitudes, and waving\nsentimental adieus, and talking infinitesimal nothings, and finding\nhis heaven in the set of a lavender kid-glove. Boots as tight as an\nInquisition, two hours of consummate skill exhibited in the tie of a\nflaming cravat, his conversation made up of \"Ah's\" and \"Oh's\" and\n\"He-hee's.\" It would take five hundred of them stewed down to make a\nteaspoonful of calves-foot jelly. There is only one counterpart to\nsuch a man as that, and that is the frothy young woman at the\nwatering-place, her conversation made up of French moonshine; what she\nhas on her head only equaled by what she has on her back; useless ever\nsince she was born, and to be useless until she is dead: and what they\nwill do with her in the next world I do not know, except to set her\nupon the banks of the River Life for eternity to look sweet! God\nintends us to admire music and fair faces and graceful step, but amid\nthe heartlessness and the inflation and the fantastic influences of\nour modern watering-places, beware how you make life-long covenants!\n\nV. Another temptation that will hover over the watering-place is that\nof baneful literature. Almost every one starting off for the summer\ntakes some reading matter. It is a book out of the library or off the\nbookstand, or bought of the boy hawking books through the cars. I\nreally believe there is more pestiferous trash read among the\nintelligent classes in July and August than in all the other ten\nmonths of the year. Men and women who at home would not be satisfied\nwith a book that was not really sensible, I found sitting on\nhotel-piazzas or under the trees reading books the index of which\nwould make them blush if they knew that you knew what the book was.\n\n\"Oh,\" they say, \"you must have intellectual recreation!\" Yes. There is\nno need that you take along into a watering-place \"Hamilton's\nMetaphysics\" or some thunderous discourse on the eternal decrees, or\n\"Faraday's Philosophy.\" There are many easy books that are good. You\nmight as well say: \"I propose now to give a little rest to my\ndigestive organs; and, instead of eating heavy meat and vegetables, I\nwill for a little while take lighter food--a little strychnine and a\nfew grains of ratsbane.\" Literary poison in August is as bad as\nliterary poison in December. Mark that. Do not let the frogs and the\nlice of a corrupt printing-press jump and crawl into your Saratoga\ntrunk or White Mountain valise.\n\nWould it not be an awful thing for you to be struck with lightning\nsome day when you had in your hand one of these paper-covered\nromances--the hero a Parisian _rou\u00e9_, the heroine an unprincipled\nflirt--chapters in the book that you would not read to your children\nat the rate of $100 a line? Throw out all that stuff from your summer\nbaggage. Are there not good books that are easy to read--books of\nentertaining travel, books of congenial history, books of pure fun,\nbooks of poetry ringing with merry canto, books of fine engravings,\nbooks that will rest the mind as well as purify the heart and elevate\nthe whole life? My hearers, there will not be an hour between this\nand the day of your death when you can afford to read a book lacking\nin moral principle.\n\nVI. Another temptation hovering all around our watering-places is the\nintoxicating beverage. I am told that it is becoming more and more\nfashionable for woman to drink. I care not how well a woman may dress,\nif she has taken enough of wine to flush her cheek and put glassiness\non her eyes, she is intoxicated. She may be handed into a $2500\ncarriage, and have diamonds enough to confound the Tiffanys--she is\nintoxicated. She may be a graduate of Packer Institute, and the\ndaughter of some man in danger of being nominated for the\nPresidency--she is drunk. You may have a larger vocabulary than I\nhave, and you may say in regard to her that she is \"convivial,\" or she\nis \"merry,\" or she is \"festive,\" or she is \"exhilarated,\" but you can\nnot with all your garlands of verbiage cover up the plain fact that it\nis an old-fashioned case of drunk.\n\nNow, the watering-places are full of temptations to men and women to\ntipple. At the close of the tenpin or billiard-game they tipple. At\nthe close of the cotillon they tipple. Seated on the piazza cooling\nthemselves off they tipple. The tinged glasses come around with bright\nstraws, and they tipple. First they take \"light wines,\" as they call\nthem; but \"light wines\" are heavy enough to debase the appetite. There\nis not a very long road between champagne at $5 a bottle and whiskey\nat five cents a glass.\n\nSatan has three or four grades down which he takes men to destruction.\nOne man he takes up, and through one spree pitches him into eternal\ndarkness. That is a rare case. Very seldom, indeed, can you find a man\nwho will be such a fool as that.\n\nWhen a man goes down to destruction Satan brings him to a plane. It is\nalmost a level. The depression is so slight that you can hardly see\nit. The man does not actually know that he is on the down grade, and\nit tips only a little toward darkness--just a little. And the first\nmile it is claret, and the second mile it is sherry, and the third\nmile it is punch, and the fourth mile it is ale, and the fifth mile it\nis porter, and the sixth mile it is brandy, and then it gets steeper\nand steeper and steeper, and the man gets frightened and says, \"Oh,\nlet me get off!\" \"No,\" says the conductor, \"this is an express train,\nand it does not stop until it gets to the Grand Central Depot at\nSmashupton.\" Ah, \"look not thou upon the wine when it is red, when it\ngiveth its color in the cup, when it moveth itself aright. At the last\nit biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder.\" And if any young\nman in my congregation should get astray this summer in this direction\nit will not be because I have not given him fair warning.\n\nMy friends, whether you tarry at home--which will be quite as safe and\nperhaps quite as comfortable--or go into the country, arm yourself\nagainst temptation. The grace of God is the only safe shelter, whether\nin town or country. There are watering-places accessible to all of us.\nYou can not open a book of the Bible without finding out some such\nwatering-place. Fountains open for sin and uncleanliness; wells of\nsalvation; streams from Lebanon; a flood struck out of the rock by\nMoses; fountains in the wilderness discovered by Hagar; water to\ndrink and water to bathe in; the river of God, which is full of water;\nwater of which if a man drink he shall never thirst; wells of water in\nthe Valley of Baca; living fountains of water; a pure river of water\nas clear as crystal from under the throne of God.\n\nThese are watering-places accessible to all of us. We do not have a\nlaborious packing up before we start--only the throwing away of our\ntransgressions. No expensive hotel bills to pay; it is \"without money\nand without price.\" No long and dirty travel before we get there; it\nis only one step away. California in five minutes. I walked around and\nsaw ten fountains, all bubbling up, and they were all different. And\nin five minutes I can get through this Bible _parterre_ and find you\nfifty bright, sparkling fountains bubbling up into eternal life.\n\nA chemist will go to one of these summer watering-places and take the\nwater and analyze it and tell you that it contains so much of iron,\nand so much of soda, and so much of lime, and so much of magnesia. I\ncome to this Gospel well, this living fountain and analyze the water,\nand I find that its ingredients are peace, pardon, forgiveness, hope,\ncomfort, life, heaven. \"Ho, every one that thirsteth, come ye\" to this\nwatering-place!\n\nCrowd around this Bethesda this morning! Oh, you sick, you lame, you\ntroubled, you dying--crowd around this Bethesda! Step in it! Oh, step\nin it! The angel of the covenant this morning stirs the water. Why do\nyou not step in it? Some of you are too weak to take a step in that\ndirection. Then we take you up in the arms of our closing prayer and\nplunge you clean under the wave, hoping that the cure may be as sudden\nand as radical as with Captain Naaman, who, blotched and carbuncled,\nstepped into the Jordan, and after the seventh dive came up, his skin\nroseate-complexioned as the flesh of a little child.\n\n\n\n\nTHE BANISHED QUEEN.\n\n    \"Also Vashti the queen made a feast for the women in the royal\n    house which belonged to King Ahasuerus. On the seventh day\n    when the heart of the king was merry with wine, he commanded\n    Mehuman, Biztha, Harbona, Bigtha, and Abagtha, Zethar, and\n    Carcas, the seven chamberlains that served in the presence of\n    Ahasuerus the king, to bring Vashti the queen before the king\n    with the crown royal, to show the people and the princes her\n    beauty: for she was fair to look on. But the Queen Vashti\n    refused to come at the king's commandment by his chamberlains;\n    therefore was the king very wroth, and his anger burned in\n    him.\"--ESTHER i: 9-12.\n\n\nWe stand amid the palaces of Shushan. The pinnacles are aflame with\nthe morning light. The columns rise festooned and wreathed, the wealth\nof empires flashing from the grooves; the ceilings adorned with images\nof bird and beast, and scenes of prowess and conquest. The walls are\nhung with shields, and emblazoned until it seems that the whole round\nof splendors is exhausted. Each arch is a mighty leaf of architectural\nachievement. Golden stars shining down on glowing arabesque. Hangings\nof embroidered work in which mingle the blueness of the sky, the\ngreenness of the grass, and the whiteness of the sea-foam. Tapestries\nhung on silver rings, wedding together the pillars of marble.\nPavilions reaching out in every direction. These for repose, filled\nwith luxuriant couches, in which weary limbs sink until all fatigue is\nsubmerged. Those for carousal, where kings drink down a kingdom at one\nswallow.\n\nAmazing spectacle!\n\nLight of silver dripping down over stairs of ivory on shields of gold.\nFloors of stained marble, sunset red and night black, and inlaid with\ngleaming pearl.\n\nIn connection with this palace there is a garden, where the mighty men\nof foreign lands are seated at a banquet. Under the spread of oak and\nlinden and acacia the tables are arranged. The breath of honeysuckle\nand frankincense fills the air. Fountains leap up into the light, the\nspray struck through with rainbows falling in crystalline baptism upon\nflowering shrubs--then rolling down through channels of marble, and\nwidening out here and there into pools swirling with the finny tribes\nof foreign aquariums, bordered with scarlet anemones, hypericums, and\nmany-colored ranunculi.\n\nMeats of rarest bird and beast smoking up amid wreaths of aromatics.\nThe vases filled with apricots and almonds. The baskets piled up with\napricots and figs and oranges and pomegranates. Melons tastefully\ntwined with leaves of acacia. The bright waters of Eul\u00e6us filling the\nurns and dropping outside the rim in flashing beads amid the\ntraceries. Wine from the royal vats of Ispahan and Shiraz, in bottles\nof tinged shell, and lily-shaped cups of silver, and flagons and\ntankards of solid gold. The music rises higher, and the revelry breaks\nout into wilder transport, and the wine has flushed the cheek and\ntouched the brain, and louder than all other voices are the hiccough\nof the inebriates, the gabble of fools, and the song of the drunkards.\n\nIn another part of the palace, Queen Vashti is entertaining the\nprincesses of Persia at a banquet. Drunken Ahasuerus says to his\nservants, \"You go out and fetch Vashti from, that banquet with the\nwomen, and bring her to this banquet with the men, and let me display\nher beauty.\" The servants immediately start to obey the king's\ncommand; but there was a rule in Oriental society that no woman might\nappear in public without having her face veiled. Yet here was a\nmandate that no one dare dispute, demanding that Vashti come in\nunveiled before the multitude. However, there was in Vashti's soul a\nprinciple more regal than Ahasuerus, more brilliant than the gold of\nShushan, of more wealth than the realm of Persia, which commanded her\nto disobey this order of the king; and so all the righteousness and\nholiness and modesty of her nature rise up into one sublime refusal.\nShe says, \"I will not go into the banquet unveiled.\" Ahasuerus was\ninfuriate; and Vashti, robbed of her position and her estate, is\ndriven forth in poverty and ruin to suffer the scorn of a nation, and\nyet to receive the applause of after generations, who shall rise up to\nadmire this martyr to kingly insolence. Well, the last vestige of that\nfeast is gone; the last garland has faded; the last arch has fallen;\nthe last tankard has been destroyed; and Shushan is a ruin; but as\nlong as the world stands there will be multitudes of men and women,\nfamiliar with the Bible, who will come into this picture-gallery of\nGod and admire the divine portrait of Vashti the queen, Vashti the\nveiled, Vashti the sacrifice, Vashti the silent.\n\nI. In the first place, I want you to look upon Vashti the queen. A\nblue ribbon, rayed with white, drawn around her forehead, indicated\nher queenly position. It was no small honor to be queen in such a\nrealm as that. Hark to the rustle of her robes! See the blaze of her\njewels! And yet, my friends, it is not necessary to have place and\nregal robe in order to be queenly. When I see a woman with stout faith\nin God, putting her foot upon all meanness and selfishness and godless\ndisplay, going right forward to serve Christ and the race by a grand\nand a glorious service, I say: \"That woman is a queen,\" and the ranks\nof heaven look over the battlements upon the coronation; and whether\nshe comes up from the shanty on the commons or the mansion of the\nfashionable square, I greet her with the shout, \"All hail, Queen\nVashti!\"\n\nWhat glory was there on the brow of Mary of Scotland, or Elizabeth of\nEngland, or Margaret of France, or Catherine of Russia, compared with\nthe worth of some of our Christian mothers, many of them gone into\nglory?--or of that woman mentioned in the Scriptures, who put her all\ninto the Lord's treasury?--or of Jephtha's daughter, who made a\ndemonstration of unselfish patriotism?--or of Abigail, who rescued the\nherds and flocks of her husband?--or of Ruth, who toiled under a\ntropical sun for poor, old, helpless Naomi?--or of Florence\nNightingale, who went at midnight to stanch the battle wounds of the\nCrimea?--or of Mrs. Adoniram Judson, who kindled the lights of\nsalvation amid the darkness of Burmah?--or of Mrs. Hemans, who poured\nout her holy soul in words which will forever be associated with\nhunter's horn, and captive's chain, and bridal hour, and lute's throb,\nand curfew's knell at the dying day?--and scores and hundreds of\nwomen, unknown on earth, who have given water to the thirsty, and\nbread to the hungry, and medicine to the sick, and smiles to the\ndiscouraged--their footsteps heard along dark lane and in government\nhospital, and in almshouse corridor, and by prison gate? There may be\nno royal robe--there may be no palatial surroundings. She does not\nneed them; for all charitable men will unite with the crackling lips\nof fever-struck hospital and plague-blotched lazaretto in greeting her\nas she passes: \"Hail! Hail! Queen Vashti!\"\n\nII. Again, I want you to consider Vashti the veiled. Had she appeared\nbefore Ahasuerus and his court on that day with her face uncovered she\nwould have shocked all the delicacies of Oriental society, and the\nvery men who in their intoxication demanded that she come, in their\nsober moments would have despised her. As some flowers seem to thrive\nbest in the dark lane and in the shadow, and where the sun does not\nseem to reach them, so God appoints to most womanly natures a retiring\nand unobtrusive spirit.\n\nGod once in awhile does call an Isabella to a throne, or a Miriam to\nstrike the timbrel at the front of a host, or a Marie Antoinette to\nquell a French mob, or a Deborah to stand at the front of an armed\nbattalion, crying out, \"Up! Up! This is the day in which the Lord will\ndeliver Sisera into thy hands.\" And when the women are called to such\nout-door work and to such heroic positions, God prepares them for it;\nand they have iron in their soul, and lightnings in their eye, and\nwhirlwinds in their breath, and the borrowed strength of the Lord\nOmnipotent in their right arm. They walk through furnaces as though\nthey were hedges of wild-flowers, and cross seas as though they were\nshimmering sapphire; and all the harpies of hell down to their dungeon\nat the stamp of womanly indignation.\n\nBut these are the exceptions. Generally, Dorcas would rather make a\ngarment for the poor boy; Rebecca would rather fill the trough for the\ncamels; Hannah would rather make a coat for Samuel; the Hebrew maid\nwould rather give a prescription for Naaman's leprosy; the woman of\nSarepta would rather gather a few sticks to cook a meal for famished\nElijah; Phebe would rather carry a letter for the inspired apostle;\nMother Lois would rather educate Timothy in the Scriptures. When I see\na woman going about her daily duty, with cheerful dignity presiding at\nthe table, with kind and gentle, but firm discipline presiding in the\nnursery, going out into the world without any blast of trumpets,\nfollowing in the footsteps of Him who went about doing good--I say:\n\"This is Vashti with a veil on.\"\n\nBut when I see a woman of unblushing boldness, loud-voiced, with a\ntongue of infinite clitter-clatter, with arrogant look, passing\nthrough the streets with the step of a walking-beam, gayly arrayed in\na very hurricane of millinery, I cry out: \"Vashti has lost her veil!\"\nWhen I see a woman struggling for political preferment--trying to\nforce her way on up to the ballot-box, amid the masculine demagogues\nwho stand, with swollen fists and bloodshot eyes and pestiferous\nbreath, to guard the polls--wanting to go through the loaferism and\nthe defilement of popular sovereigns, who crawl up from the saloons\ngreasy and foul and vermin-covered, to decide questions of justice and\norder and civilization--when I see a woman, I say, who wants to press\nthrough all that horrible scum to get to the ballot-box, I say: \"Ah,\nwhat a pity! Vashti has lost her veil!\"\n\nWhen I see a woman of comely features, and of adroitness of intellect,\nand endowed with all that the schools can do for one, and of high\nsocial position, yet moving in society with superciliousness and\n_hauteur_, as though she would have people know their place, and with\nan undefined combination of giggle and strut and rhodomontade, endowed\nwith allopathic quantities of talk, but only homeopathic\ninfinitesimals of sense, the terror of dry-goods clerks and railroad\nconductors, discoverers of significant meanings in plain conversation,\nprodigies of badinage and innuendo--I say: \"Vashti has lost her veil.\"\n\nIII. Again, I want you this morning to consider Vashti the sacrifice.\nWho is this that I see coming out of that palace gate of Shushan? It\nseems to me that I have seen her before. She comes homeless,\nhouseless, friendless, trudging along with a broken heart. Who is she?\nIt is Vashti the sacrifice. Oh! what a change it was from regal\nposition to a wayfarer's crust! A little while ago, approved and\nsought for; now, none so poor as to acknowledge her acquaintanceship.\nVashti the sacrifice!\n\nAh! you and I have seen it many a time. Here is a home empalaced with\nbeauty. All that refinement and books and wealth can do for that home\nhas been done; but Ahasuerus, the husband and the father, is taking\nhold on paths of sin. He is gradually going down. After awhile he will\nflounder and struggle like a wild beast in the hunter's net--further\naway from God, further away from the right. Soon the bright apparel of\nthe children will turn to rags; soon the household song will become\nthe sobbing of a broken heart. The old story over again. Brutal\nCentaurs breaking up the marriage feast of Lapith\u00e6. The house full of\noutrage and cruelty and abomination, while trudging forth from the\npalace gate are Vashti and her children. There are homes represented\nin this house this morning that are in danger of such breaking-up. Oh,\nAhasuerus! that you should stand in a home, by a dissipated life\ndestroying the peace and comfort of that home. God forbid that your\nchildren should ever have to wring their hands, and have people point\ntheir finger at them as they pass down the street, and say, \"There\ngoes a drunkard's child.\" God forbid that the little feet should ever\nhave to trudge the path of poverty and wretchedness! God forbid that\nany evil spirit born of the wine-cup or the brandy-glass should come\nforth and uproot that garden, and with a lasting, blistering,\nall-consuming curse, shut forever the palace gate against Vashti and\nthe children.\n\nOne night during the war I went to Hagerstown to look at the army, and\nI stood on a hill-top and looked down upon them. I saw the camp-fires\nall through the valleys and all over the hills. It was a weird\nspectacle, those camp-fires, and I stood and watched them; and the\nsoldiers who were gathered around them were, no doubt, talking of\ntheir homes, and of the long march they had taken, and of the battles\nthey were to fight; but after awhile I saw these camp-fires begin to\nlower; and they continued to lower, until they were all gone out, and\nthe army slept. It was imposing when I saw the camp-fires; it was\nimposing in the darkness when I thought of that great host asleep.\nWell, God looks down from heaven, and He sees the fireside of\nChristendom and the loved ones gathered around these firesides. These\nare the camp-fires where we warm ourselves at the close of day, and\ntalk over the battles of life we have fought and the battles that are\nyet to come. God grant that when at last these fires begin to go out,\nand continue to lower until finally they are extinguished, and the\nashes of consumed hopes strew the hearth of the old homestead, it may\nbe because we have\n\n    \"Gone to sleep that last long sleep,\n    From which none ever wake to weep.\"\n\nNow we are an army on the march of life. Then we shall be an army\nbivouacked in the tent of the grave.\n\nIV. Once more: I want you to look at Vashti the silent. You do not\nhear any outcry from this woman as she goes forth from the palace\ngate. From the very dignity of her nature, you know there will be no\nvociferation. Sometimes in life it is necessary to make a retort;\nsometimes in life it is necessary to resist; but there are crises when\nthe most triumphant thing to do is to keep silence. The philosopher,\nconfident in his newly discovered principle, waited for the coming of\nmore intelligent generations, willing that men should laugh at the\nlightning-rod and cotton-gin and steam-boat--waiting for long years\nthrough the scoffing of philosophical schools, in grand and\nmagnificent silence.\n\nGalileo, condemned by mathematicians and monks and cardinals,\ncaricatured everywhere, yet waiting and watching with his telescope to\nsee the coming up of stellar reenforcements, when the stars in their\ncourses would fight for the Copernican system; then sitting down in\ncomplete blindness and deafness to wait for the coming on of the\ngenerations who would build his monument and bow at his grave. The\nreformer, execrated by his contemporaries, fastened in a pillory, the\nslow fires of public contempt burning under him, ground under the\ncylinders of the printing-press, yet calmly waiting for the day when\npurity of soul and heroism of character will get the sanction of earth\nand the plaudits of heaven.\n\nAffliction enduring without any complaint the sharpness of the pang,\nand the violence of the storm, and the heft of the chain, and the\ndarkness of the night--waiting until a Divine hand shall be put forth\nto soothe the pang, and hush the storm, and release the captive. A\nwife abused, persecuted, and a perpetual exile from every earthly\ncomfort--waiting, waiting, until the Lord shall gather up His dear\nchildren in a heavenly home, and no poor Vashti will ever be thrust\nout from the palace gate.\n\nJesus, in silence and answering not a word, drinking the gall, bearing\nthe cross, in prospect of the rapturous consummation when\n\n    \"Angels thronged their chariot wheel,\n      And bore Him to His throne,\n    Then swept their golden harps and sung,\n      'The glorious work is done!'\"\n\nOh, woman! does not this story of Vashti the queen, Vashti the veiled,\nVashti the sacrifice, Vashti the silent, move your soul? My sermon\nconverges into the one absorbing hope that none of you may be shut out\nof the palace gate of heaven. You can endure the hardships, and the\nprivations, and the cruelties, and the misfortunes of this life if you\ncan only gain admission there. Through the blood of the everlasting\ncovenant you go through those gates, or never go at all. God forbid\nthat you should at last be banished from the society of angels, and\nbanished from the companionship of your glorified kindred, and\nbanished forever. Through the rich grace of our Lord Jesus Christ, may\nyou be enabled to imitate the example of Rachel, and Hannah, and\nAbigail, and Deborah, and Mary, and Esther, and Vashti.\n\n\n\n\nTHE DAY WE LIVE IN.\n\n    \"Who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom for such a\n    time as this?\"--ESTHER iv. 14.\n\n\nEsther the beautiful was the wife of Ahasuerus the abominable. The\ntime had come for her to present a petition to her infamous husband in\nbehalf of the Jewish nation, to which she had once belonged. She was\nafraid to undertake the work, lest she should lose her own life; but\nher uncle, Mordecai, who had brought her up, encouraged her with the\nsuggestion that probably she had been raised up of God for that\npeculiar mission. \"Who knoweth whether thou art come to the kingdom\nfor such a time as this?\" Esther had her God-appointed work; you and I\nhave ours. It is my business to tell you what style of men and women\nyou ought to be in order that you meet the demand of the age in which\nGod has cast your lot. If you have come expecting to hear abstractions\ndiscussed, or dry technicalities of religion glorified, you have come\nto the wrong church; but if you really would like to know what this\nage has a right to expect of you as Christian men and women, then I am\nready in the Lord's name to look you in the face. When two armies have\nrushed into battle the officers of either army do not want a\nphilosophical discussion about the chemical properties of human blood\nor the nature of gunpowder; they want some one to man the batteries\nand swab out the guns. And now, when all the forces of light and\ndarkness, of heaven and hell, have plunged into the fight, it is no\ntime to give ourselves to the definitions and formulas and\ntechnicalities and conventionalities of religion.\n\nWhat we want is practical, earnest, concentrated, enthusiastic, and\ntriumphant help.\n\nI. In the first place, in order to meet the special demand of this\nage, you need to be an unmistakably aggressive Christian. Of\nhalf-and-half Christians we do not want any more. The Church of Jesus\nChrist will be better without ten thousand of them. They are the chief\nobstacle to the Church's advancement. I am speaking of another kind of\nChristian. All the appliances for your becoming an earnest Christian\nare at your hand, and there is a straight path for you into the broad\ndaylight of God's forgiveness. You may have come into this Tabernacle\nthe bondsmen of the world, and yet before you go out of these doors\nyou may become princes of the Lord God Almighty. You remember what\nexcitement there was in this country, years ago, when the Prince of\nWales came here--how the people rushed out by hundreds of thousands to\nsee him. Why? Because they expected that some day he would sit upon\nthe throne of England. But what was all that honor compared with the\nhonor to which God calls you--to be sons and daughters of the Lord\nAlmighty; yea, to be queens and kings unto God? \"They shall reign with\nHim forever and forever.\"\n\nBut, my friends, you need to be aggressive Christians, and not like\nthose persons who spend their lives in hugging their Christian graces\nand wondering why they do not make any progress. How much robustness\nof health would a man have if he hid himself in a dark closet? A great\ndeal of the piety of the day is too exclusive. It hides itself. It\nneeds more fresh air, more out-door exercise. There are many\nChristians who are giving their entire life to self-examination. They\nare feeling their pulses to see what is the condition of their\nspiritual health. How long would a man have robust physical health if\nhe kept all the days and weeks and months and years of his life\nfeeling his pulse instead of going out into active, earnest, every-day\nwork?\n\nI was once amid the wonderful, bewitching cactus growths of North\nCarolina. I never was more bewildered with the beauty of flowers, and\nyet when I would take up one of these cactuses and pull the leaves\napart, the beauty was all gone. You could hardly tell that it had ever\nbeen a flower. And there are a great many Christian people in this day\njust pulling apart their Christian experiences to see what there is in\nthem, and there is nothing left in them. This style of\nself-examination is a damage instead of an advantage to their\nChristian character. I remember when I was a boy I used to have a\nsmall piece in the garden that I called my own, and I planted corn\nthere, and every few days I would pull it up to see how fast it was\ngrowing. Now, there are a great many Christian people in this day\nwhose self-examination merely amounts to the pulling up of that which\nthey only yesterday or the day before planted.\n\nO my friends! if you want to have a stalwart Christian character,\nplant it right out of doors in the great field of Christian\nusefulness, and though storms may come upon it, and though the hot sun\nof trial may try to consume it, it will thrive until it becomes a\ngreat tree, in which the fowls of heaven may have their habitation. I\nhave no patience with these flower-pot Christians. They keep\nthemselves under shelter, and all their Christian experience in a\nsmall, exclusive circle, when they ought to plant it in the great\ngarden of the Lord, so that the whole atmosphere could be aromatic\nwith their Christian usefulness. What we want in the Church of God is\nmore brawn of piety.\n\nThe century plant is wonderfully suggestive and wonderfully beautiful,\nbut I never look at it without thinking of its parsimony. It lets\nwhole generations go by before it puts forth one blossom; so I have\nreally more heartfelt admiration when I see the dewy tears in the blue\neyes of the violets, for they come every spring. My Christian friends,\ntime is going by so rapidly that we can not afford to be idle.\n\nA recent statistician says that human life now has an average of only\nthirty-two years. From these thirty-two years you must subtract all\nthe time you take for sleep and the taking of food and recreation;\nthat will leave you about sixteen years. From those sixteen years you\nmust subtract all the time that you are necessarily engaged in the\nearning of a livelihood; that will leave you about eight years. From\nthose eight years you must take all the days and weeks and months--all\nthe length of time that is passed in childhood and sickness, leaving\nyou about one year in which to work for God. Oh, my soul, wake up!\nHow darest thou sleep in harvest-time and with so few hours in which\nto reap? So that I state it as a simple fact that all the time that\nthe vast majority of you will have for the exclusive service of God\nwill be less than one year!\n\n\"But,\" says some man, \"I liberally support the Gospel, and the church\nis open and the Gospel is preached: all the spiritual advantages are\nspread before men, and if they want to be saved, let them come to be\nsaved; I have discharged all my responsibility.\" Ah! is that the\nMaster's spirit? Is there not an old Book somewhere that commands us\nto go out into the highways and the hedges and compel the people to\ncome in? What would have become of you and me if Christ had not come\ndown off the hills of heaven, and if He had not come through the door\nof the Bethlehem caravansary, and if He had not with the crushed hand\nof the crucifixion knocked at the iron gate of the sepulcher of our\nspiritual death, crying, \"Lazarus, come forth\"? Oh, my Christian\nfriends, this is no time for inertia, when all the forces of darkness\nseem to be in full blast; when steam printing-presses are publishing\ninfidel tracts; when express railroad trains are carrying messengers\nof sin; when fast clippers are laden with opium and rum; when the\nnight-air of our cities is polluted with the laughter that breaks up\nfrom the ten thousand saloons of dissipation and abandonment; when the\nfires of the second death already are kindled in the cheeks of some\nwho, only a little while ago, were incorrupt. Oh, never since the\ncurse fell upon the earth has there been a time when it was such an\nunwise, such a cruel, such an awful thing for the Church to sleep!\nThe great audiences are not gathered in the Christian churches; the\ngreat audiences are gathered in temples of sin--tears of unutterable\nwoe their baptism, the blood of crushed hearts the awful wine of their\nsacrament, blasphemies their litany, and the groans of the lost world\nthe organ dirge of their worship.\n\nII. Again, if you want to be qualified to meet the duties which this\nage demands of you, you must on the one hand avoid reckless\niconoclasm, and on the other hand not stick too much to things because\nthey are old. The air is full of new plans, new projects, new theories\nof government, new theologies, and I am amazed to see how so many\nChristians want only novelty in order to recommend a thing to their\nconfidence; and so they vacillate and swing to and fro, and they are\nuseless, and they are unhappy. New plans--secular, ethical,\nphilosophical, religious, cisatlantic, transatlantic--long enough to\nmake a line reaching from the German universities to Great Salt Lake\nCity. Ah, my brother, do not take hold of a thing merely because it is\nnew. Try it by the realities of a Judgment Day.\n\nBut, on the other hand, do not adhere to any thing merely because it\nis old. There is not a single enterprise of the Church or the world\nbut has sometimes been scoffed at. There was a time when men derided\neven Bible societies; and when a few young men met near a hay-stack in\nMassachusetts and organized the first missionary society ever\norganized in this country, there went laughter and ridicule all around\nthe Christian Church. They said the undertaking was preposterous. And\nso also the work of Jesus Christ was assailed. People cried out, \"Who\never heard of such theories of ethics and government? Who ever\nnoticed such a style of preaching as Jesus has?\" Ezekiel had talked of\nmysterious wings and wheels. Here came a man from Capernaum and\nGennesaret, and he drew his illustration from the lakes, from the\nsand, from the ravine, from the lilies, from the corn-stalks. How the\nPharisees scoffed! How Herod derided! How Caiaphas hissed! And this\nJesus they plucked by the beard, and they spat in his face, and they\ncalled him \"this fellow!\" All the great enterprises in and out of the\nChurch have at times been scoffed at, and there have been a great\nmultitude who have thought that the chariot of God's truth would fall\nto pieces if it once got out of the old rut.\n\nAnd so there are those who have no patience with anything like\nimprovement in church architecture, or with anything like good,\nhearty, earnest church singing, and they deride any form of religious\ndiscussion which goes down walking among every-day men rather than\nthat which makes an excursion on rhetorical stilts. Oh, that the\nChurch of God would wake up to an adaptability of work! We must admit\nthe simple fact that the churches of Jesus Christ in this day do not\nreach the great masses. There are fifty thousand people in Edinburgh\nwho never hear the Gospel. There are one million people in London who\nnever hear the Gospel. There are at least three hundred thousand souls\nin the city of Brooklyn who come not under the immediate ministrations\nof Christ's truth; and the Church of God in this day, instead of being\na place full of living epistles, read and known of all men, is more\nlike a \"dead-letter\" post-office.\n\n\"But,\" say the people, \"the world is going to be converted; you must\nbe patient; the kingdoms of this world are to become the kingdoms of\nChrist,\" Never, unless the Church of Jesus Christ puts on more speed\nand energy. Instead of the Church converting the world, the world is\nconverting the Church. Here is a great fortress. How shall it be\ntaken? An army comes and sits around about it, cuts off the supplies,\nand says: \"Now we will just wait until from exhaustion and starvation\nthey will have to give up.\" Weeks and months, and perhaps a year, pass\nalong, and finally the fortress surrenders through that starvation and\nexhaustion. But, my friends, the fortresses of sin are never to be\ntaken in that way. If they are taken for God it will be by storm; you\nwill have to bring up the great siege guns of the Gospel to the very\nwall and wheel the flying artillery into line, and when the armed\ninfantry of heaven shall confront the battlements you will have to\ngive the quick command, \"Forward! Charge!\"\n\nAh, my friends, there is work for you to do and for me to do in order\nto this grand accomplishment! Here is my pulpit, and I preach in it.\nYour pulpit is the bank. Your pulpit is the store. Your pulpit is the\neditorial chair. Your pulpit is the anvil. Your pulpit is the house\nscaffolding. Your pulpit is the mechanic's shop. I may stand in this\nplace and, through cowardice or through self-seeking, may keep back\nthe word I ought to utter; while you, with sleeve rolled up and brow\nbesweated with toil, may utter the word that will jar the foundations\nof heaven with the shout of a great victory. Oh, that this morning\nthis whole audience might feel that the Lord Almighty was putting upon\nthem the hands of ordination. I tell you, every one, go forth and\npreach this gospel. You have as much right to preach as I have, or as\nany man has. Only find out the pulpit where God will have you preach,\nand there preach.\n\nHedley Vicars was a wicked man in the English army. The grace of God\ncame to him. He became an earnest and eminent Christian. They scoffed\nat him, and said: \"You are a hypocrite; you are as bad as ever you\nwere.\" Still he kept his faith in Christ, and after awhile, finding\nthat they could not turn him aside by calling him a hypocrite, they\nsaid to him: \"Oh, you are nothing but a Methodist.\" That did not\ndisturb him. He went on performing his Christian duty until he had\nformed all his troop into a Bible-class, and the whole encampment was\nshaken with the presence of God. So Havelock went into the heathen\ntemple in India while the English army was there, and put a candle\ninto the hand of each of the heathen gods that stood around in the\nheathen temple, and by the light of those candles, held up by the\nidols, General Havelock preached righteousness, temperance, and\njudgment to come. And who will say, on earth or in Heaven, that\nHavelock had not the right to preach?\n\nIn the minister's house where I prepared for college, there was a man\nwho worked, by the name of Peter Croy. He could neither read nor\nwrite, but he was a man of God. Often theologians would stop in the\nhouse--grave theologians--and at family prayers Peter Croy would be\ncalled upon to lead; and all those wise men sat around, wonder-struck\nat his religious efficiency. When he prayed he reached up and seemed\nto take hold of the very throne of the Almighty, and he talked with\nGod until the very heavens were bowed down into the sitting-room. Oh,\nif I were dying I would rather have plain Peter Croy kneel by my\nbedside and commend my immortal spirit to God than the greatest\narchbishop, arrayed in costly canonicals. Go preach this Gospel. You\nsay you are not licensed. In the name of the Lord Almighty, this\nmorning, I license you. Go preach this Gospel--preach it in the\nSabbath-schools, in the prayer-meetings, in the highways, in the\nhedges. Woe be unto you if you preach it not.\n\nIII. I remark, again, that in order to be qualified to meet your duty\nin this particular age you want unbounded faith in the triumph of the\ntruth and the overthrow of wickedness. How dare the Christian Church\never get discouraged? Have we not the Lord Almighty on our side? How\nlong did it take God to slay the hosts of Sennacherib or burn Sodom or\nshake down Jericho? How long will it take God, when He once arises in\nHis strength, to overthrow all the forces of iniquity? Between this\ntime and that there may be long seasons of darkness--the\nchariot-wheels of God's Gospel may seem to drag heavily; but here is\nthe promise, and yonder is the throne; and when Omniscience has lost\nits eyesight, and Omnipotence falls back impotent, and Jehovah is\ndriven from His throne, then the Church of Jesus Christ can afford to\nbe despondent, but never until then. Despots may plan and armies may\nmarch, and the congresses of the nations may seem to think they are\nadjusting all the affairs of the world, but the mighty men of the\nearth are only the dust of the chariot-wheels of God's providence.\n\nI think that before the sun of this century shall set the last tyranny\nwill fall, and with a splendor of demonstration that shall be the\nastonishment of the universe God will set forth the brightness and\npomp and glory and perpetuity of His eternal government. Out of the\nstarry flags and the emblazoned insignia of this world God will make a\npath for His own triumph, and, returning from universal conquest, He\nwill sit down, the grandest, strongest, highest throne of earth His\nfootstool.\n\n    \"Then shall all nations' song ascend\n    To Thee, our Ruler, Father, Friend,\n    Till heaven's high arch resounds again\n    With 'Peace on earth, good will to men.'\"\n\nI preach this sermon because I want to encourage all Christian workers\nin every possible department. Hosts of the living God, march on! march\non! His Spirit will bless you. His shield will defend you. His sword\nwill strike for you. March on! march on! The despotism will fall, and\npaganism will burn its idols, and Mohammedanism will give up its false\nprophet, and Judaism will confess the true Messiah, and the great\nwalls of superstition will come down in thunder and wreck at the long,\nloud blast of the Gospel trumpet. March on! march on! The besiegement\nwill soon be ended. Only a few more steps on the long way; only a few\nmore sturdy blows; only a few more battle cries, then God will put the\nlaurel upon your brow, and from the living fountains of heaven will\nbathe off the sweat and the heat and the dust of the conflict. March\non! march on! For you the time for work will soon be passed, and amid\nthe outflashings of the judgment throne, and the trumpeting of\nresurrection angels, and the upheaving of a world of graves, and the\nhosanna and the groaning of the saved and the lost, we shall be\nrewarded for our faithfulness or punished for our stupidity. Blessed\nbe the Lord God of Israel from everlasting to everlasting, and let the\nwhole earth be filled with His glory. Amen and Amen.\n\n\n\n\nCAPITAL AND LABOR.\n\n    \"Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so\n    to them.\"--MATT. vii: 12.\n\n\nThe greatest war the world has ever seen is between capital and labor.\nThe strife is not like that which in history is called the Thirty\nYears' War, for it is a war of centuries, it is a war of the five\ncontinents, it is a war hemispheric. The middle classes in this\ncountry, upon whom the nation has depended for holding the balance of\npower and for acting as mediators between the two extremes, are\ndiminishing; and if things go on at the same ratio as they are now\ngoing, it will not be very long before there will be no middle class\nin this country, but all will be very rich or very poor, princes or\npaupers, and the country will be given up to palaces and hovels.\n\nThe antagonistic forces are closing in upon each other. The\ntelegraphic operators' strikes, the railroad employ\u00e9s' strikes, the\nPennsylvania miners' strikes, the movements of the Boycotters and the\ndynamiters are only skirmishes before a general engagement, or, if you\nprefer it, escapes through the safety-valves of an imprisoned force\nwhich promises the explosion of society. You may pooh-pooh it; you may\nsay that this trouble, like an angry child, will cry itself to sleep;\nyou may belittle it by calling it Fourierism, or Socialism, or St.\nSimonism, or Nihilism, or Communism; but that will not hinder the fact\nthat it is the mightiest, the darkest, the most terrific threat of\nthis century. All attempts at pacification have been dead failures,\nand monopoly is more arrogant, and the trades unions more bitter.\n\"Give us more wages,\" cry the employ\u00e9s. \"You shall have less,\" say the\ncapitalists. \"Compel us to do fewer hours of toil in a day.\" \"You\nshall toil more hours,\" say the others. \"Then, under certain\nconditions, we will not work at all,\" say these. \"Then you shall\nstarve,\" say those, and the workmen gradually using up that which they\naccumulated in better times, unless there be some radical change, we\nshall have soon in this country three million hungry men and women.\nNow, three million hungry people can not be kept quiet. All the\nenactments of legislatures and all the constabularies of the cities,\nand all the army and navy of the United States can not keep three\nmillion hungry people quiet. What then? Will this war between capital\nand labor be settled by human wisdom? Never. The brow of the one\nbecomes more rigid, the fist of the other more clinched.\n\nBut that which human wisdom can not achieve will be accomplished by\nChristianity if it be given full sway. You have heard of medicines so\npowerful that one drop would stop a disease and restore a patient; and\nI have to tell you that one drop of my text properly administered will\nstop all those woes of society and give convalescence and complete\nhealth to all classes. \"Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you,\ndo ye even so to them.\"\n\nI shall first show you this morning how this quarrel between monopoly\nand hard work can not be stopped, and then I will show you how this\ncontroversy will be settled.\n\nFutile remedies. In the first place, there will come no pacification\nto this trouble through an outcry against rich men merely because they\nare rich. There is no member of a trades-union on earth that would not\nbe rich if he could be. Sometimes through a fortunate invention, or\nthrough some accident of prosperity, a man who had nothing comes to\nlarge estate, and we see him arrogant and supercilious, and taking\npeople by the throat just as other people took him by the throat.\nThere is something very mean about human nature when it comes to the\ntop. But it is no more a sin to be rich than it is a sin to be poor.\nThere are those who have gathered a great estate through fraud, and\nthen there are millionaires who have gathered their fortune through\nforesight in regard to changes in the markets, and through brilliant\nbusiness faculty, and every dollar of their estate is as honest as the\ndollar which the plumber gets for mending a pipe, or the mason gets\nfor building a wall. There are those who keep in poverty because of\ntheir own fault. They might have been well-off, but they smoked or\nchewed up their earnings, or they lived beyond their means, while\nothers on the same wages and on the same salaries went on to\ncompetency. I know a man who is all the time complaining of his\npoverty and crying out against rich men, while he himself keeps two\ndogs, and chews and smokes, and is filled to the chin with whisky and\nbeer!\n\nMicawber said to David Copperfield: \"Copperfield, my boy, one pound\nincome, twenty shillings and sixpence expenses: result misery. But,\nCopperfield, my boy, one pound income, expenses nineteen shillings and\nsixpence; result, happiness.\" And there are vast multitudes of people\nwho are kept poor because they are the victims of their own\nimprovidence. It is no sin to be rich, and it is no sin to be poor. I\nprotest against this outcry which I hear against those who, through\neconomy and self-denial and assiduity, have come to large fortune.\nThis bombardment of commercial success will never stop this quarrel\nbetween capital and labor.\n\nNeither will the contest be settled by cynical and unsympathetic\ntreatment of the laboring classes. There are those who speak of them\nas though they were only cattle or draught horses. Their nerves are\nnothing, their domestic comfort is nothing, their happiness is\nnothing. They have no more sympathy for them than a hound has for a\nhare, or a hawk for a hen, or a tiger for a calf. When Jean Valjean,\nthe greatest hero of Victor Hugo's writings, after a life of suffering\nand brave endurance, goes into incarceration and death, they clap the\nbook shut and say, \"Good for him!\" They stamp their feet with\nindignation and say just the opposite of \"Save the working-classes.\"\nThey have all their sympathies with Shylock, and not with Antonio and\nPortia. They are plutocrats, and their feelings are infernal. They are\nfilled with irritation and irascibility on this subject. To stop this\nawful imbroglio between capital and labor they will lift not so much\nas the tip end of the little finger.\n\nNeither will there be any pacification of this angry controversy\nthrough violence. God never blessed murder.\n\nThe poorest use you can put a man to is to kill him. Blow up to-morrow\nall the country-seats on the banks of the Hudson, and all the fine\nhouses on Madison Square, and Brooklyn Heights, and Bunker Hill, and\nRittenhouse Square, and Beacon Street, and all the bricks and timber\nand stone will just fall back on the bare head of American labor. The\nworst enemies of the working-classes in the United States and Ireland\nare their demented coadjutors. Assassination--the assassination of\nLord Frederick Cavendish and Mr. Burke in Phoenix Park, Dublin,\nIreland, in the attempt to avenge the wrongs of Ireland, only turned\naway from that afflicted people millions of sympathizers. The recent\nattempt to blow up the House of Commons, in London, had only this\neffect: to throw out of employment tens of thousands of innocent Irish\npeople in England.\n\nIn this country the torch put to the factories that have discharged\nhands for good or bad reason; obstructions on the rail-track in front\nof midnight express trains because the offenders do not like the\npresident of the company; strikes on shipboard the hour they were\ngoing to sail, or in printing-offices the hour the paper was to go to\npress, or in mines the day the coal was to be delivered, or on house\nscaffoldings so the builder fails in keeping his contract--all these\nare only a hard blow on the head of American labor, and cripple its\narms, and lame its feet, and pierce its heart. Take the last great\nstrike in America--the telegraph operators' strike--and you have to\nfind that the operators lost four hundred thousand dollars' worth of\nwages, and have had poorer wages ever since. Traps sprung suddenly\nupon employers, and violence, never took one knot out of the knuckle\nof toil, or put one farthing of wages into a callous palm. Barbarism\nwill never cure the wrongs of civilization. Mark that!\n\nFrederick the Great admired some land near his palace at Potsdam, and\nhe resolved to get it. It was owned by a miller. He offered the miller\nthree times the value of the property. The miller would not take it,\nbecause it was the old homestead, and he felt about as Naboth felt\nabout his vineyard when Ahab wanted it. Frederick the Great was a\nrough and terrible man, and he ordered the miller into his presence;\nand the king, with a stick, in his hand--a stick with which he\nsometimes struck his officers of state--said to this miller: \"Now, I\nhave offered you three times the value of that property, and if you\nwon't sell it I'll take it anyhow.\" The miller said, \"Your majesty,\nyou won't.\" \"Yes,\" said the king, \"I will take it.\" \"Then,\" said the\nmiller, \"if your majesty does take it, I will sue you in the Chancery\nCourt.\" At that threat Frederick the Great yielded his infamous\ndemand. And the most imperious outrage against the working-classes\nwill yet cower before the law. Violence and contrary to the law will\nnever accomplish anything, but righteousness and according to law will\naccomplish it.\n\nWell, if this controversy between Capital and Labor can not be settled\nby human wisdom, if to-day Capital and Labor stand with their thumbs\non each other's throat--as they do--it is time for us to look\nsomewhere else for relief, and it points from my text roseate and\njubilant, and puts one hand on the broadcloth shoulder of Capital, and\nputs the other hand on the homespun-covered shoulder of Toil, and\nsays, with a voice that will grandly and gloriously settle this, and\nsettle everything, \"Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do\nye even so to them.\" That is, the lady of the household will say: \"I\nmust treat the maid in the kitchen just as I would like to be treated\nif I were down-stairs, and it were my work to wash, and cook, and\nsweep, and it were the duty of the maid in the kitchen to preside in\nthis parlor.\" The maid in the kitchen must say: \"If my employer seems\nto be more prosperous than I, that is no fault of hers; I shall not\ntreat her as an enemy. I will have the same industry and fidelity\ndown-stairs as I would expect from my subordinates, if I happened to\nbe the wife of a silk importer.\"\n\nThe owner of an iron mill, having taken a dose of my text before\nleaving home in the morning, will go into his foundry, and, passing\ninto what is called the puddling-room, he will see a man there\nstripped to the waist, and besweated and exhausted with the labor and\nthe toil, and he will say to him: \"Why, it seems to be very hot in\nhere. You look very much exhausted. I hear your child is sick with\nscarlet fever. If you want your wages a little earlier this week, so\nas to pay the nurse and get the medicines, just come into my office\nany time.\"\n\nAfter awhile, crash goes the money market, and there is no more demand\nfor the articles manufactured in that iron mill, and the owner does\nnot know what to do. He says, \"Shall I stop the mill, or shall I run\nit on half time, or shall I cut down the men's wages?\" He walks the\nfloor of his counting-room all day, hardly knowing what to do. Toward\nevening he calls all the laborers together. They stand all around,\nsome with arms akimbo, some with folded arms, wondering what the boss\nis going to do now. The manufacturer says: \"Men, times are very hard;\nI don't make twenty dollars where I used to make one hundred. Somehow,\nthere is no demand now for what we manufacture, or but very little\ndemand. You see I am at vast expense, and I have called you together\nthis afternoon to see what you would advise. I don't want to shut up\nthe mill, because that would force you out of work, and you have\nalways been very faithful, and I like you, and you seem to like me,\nand the bairns must be looked after, and your wife will after awhile\nwant a new dress. I don't know what to do.\"\n\nThere is a dead halt for a minute or two, and then one of the workmen\nsteps out from the ranks of his fellows, and says: \"Boss, you have\nbeen very good to us, and when you prospered we prospered, and now you\nare in a tight place and I am sorry, and we have got to sympathize\nwith you. I don't know how the others feel, but I propose that we take\noff twenty per cent. from our wages, and that when the times get good\nyou will remember us and raise them again.\" The workman looks around\nto his comrades, and says: \"Boys, what do you say to this? all in\nfavor of my proposition will say ay.\" \"Ay! ay! ay!\" shout two hundred\nvoices.\n\nBut the mill-owner, getting in some new machinery, exposes himself\nvery much, and takes cold, and it settles into pneumonia, and he dies.\nIn the procession to the tomb are all the workmen, tears rolling down\ntheir cheeks, and off upon the ground; but an hour before the\nprocession gets to the cemetery the wives and the children of those\nworkmen are at the grave waiting for the arrival of the funeral\npageant. The minister of religion may have delivered an eloquent\neulogium before they started from the house, but the most impressive\nthings are said that day by the working-classes standing around the\ntomb.\n\nThat night in all the cabins of the working-people where they have\nfamily prayers the widowhood and the orphanage in the mansion are\nremembered. No glaring populations look over the iron fence of the\ncemetery; but, hovering over the scene, the benediction of God and man\nis coming for the fulfillment of the Christlike injunction,\n\"Whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to\nthem.\"\n\n\"Oh,\" says some man here, \"that is all Utopian, that is apocryphal,\nthat is impossible.\" No. Yesterday, I cut out of a paper this: \"One of\nthe pleasantest incidents recorded in a long time is reported from\nSheffield, England. The wages of the men in the iron works at\nSheffield are regulated by a board of arbitration, by whose decision\nboth masters and men are bound. For some time past the iron and steel\ntrade has been extremely unprofitable, and the employers can not,\nwithout much loss, pay the wages fixed by the board, which neither\nemployers nor employed have the power to change. To avoid this\ndifficulty, the workmen in one of the largest steel works in Sheffield\nhit upon a device as rare as it was generous. They offered to work for\ntheir employers one week without any pay whatever. How much better\nthat plan is than a strike would be.\"\n\nBut you go with me and I will show you--not so far off as Sheffield,\nEngland--factories, banking-houses, storehouses, and costly\nenterprises where this Christ-like injunction of my text is fully\nkept, and you could no more get the employer to practice an injustice\nupon his men, or the men to conspire against the employer, than you\ncould get your right hand and your left hand, your right eye and your\nleft eye, your right ear and your left ear, into physiological\nantagonism. Now, where is this to begin? In our homes, in our stores,\non our farms--not waiting for other people to do their duty. Is there\na divergence now between the parlor and the kitchen? Then there is\nsomething wrong, either in the parlor or the kitchen, perhaps in both.\nAre the clerks in your store irate against the firm? Then there is\nsomething wrong, either behind the counter, or in the private office,\nor perhaps in both.\n\nThe great want of the world to-day is the fulfillment of this\nChrist-like injunction, that which He promulgated in His sermon\nOlivetic. All the political economists under the arch or vault of the\nheavens in convention for a thousand years can not settle this\ncontroversy between monopoly and hard work, between capital and labor.\nDuring the Revolutionary War there was a heavy piece of timber to be\nlifted, perhaps for some fortress, and a corporal was overseeing the\nwork, and he was giving commands to some soldiers as they lifted:\n\"Heave away, there! yo heave!\" Well, the timber was too heavy; they\ncould not get it up. There was a gentleman riding by on a horse, and\nhe stopped and said to this corporal, \"Why don't you help them lift?\nThat timber is too heavy for them to lift.\" \"No,\" he said, \"I won't;\nI am a corporal.\" The gentleman got off his horse and came up to the\nplace. \"Now,\" he said to the soldiers, \"all together--yo heave!\" and\nthe timber went to its place. \"Now,\" said the gentleman to the\ncorporal, \"when you have a piece of timber too heavy for the men to\nlift, and you want help, you send to your commander-in-chief.\" It was\nWashington. Now, that is about all the Gospel I know--the Gospel of\ngiving somebody a lift, a lift out of darkness, a lift out of earth\ninto heaven. That is all the Gospel I know--the Gospel of helping\nsomebody else to lift.\n\n\"Oh,\" says some wiseacre, \"talk as you will, the law of demand and\nsupply will regulate these things until the end of time.\" No, they\nwill not, unless God dies and the batteries of the Judgment Day are\nspiked, and Pluto and Proserpine, king and queen of the infernal\nregions, take full possession of this world. Do you know who Supply\nand Demand are? They have gone into partnership, and they propose to\nswindle this earth and are swindling it. You are drowning. Supply and\nDemand stand on the shore, one on one side, the other on the other\nside, of the life-boat, and they cry out to you, \"Now, you pay us what\nwe ask you for getting you to shore, or go to the bottom!\" If you can\nborrow $5000 you can keep from failing in business. Supply and Demand\nsay, \"Now, you pay us exorbitant usury, or you go into bankruptcy.\"\nThis robber firm of Supply and Demand say to you: \"The crops are\nshort. We bought up all the wheat and it is in our bin. Now, you pay\nour price or starve.\" That is your magnificent law of supply and\ndemand.\n\nSupply and Demand own the largest mill on earth, and all the rivers\nroll over their wheel, and into their hopper they put all the men,\nwomen, and children they can shovel out of the centuries, and the\nblood and the bones redden the valley while the mill grinds. That\ndiabolic law of supply and demand will yet have to stand aside, and\ninstead thereof will come the law of love, the law of cooperation, the\nlaw of kindness, the law of sympathy, the law of Christ.\n\nHave you no idea of the coming of such a time? Then you do not believe\nthe Bible. All the Bible is full of promises on this subject, and as\nthe ages roll on the time will come when men or fortune will be giving\nlarger sums to humanitarian and evangelistic purposes, and there will\nbe more James Lenoxes and Peter Coopers and William E. Dodges and\nGeorge Peabodys. As that time comes there will be more parks, more\npicture-galleries, more gardens thrown open for the holiday people and\nthe working-classes.\n\nI was reading only this morning in regard to a charge that had been\nmade in England against Lambeth Palace, that it was exclusive; and\nthat charge demonstrated the sublime fact that to the grounds of that\nwealthy estate eight hundred poor families have free passes, and forty\ncroquet companies, and on the hall-day holidays four thousand poor\npeople recline on the grass, walk through the paths, and sit under the\ntrees. That is Gospel--Gospel on the wing, Gospel out-of-doors worth\njust as much as in-doors. That time is going to come.\n\nThat is only a hint of what is going to be. The time is going to come\nwhen, if you have anything in your house worth looking at--pictures,\npieces of sculpture--you are going to invite me to come and see it,\nyou are going to invite my friends to come and see it, and you will\nsay, \"See what I have been blessed with. God has given me this, and so\nfar as enjoying it, it is yours also.\" That is Gospel.\n\nIn crossing the Alleghany Mountains, many years ago, the stage halted,\nand Henry Clay dismounted from the stage, and went out on a rock at\nthe very verge of the cliff, and he stood there with his cloak wrapped\nabout him, and he seemed to be listening for something. Some one said\nto him, \"What are you listening for?\" Standing there, on the top of\nthe mountain, he said: \"I am listening to the tramp of the footsteps\nof the coming millions of this continent.\" A sublime posture for an\nAmerican statesman! You and I to-day stand on the mountain-top of\nprivilege, and on the Rock of Ages, and we look off, and we hear\ncoming from the future the happy industries, and smiling populations,\nand the consecrated fortunes, and the innumerable prosperities of the\nclosing nineteenth and the opening twentieth century.\n\nWhile I speak this morning, there lies in state the dead author and\npatriot of France, Victor Hugo. The ten thousand dollars in his will\nhe has given to the poor of the city are only a hint of the work he\nhas done for all nations and for all times. I wonder not that they\nallow eleven days to pass between his death and his burial, his body\nmeantime kept under triumphal arch, for the world can hardly afford to\nlet go this man who for more than eight decades has by his\nunparalleled genius blessed it. His name shall be a terror to all\ndespots, and an encouragement to all the struggling. He has made the\nworld's burden lighter, and its darkness less dense, and its chain\nless galling, and its thrones of iniquity less secure. Farewell,\npatriot, genius of the century, Victor Hugo! But he was not the\novertowering friend of mankind.\n\nThe greatest friend of capitalist and toiler, and the one who will yet\nbring them together in complete accord, was born one Christmas night\nwhile the curtains of heaven swung, stirred by the wings angelic.\nOwner of all things--all the continents, all worlds, and all the\nislands of light. Capitalist of immensity, crossing over to our\ncondition. Coming into our world, not by gate of palace, but by door\nof barn. Spending His first night amid the shepherds. Gathering after\naround Him the fishermen to be His chief attendants. With adze, and\nsaw, and chisel, and ax, and in a carpenter-shop showing himself\nbrother with the tradesmen. Owner of all things, and yet on a hillock\nback of Jerusalem one day resigning everything for others, keeping not\nso much as a shekel to pay for His obsequies, by charity buried in the\nsuburbs of a city that had cast Him out. Before the cross of such a\ncapitalist, and such a carpenter, all men can afford to shake hands\nand worship. Here is the every man's Christ. None so high, but He was\nhigher. None so poor, but He was poorer. At His feet the hostile\nextremes will yet renounce their animosities, and countenances which\nhave glowered with the prejudices and revenge of centuries shall\nbrighten with the smile of heaven as He commands: \"Whatsoever ye would\nthat men should do to you, do ye even so to them.\"\n\n\n\n\nDESPOTISM OF THE NEEDLE.\n\n    \"So I returned, and considered all the oppressions that are\n    done under the sun: and behold the tears of such as were\n    oppressed, and they had no comforter; and on the side of their\n    oppressors there was power; but they had no\n    comforter.\"--ECCLES. iv: 1.\n\n\nVery long ago the needle was busy. It was considered honorable for\nwomen to toil in olden time. Alexander the Great stood in his palace\nshowing garments made by his own mother. The finest tapestries at\nBayeux were made by the queen of William the Conqueror. Augustus, the\nEmperor, would not wear any garments except those that were fashioned\nby some member of his royal family. So let the toiler everywhere be\nrespected!\n\nThe needle has slain more than the sword. When the sewing-machine was\ninvented some thought that invention would alleviate woman's toil and\nput an end to the despotism of the needle. But no; while the\nsewing-machine has been a great blessing to well-to-do families in\nmany cases, it has added to the stab of the needle the crush of the\nwheel; and multitudes of women, notwithstanding the re-enforcement of\nthe sewing-machines, can only make, work hard as they will, between\ntwo dollars and three dollars per week.\n\nThe greatest blessing that could have happened to our first parents\nwas being turned out of Eden after they had done wrong. Adam and Eve,\nin their perfect state, might have got along without work, or only\nsuch slight employment as a perfect garden with no weeds in it\ndemanded. But as soon as they had sinned, the best thing for them was\nto be turned out where they would have to work. We know what a\nwithering thing it is for a man to have nothing to do. Old Ashbel\nGreen, at fourscore years, when asked why he kept on working, said: \"I\ndo so to keep out of mischief.\" We see that a man who has a large\namount of money to start with has no chance. Of the thousand\nprosperous and honorable men that you know, nine hundred and\nninety-nine had to work vigorously at the beginning. But I am now to\ntell you that industry is just as important for a woman's safety and\nhappiness. The most unhappy women in our communities to-day are those\nwho have no engagements to call them up in the morning; who, once\nhaving risen and breakfasted, lounge through the dull forenoon in\nslippers down at the heel and with disheveled hair, reading Ouida's\nlast novel, and who, having dragged through a wretched forenoon and\ntaken their afternoon sleep, and having passed an hour and a half at\ntheir toilet, pick up their card-case and go out to make calls, and\nwho pass their evenings waiting for somebody to come in and break up\nthe monotony. Arabella Stuart never was imprisoned in so dark a\ndungeon as that.\n\nThere is no happiness in an idle woman. It may be with hand, it may be\nwith brain, it may be with foot; but work she must, or be wretched\nforever. The little girls of our families must be started with that\nidea.\n\nThe curse of American society is that our young women are taught that\nthe first, second, third, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh, tenth,\nfiftieth, thousandth thing in their life is to get somebody to take\ncare of them. Instead of that, the first lesson should be how under\nGod they may take care of themselves. The simple fact is that a\nmajority of them do have to take care of themselves, and that, too,\nafter having, through the false notions of their parents, wasted the\nyears in which they ought to have learned how successfully to maintain\nthemselves. We now and here declare the inhumanity, cruelty, and\noutrage of that father and mother who pass their daughters into\nwomanhood, having given them no facility for earning their livelihood.\nMadame de Sta\u00ebl said: \"It is not these writings that I am proud of,\nbut the fact that I have facility in ten occupations, in any one of\nwhich I could make a livelihood.\" You say you have a fortune to leave\nthem. Oh, man and woman, have you not learned that like vultures, like\nhawks, like eagles, riches have wings and fly away? Though you should\nbe successful in leaving a competency behind you, the trickery of\nexecutors may swamp it in a night? or some officials in our churches\nmay get up a mining company and induce your orphans to put their money\ninto a hole in Colorado, and if by the most skillful machinery the\nsunken money can not be brought up again, prove to them, that it was\neternally decreed that that was the way they were to lose it, and that\nit went in the most orthodox and heavenly style. Oh, the damnable\nschemes that professed Christians will engage in until God puts His\nfingers into the collar of the hypocrite's robe and strips it clear\ndown to the bottom! You have no right, because you are well off, to\nconclude that your children are going to be as well off. A man died\nleaving a large fortune. His son fell dead in a Philadelphia\ngrog-shop. His old comrades came in and said as they bent over his\ncorpse: \"What is the matter with you, Boggsey?\" The surgeon standing\nover him said: \"Hush ye! He is dead!\" \"Oh, he is dead,\" they said.\n\"Come, boys; let us go and take a drink in memory of poor Boggsey!\"\nHave you nothing better than money to leave your children? If you have\nnot, but send your daughters into the world with empty brain and\nunskilled hand, you are guilty of assassination, homicide, regicide,\ninfanticide.\n\nThere are women toiling in our cities for two and three dollars per\nweek who were the daughters of merchant princes. These suffering ones\nnow would be glad to have the crumbs that once fell from their\nfathers' table. That worn-out, broken shoe that she wears is the\nlineal descendant of the twelve-dollar gaiters in which her mother\nwalked; and that torn and faded calico had ancestry of magnificent\nbrocade that swept Broadway clean without any expense to the street\ncommissioners. Though you live in an elegant residence and fare\nsumptuously every day, let your daughters feel it is a disgrace to\nthem not to know how to work. I denounce the idea prevalent in society\nthat, though our young women may embroider slippers and crochet and\nmake mats for lamps to stand on without disgrace, the idea of doing\nanything for a livelihood is dishonorable. It is a shame for a young\nwoman belonging to a large family to be inefficient when the father\ntoils his life away for her support. It is a shame for a daughter to\nbe idle while her mother toils at the wash-tub. It is as honorable to\nsweep the house, make beds or trim hats as it is to twist a\nwatch-chain.\n\nAs far as I can understand, the line of respectability lies between\nthat which is useful and that which is useless. If women do that which\nis of no value, their work is honorable. If they do practical work, it\nis dishonorable. That our young women may escape the censure of doing\ndishonorable work, I shall particularize. You may knit a tidy for the\nback of an arm-chair, but by no means make the money wherewith to buy\nthe chair. You may with a delicate brush beautify a mantel ornament,\nbut die rather than earn enough to buy a marble mantel. You may learn\nartistic music until you can squall Italian, but never sing\n\"Ortonville\" or \"Old Hundred.\" Do nothing practical if you would in\nthe eyes of refined society preserve your respectability. I scout\nthese fine notions. I tell you a woman, no more than a man, has a\nright to occupy a place in this world unless she pays a rent for it.\n\nIn the course of a life-time you consume whole harvests and droves of\ncattle, and every day you live, breathe forty hogsheads of good, pure\nair. You must by some kind of usefulness pay for all this. Our race\nwas the last thing created--the birds and fishes on the fourth day,\nthe cattle and lizards on the fifth day, and man on the sixth day. If\ngeologists are right, the earth was a million of years in the\npossession of the insects, beasts, and birds before our race came upon\nit. In one sense we were innovators. The cattle, the lizards, and the\nhawks had pre-emption right. The question is not what we are to do\nwith the lizards and summer insects, but what the lizards and summer\ninsects are to do with us. If we want a place in this world, we must\nearn it. The partridge makes its own nest before it occupies it. The\nlark by its morning song earns its breakfast before it eats it, and\nthe Bible gives an intimation that the first duty of an idler is to\nstarve when it says: \"If he will not work, neither shall he eat.\"\nIdleness ruins the health; and very soon nature says: \"This man has\nrefused to pay his rent, out with him!\" Society is to be reconstructed\non the subject of woman's toil. A vast majority of those who would\nhave woman industrious shut her up to a few kinds of work. My judgment\nin this matter is that a woman has a right to do anything that she can\ndo well. There should be no department of merchandise, mechanism, art,\nor science barred against her. If Miss Hosmer has genius for\nsculpture, give her a chisel. If Rosa Bonheur has a fondness for\ndelineating animals, let her make \"The Horse Fair.\" If Miss Mitchell\nwill study astronomy, let her mount the starry ladder. If Lydia will\nbe a merchant, let her sell purple. If Lucretia Mott will preach the\nGospel, let her thrill with her womanly eloquence the Quaker\nmeeting-house.\n\nIt is said, If woman is given such opportunities she will occupy\nplaces that might be taken by men. I say, If she have more skill and\nadaptedness for any position than a man has, let her have it! She has\nas much right to her bread, to her apparel, and to her home, as men\nhave. But it is said that her nature is so delicate that she is\nunfitted for exhausting toil. I ask in the name of all past history\nwhat toil on earth is more severe, exhausting, and tremendous than\nthat toil of the needle to which for ages she has been subjected? The\nbattering-ram, the sword, the carbine, the battle-ax, have made no\nsuch havoc as the needle. I would that these living sepulchers in\nwhich women have for ages been buried might be opened, and that some\nresurrection trumpet might bring up these living corpses to the fresh\nair and sunlight.\n\nGo with me and I will show you a woman who by hardest toil supports\nher children, her drunken husband, her old father and mother, pays her\nhouse rent, always has wholesome food on her table, and when she can\nget some neighbor on the Sabbath to come in and take care of her\nfamily, appears in church with hat and cloak that are far from\nindicating the toil to which she is subjected. Such a woman as that\nhas body and soul enough to fit her for any position. She could stand\nbeside the majority of your salesmen and dispose of more goods. She\ncould go into your wheelwright shops and beat one half of your workmen\nat making carriages. We talk about woman as though we had resigned to\nher all the light work, and ourselves had shouldered the heavier. But\nthe day of judgment, which will reveal the sufferings of the stake and\nInquisition, will marshal before the throne of God and the hierarchs\nof heaven the martyrs of wash-tub and needle. Now, I say if there be\nany preference in occupation, let women have it. God knows her trials\nare the severest. By her acuter sensitiveness to misfortune, by her\nhour of anguish, I demand that no one hedge up her pathway to a\nlivelihood. Oh! the meanness, the despicability of men who begrudge a\nwoman the right to work anywhere in any honorable calling!\n\nI go still further and say that woman should have equal compensation\nwith men. By what principle of justice is it that women in many of our\ncities get only two thirds as much pay as men, and in many cases only\nhalf? Here is the gigantic injustice--that for work equally well, if\nnot better, done, woman receives far less compensation than man. Start\nwith the National Government. Women clerks in Washington get nine\nhundred dollars for doing that for which men receive eighteen hundred\ndollars. The wheel of oppression is rolling over the necks of\nthousands of women who are at this moment in despair about what they\nare to do. Many of the largest mercantile establishments of our cities\nare accessory to these abominations, and from their large\nestablishments there are scores of souls being pitched off into death,\nand their employers know it. Is there a God? Will there be a judgment?\nI tell you, if God rises up to redress woman's wrongs, many of our\nlarge establishments will be swallowed up quicker than a South\nAmerican earthquake ever took down a city. God will catch these\noppressors between the two millstones of his wrath and grind them to\npowder.\n\nWhy is it that a female principal in a school gets only eight hundred\nand twenty-five dollars for doing work for which a male principal gets\nsixteen hundred and fifty dollars? I hear from all this land the wail\nof womanhood. Man has nothing to answer to that wail but flatteries.\nHe says she is an angel. She is not. She knows she is not. She is a\nhuman being who gets hungry when she has no food, and cold when she\nhas no fire. Give her no more flatteries; give her justice! There are\nsixty-five thousand sewing-girls in New York and Brooklyn. Across the\nsunlight comes their death groan. It is not such a cry as comes from\nthose who are suddenly hurled out of life, but a slow, grinding,\nhorrible wasting-away. Gather them before you and look into their\nfaces, pinched, ghastly, hunger-struck! Look at their fingers,\nneedle-pricked and blood-tipped! See that premature stoop in the\nshoulders! Hear that dry, hacking, merciless cough! At a large meeting\nof these women held in a hall in Philadelphia, grand speeches were\ndelivered, but a needle-woman took the stand, threw aside her faded\nshawl, and with her shriveled arm hurled a very thunder-bolt of\neloquence, speaking out the horrors of her own experience.\n\nStand at the corner of a street in New York at six or seven o'clock in\nthe morning as the women go to work. Many of them had no breakfast\nexcept the crumbs that were left over from the night before, or the\ncrumbs they chew on their way through the street. Here they come! The\nworking-girls of New York and Brooklyn. These engaged in head work,\nthese in flower-making, in millinery, in paper-box making; but, most\noverworked of all and least compensated, the sewing-women. Why do they\nnot take the city cars on their way up? They can not afford the five\ncents. If, concluding to deny herself something else, she gets into\nthe car, give her a seat. You want to see how Latimer and Ridley\nappeared in the fire. Look at that woman and behold a more horrible\nmartyrdom, a hotter fire, a more agonizing death. Ask that woman how\nmuch she gets for her work, and she will tell you six cents for making\ncoarse shirts and find her own thread.\n\nYears ago, one Sabbath night in the vestibule of this church, after\nservice, a woman fell in convulsions. The doctor said she needed\nmedicine not so much as something to eat. As she began to revive, in\nher delirium she said, gaspingly: \"Eight cents! Eight cents! Eight\ncents! I wish I could get it done, I am so tired. I wish I could get\nsome sleep, but I must get it done. Eight cents! Eight cents! Eight\ncents!\" We found afterward that she was making garments for eight\ncents apiece, and that she could make but three of them in a day. Hear\nit! Three times eight are twenty-four. Hear it, men and women who have\ncomfortable homes! Some of the worst villains of our cities are the\nemployers of these women. They beat them down to the last penny and\ntry to cheat them out of that. The woman must deposit a dollar or two\nbefore she gets the garments to work on. When the work is done it is\nsharply inspected, the most insignificant flaws picked out, and the\nwages refused and sometimes the dollar deposited not given back. The\nWomen's Protective Union reports a case where one of the poor souls,\nfinding a place where she could get more wages, resolved to change\nemployers, and went to get her pay for work done. The employer says:\n\"I hear you are going to leave me?\" \"Yes,\" she said, \"and I have come\nto get what you owe me.\" He made no answer. She said: \"Are you not\ngoing to pay me?\" \"Yes,\" he said, \"I will pay you,\" and he kicked her\ndown-stairs.\n\nOh, that Women's Protective Union, 19 Clinton Place, New York! The\nblessings of Heaven be on it for the merciful and divine work it is\ndoing in the defense of toiling womanhood! What tragedies of suffering\nare presented to them day by day! A paragraph from their report: \"'Can\nyou make Mr. Jones pay me? He owes me for three weeks at $2.50 a week,\nand I can't get anything, and my child is very sick!' The speaker, a\nyoung woman lately widowed, burst into a flood of tears as she spoke.\nShe was bidden to come again the next afternoon and repeat her story\nto the attorney at his usual weekly hearing of frauds and impositions.\nMeans were found by which Mr. Jones was induced to pay the $7.50.\"\n\nAnother paragraph from their report: \"A fortnight had passed, when she\nmodestly hinted a desire to know how much her services were worth.\n'Oh, my dear,' he replied, 'you are getting to be one of the most\nvaluable hands in the trade; you will always get the very best price.\nTen dollars a week you will be able to earn very easily.' And the\ngirl's fingers flew on with her work at a marvelous rate. The picture\nof $10 a week had almost turned her head. A few nights later, while\ncrossing the ferry, she overheard the name of her employer in the\nconversation of girls who stood near: 'What, John Snipes? Why, he\ndon't pay! Look out for him every time. He'll keep you on trial, as he\ncalls it, for weeks, and then he'll let you go, and get some other\nfool!' And thus Jane Smith gained her warning against the swindler.\nBut the Union held him in the toils of the law until he paid the worth\nof each of those days of 'trial.'\"\n\nAnother paragraph: \"Her mortification may be imagined when told that\none of the two five-dollar bills which she had just received for her\nwork was counterfeit. But her mortification was swallowed up in\nindignation when her employer denied having paid her the money, and\ninsultingly asked her to prove it. When the Protective Union had\nplaced this matter in the courts, the judge said: 'You will pay\nEleanor the amount of her claim, $5.83, and also the costs of the\ncourt.'\"\n\nHow are these evils to be eradicated? Some say: \"Give woman the\nballot.\" What effect such ballot might have on other questions I am\nnot here to discuss; but what would be the effect of female suffrage\non women's wages? I do not believe that woman will ever get justice by\nwoman's ballot. Indeed, women oppress women as much as men do. Do not\nwomen, as much as men, beat down to the lowest figure the woman who\nsews for them? Are not women as sharp as men on washer-women and\nmilliners and mantua-makers? If a woman asks a dollar for her work,\ndoes not her female employer ask her if she will not take ninety\ncents? You say, \"Only ten cents difference.\" But that is sometimes the\ndifference between heaven and hell. Women often have less\ncommiseration for women than men. If a woman steps aside from the path\nof rectitude, man may forgive--woman never! Woman will never get\njustice done her from woman's ballot. Neither will she get it from\nman's ballot. How then? God will rise up for her. God has more\nresources than we know of. The flaming sword that hung at Eden's gate\nwhen woman was driven out will cleave with its terrible edge her\noppressors.\n\nBut there is something for women to do. Let young people prepare to\nexcel in spheres of work, and they will be able after awhile to get\nlarger wages. Unskilled and incompetent labor must take what is given:\nskilled and competent labor will eventually make its own standard.\nAdmitting that the law of supply and demand regulates these things, I\ncontend that the demand for skilled labor is very great and the supply\nvery small. Start with the idea that work is honorable, and that you\ncan do some one thing better than anybody else. Resolve that, God\nhelping, you will take care of yourself. If you are after awhile\ncalled into another relation you will all the better be qualified for\nit by your spirit of self-reliance, or if you are called to stay as\nyou are, you can be happy and self-supporting.\n\nPoets are fond of talking about man as an oak and woman the vine that\nclimbs it; but I have seen many a tree fall that not only went down\nitself, but took all the vines with it. I can tell you of something\nstronger than an oak for an ivy to climb on, and that is the throne of\nthe great Jehovah. Single or affianced, that woman is strong who leans\non God and does her best. Many of you will go single-handed through\nlife, and you will have to choose between two characters. Young woman,\nI am sure you will turn your back upon the useless, giggling,\nirresponsible nonentity which society ignominiously acknowledges to be\na woman, and ask God to make you an humble, active, earnest Christian.\nWhat will become of that womanly disciple of the world? She is more\nthoughtful of the attitude she strikes upon the carpet than how she\nwill look in the judgment; more worried about her freckles than her\nsins; more interested in her apparel than in her redemption. The\ndying actress whose life had been vicious said: \"The scene\ncloses--draw the curtain.\" Generally the tragedy comes first and the\nfarce afterward; but in her life it was first the farce of a useless\nlife and then the tragedy of a wretched eternity.\n\nCompare the life and death of such a one with that of some Christian\naunt that was once a blessing to your household. I do not know that\nshe was ever asked to give her hand in marriage. She lived single,\nthat, untrammeled, she might be everybody's blessing. Whenever the\nsick were to be visited or the poor to be provided with bread she went\nwith a blessing. She could pray or sing \"Rock of Ages\" for any sick\npauper who asked her. As she got older there were many days when she\nwas a little sharp, but for the most part auntie was a sunbeam--just\nthe one for Christmas Eve. She knew better than any one else how to\nfix things. Her every prayer, as God heard it, was full of everybody\nwho had trouble. The brightest things in all the house dropped from\nher fingers. She had peculiar notions, but the grandest notion she\never had was to make you happy. She dressed well--auntie always\ndressed well; but her highest adornment was that of a meek and quiet\nspirit, which, in the sight of God, is of great price. When she died\nyou all gathered lovingly about her; and as you carried her out to\nrest, the Sunday-school class almost covered the coffin with\njaponicas; and the poor people stood at the end of the alley, with\ntheir aprons to their eyes, sobbing bitterly, and the man of the world\nsaid, with Solomon: \"Her price was above rubies;\" and Jesus, as unto\nthe maiden in Judea, commanded, \"I say unto thee, Arise!\"\n\n\n\n\nTOBACCO AND OPIUM.\n\n    \"Let the earth bring forth grass, the herb yielding\n    seed.\"--GEN. i: 11.\n\n\nThe two first born of our earth were the grass-blade and the herb.\nThey preceded the brute creation and the human family--the grass for\nthe animal creation, the herb for human service. The cattle came and\ntook possession of their inheritance, the grass-blade; man came and\ntook possession of his inheritance, the herb. We have the herb for\nfood as in case of hunger, for narcotic as in case of insomnia, for\nanodyne as in case of paroxysm, for stimulant as when the pulses flag\nunder the weight of disease. The caterer comes and takes the herb and\npresents it in all styles of delicacy. The physician comes and takes\nthe herb and compounds it for physical recuperation. Millions of\npeople come and take the herb for ruinous physical and intellectual\ndelectation. The herb, which was divinely created, and for good\npurposes, has often been degraded for bad results. There is a useful\nand a baneful employment of the herbaceous kingdom.\n\nThere sprung up in Yucatan of this continent an herb that has\nbewitched the world. In the fifteenth century it crossed the Atlantic\nOcean and captured Spain. Afterward it captured Portugal. Then the\nFrench embassadors took it to Paris, and it captured the French\nEmpire. Then Walter Raleigh took it to London, and it captured Great\nBritain. Nicotiana, ascribed to that genus by the botanists, but we\nall know it is the exhilarating, elevating, emparadising,\nnerve-shattering, dyspepsia-breeding, health-destroying tobacco. I\nshall not in my remarks be offensively personal, because you all use\nit, or nearly all! I know by experience how it soothes and roseates\nthe world, and kindles sociality, and I also know some of its baleful\nresults. I was its slave, and by the grace of God I have become its\nconqueror. Tens of thousands of people have been asking the question\nduring the past two months, asking it with great pathos and great\nearnestness: \"Does the use of tobacco produce cancerous and other\ntroubles?\" I shall not answer the question in regard to any particular\ncase, but shall deal with the subject in a more general way.\n\nYou say to me, \"Did God not create tobacco?\" Yes. You say to me, \"Is\nnot God good?\" Yes. Well, then, you say, \"If God is good and he\ncreated tobacco, He must have created it for some good purpose.\" Yes,\nyour logic is complete. But God created the common sense at the same\ntime, by which we are to know how to use a poison and how not to use\nit. God created that just as He created henbane and nux vomica and\ncopperas and belladonna and all other poisons, whether directly\ncreated by Himself or extracted by man.\n\nThat it is a poison no man of common sense will deny. A case was\nreported where a little child lay upon its mother's lap and one drop\nfell from a pipe to the child's lip, and it went into convulsions and\ninto death. But you say, \"Haven't people lived on in complete use of\nit to old age?\" Oh, yes; just as I have seen inebriates seventy years\nold. In Boston, years ago, there was a meeting in which there were\nseveral centenarians, and they were giving their experience, and one\ncentenarian said that he had lived over a hundred years, and that he\nascribed it to the fact that he had refrained from the use of\nintoxicating liquors. Right after him another centenarian said he had\nlived over a hundred years, and he ascribed it to the fact that for\nthe last fifty years he had hardly seen a sober moment. It is an\namazing thing how many outrages men may commit upon their physical\nsystem and yet live on. In the case of the man of the jug he lived on\nbecause his body was pickled. In the case of the man of the pipe, he\nlived on because his body turned into smoked liver!\n\nBut are there no truths to be uttered in regard to this great evil?\nWhat is the advice to be given to the multitude of young people who\nhear me this day? What is the advice you are going to give to your\nchildren?\n\nFirst of all, we must advise them to abstain from the use of tobacco\nbecause all the medical fraternity of the United States and Great\nBritain agree in ascribing to this habit terrific unhealth. The men\nwhose life-time work is the study of the science of health say so, and\nshall I set up my opinion against theirs? Dr. Agnew, Dr. Olcott, Dr.\nBarnes, Dr. Rush, Dr. Mott, Dr. Harvey, Dr. Hosack--all the doctors,\nallopathic, homeopathic, hydropathic, eclectic, denounce the habit as\na matter of unhealth. A distinguished physician declared he considered\nthe use of tobacco caused seventy different styles of disease, and he\nsays: \"Of all the cases of cancer in the mouth that have come under my\nobservation, almost in every case it has been ascribed to tobacco.\"\n\nThe united testimony of all physicians is that it depresses the\nnervous system, that it takes away twenty-five per cent. of the\nphysical vigor of this generation, and that it goes on as the years\nmultiply and, damaging this generation with accumulated curse, it\nstrikes other centuries. And if it is so deleterious to the body, how\nmuch more destructive to the mind. An eminent physician, who was the\nsuperintendent of the insane asylum at Northampton, Massachusetts,\nsays: \"Fully one half the patients we get in our asylum have lost\ntheir intellect through the use of tobacco.\" If it is such a bad thing\nto injure the body, what a bad thing, what a worse thing it is to\ninjure the mind, and any man of common sense knows that tobacco\nattacks the nervous system, and everybody knows that the nervous\nsystem attacks the mind.\n\nBesides that, all reformers will tell you that the use of tobacco\ncreates an unnatural thirst, and it is the cause of drunkenness in\nAmerica to-day more than anything else. In all cases where you find\nmen taking strong drink you find they use tobacco. There are men who\nuse tobacco who do not take strong drink, but all who use strong drink\nuse tobacco, and that shows beyond controversy there is an affinity\nbetween the two products. There are reformers here to-day who will\ntestify to you it is impossible for a man to reform from taking strong\ndrink until he quits tobacco. In many of the cases where men have been\nreformed from strong drink and have gone back to their cups, they\nhave testified that they first touched tobacco and then they\nsurrendered to intoxicants.\n\nI say in the presence of this assemblage to-day, in which there are\nmany physicians--and they know that what I say is true on the\nsubject--that the pathway to the drunkard's grave and the drunkard's\nhell is strewn thick with tobacco-leaves. What has been the testimony\non this subject? Is this a mere statement of a preacher whose business\nit is to talk morals, or is the testimony of the world just as\nemphatic? What did Benjamin Franklin say? \"I never saw a well man in\nthe exercise of common sense who would say that tobacco did him any\ngood.\" What did Thomas Jefferson say? Certainly he is good authority.\nHe says in regard to the culture of tobacco, \"It is a culture\nproductive of infinite wretchdness.\" What did Horace Greeley say of\nit? \"It is a profane stench.\" What did Daniel Webster say of it? \"If\nthose men must smoke, let them take the horse-shed!\" One reason why\nthe habit goes on from destruction to destruction is that so many\nministers of the gospel take it. They smoke themselves into\nbronchitis, and then the dear people have to send them to Europe to\nget them restored from exhausting religious services! They smoke until\nthe nervous system is shattered. They smoke themselves to death. I\ncould mention the names of five distinguished clergymen who died of\ncancer of the mouth, and the doctor said, in every case, it was the\nresult of tobacco. The tombstone of many a minister of religion has\nbeen covered all over with handsome eulogy, when, if the true epitaph\nhad been written, it would have said: \"Here lies a man killed by too\nmuch cavendish!\" They smoke until the world is blue, and their\ntheology is blue, and everything is blue. How can a man stand in the\npulpit and preach on the subject of temperance when he is indulging\nsuch a habit as that? I have seen a cuspadore in a pulpit into which\nthe holy man dropped his cud before he got up to read about \"blessed\nare the pure in heart,\" and to read about the rolling of sin as a\nsweet morsel under the tongue, and to read about the unclean animals\nin Leviticus that chewed the cud.\n\nAbout sixty-five years ago a student at Andover Theological Seminary\ngraduated into the ministry. He had an eloquence and a magnetism which\nsent him to the front. Nothing could stand before him. But in a few\nmonths he was put in an insane asylum, and the physician said tobacco\nwas the cause of the disaster. It was the custom in those days to give\na portion of tobacco to every patient in the asylum. Nearly twenty\nyears passed along, and that man was walking the floor of his cell in\nthe asylum, when his reason returned, and he saw the situation, and he\ntook the tobacco from his mouth and threw it against the iron gate of\nthe place in which he was confined, and he said: \"What brought me\nhere? What keeps me here? Tobacco! tobacco! God forgive me, God help\nme, and I will never use it again.\" He was fully restored to reason,\ncame forth, preached the Gospel of Christ for some ten years, and then\nwent into everlasting blessedness.\n\nThere are ministers of religion now in this country who are dying by\ninches, and they do not know what is the matter with them. They are\nbeing killed by tobacco. They are despoiling their influence through\ntobacco. They are malodorous with tobacco. I could give one paragraph\nof history, and that would be my own experience. It took ten cigars to\nmake one sermon, and I got very nervous, and I awakened one day to see\nwhat an outrage I was committing upon my health by the use of tobacco.\nI was about to change settlement, and a generous tobacconist of\nPhiladelphia told me if I would come to Philadelphia and be his pastor\nhe would give me all the cigars I wanted for nothing all the rest of\nmy life. I halted. I said to myself, \"If I smoke more than I ought to\nnow in these war times, and when my salary is small, what would I do\nif I had gratuitous and unlimited supply?\" Then and there, twenty-four\nyears ago, I quit once and forever. It made a new man of me. Much of\nthe time the world looked blue before that, because I was looking\nthrough tobacco smoke. Ever since the world has been full of sunshine,\nand though I have done as much work as any one of my age, God has\nblessed me, it seems to me, with the best health that a man ever had.\n\nI say that no minister of religion can afford to smoke. Put in my hand\nall the money expended by Christian men in Brooklyn for tobacco, and I\nwill support three orphan asylums as well and as grandly as the three\ngreat orphan asylums already established. Put into my hand the money\nspent by the Christians of America for tobacco, and I will clothe,\nshelter, and feed all the suffering poor of the continent. The\nAmerican Church gives a million dollars a year for the salvation of\nthe heathen, and American Christians smoke five million dollars' worth\nof tobacco.\n\nI stand here to-day in the presence of a vast multitude of young\npeople who are forming their habits. Between seventeen and twenty-five\nyears of age a great many young men get on them habits in the use of\ntobacco that they never get over. Let me say to all my young friends,\nyou can not afford to smoke, you can not afford to chew. You either\ntake very good tobacco, or you take very cheap tobacco. If it is\ncheap, I will tell you why it is cheap. It is made of burdock, and\nlampblack, and sawdust, and colt's-foot, and plantain leaves, and\nfuller's earth, and salt, and alum, and lime, and a little tobacco,\nand you can not afford to put such a mess as that in your mouth. But\nif you use expensive tobacco, do you not think it would be better for\nyou to take that amount of money which you are now expending for this\nherb, and which you will expend during the course of your life if you\nkeep the habit up, and with it buy a splendid farm and make the\nafternoon and the evening of your life comfortable?\n\nThere are young men whose life is going out inch by inch from\ncigarettes. Now, do you not think it would be well for you to listen\nto the testimony of a merchant of New York, who said this: \"In early\nlife I smoked six cigars a day at six and a half cents each. They\naveraged that. I thought to myself one day, I'll just put aside all I\nconsume in cigars and all I would consume if I keep on in the habit,\nand I'll see what it will come to by compound interest.\" And he gives\nthis tremendous statistic: \"Last July completed thirty-nine years\nsince, by the grace of God, I was emancipated from the filthy habit,\nand the saving amounted to the enormous sum of $29,102.03 by compound\ninterest. We lived in the city, but the children, who had learned\nsomething of the enjoyment of country life from their annual visits to\ntheir grandparents, longed for a home among the green fields. I found\na very pleasant place in the country for sale. The cigar money came\ninto requisition, and I found it amounted to a sufficient sum to\npurchase the place, and it is mine. Now, boys, you take your choice.\nSmoking without a home, or a home without smoking.\" This is common\nsense as well as religion.\n\nI must say a word to my friends who smoke the best tobacco, and who\ncould stop at any time. What is your Christian influence in this\nrespect? What is your influence upon young men? Do you not think it\nwould be better for you to exercise a little self-denial! People\nwondered why George Briggs, Governor of Massachusetts, wore a cravat\nbut no collar. \"Oh,\" they said, \"it is an absurd eccentricity.\" This\nwas the history of the cravat without any collar: For many years\nbefore he had been talking with an inebriate, trying to persuade him\nto give up the habit of drinking and he said to the inebriate, \"Your\nhabit is entirely unnecessary.\" \"Ah!\" replied the inebriate, \"we do a\ngreat many things that are not necessary. It isn't necessary that you\nshould have that collar.\" \"Well,\" said Mr. Briggs, \"I'll never wear a\ncollar again if you will stop drinking.\" \"Agreed,\" said the other.\nThey joined hands in a pledge that they kept for twenty years--kept\nuntil death. That is magnificent. That is Gospel, practical Gospel,\nworthy of George Briggs, worthy of you. Self-denial for others.\nSubtraction from our advantage that there may be an addition to\nsomebody else's advantage.\n\nBut what I have said has been chiefly appropriate for men. Now my\nsubject widens and shall be appropriate for both sexes. In all ages of\nthe world there has been a search for some herb or flower that would\nstimulate lethargy and compose grief. Among the ancient Greeks and\nEgyptians they found something they called nepenthe, and the Theban\nwomen knew how to compound it. If a person should chew a few of those\nleaves his grief would be immediately whelmed with hilarity. Nepenthe\npassed out from the consideration of the world and then came hasheesh,\nwhich is from the Indian hemp. It is manufactured from the flowers at\nthe top. The workman with leathern apparel walks through the field and\nthe exudation of the plants adheres to the leathern garments, and then\nthe man comes out and scrapes off this exudation, and it is mixed with\naromatics and becomes an intoxicant that has brutalized whole nations.\nIts first effect is sight, spectacle glorious and grand beyond all\ndescription, but afterward it pulls down body, mind, and soul into\nanguish.\n\nI knew one of the most brilliant men of our time. His appearance in a\nnewspaper column, or a book, or a magazine was an enchantment. In the\ncourse of a half hour he could produce more wit and more valuable\ninformation than any man I ever heard talk. But he chewed hasheesh. He\nfirst took it out of curiosity to see whether the power said to be\nattached really existed. He took it. He got under the power of it. He\ntried to break loose. He put his hand in the cockatrice's den to see\nwhether it would bite, and he found out to his own undoing. His\nfriends gathered around and tried to save him, but he could not be\nsaved. The father, a minister of the Gospel, prayed with him and\ncounseled him, and out of a comparatively small salary employed the\nfirst medical advice of New York, Philadelphia, Edinburgh, Paris,\nLondon, and Berlin, for he was his only son. No help came. First his\nbody gave way in pangs and convulsions of suffering. Then his mind\ngave way and he became a raving maniac. Then his soul went out\nblaspheming God into a starless eternity. He died at thirty years of\nage. Behold the work of accursed hasheesh.\n\nBut I must put my emphasis upon the use of opium. It is made from the\nwhite poppy. It is not a new discovery. Three hundred years before\nChrist we read of it; but it was not until the seventh century that it\ntook up its march of death, and, passing out of the curative and the\nmedicinal, through smoking and mastication it has become the curse of\nnations. In 1861 there were imported into this country one hundred and\nseven thousand pounds of opium. In 1880, nineteen years after, there\nwere imported five hundred and thirty thousand pounds of opium. In\n1876 there were in this country two hundred and twenty-five thousand\nopium-consumers. Now, it is estimated there are in the United States\nto-day six hundred thousand victims of opium. It is appalling.\n\nWe do not know why some families do not get on. There is something\nmysterious about them. The opium habit is so stealthy, it is so\ndeceitful, and it is so deathful, you can cure a hundred men of\nstrong drink where you can cure one opium-eater.\n\nI have knelt down in this very church by those who were elegant in\napparel, and elegant in appearance, and from the depths of their souls\nand from the depths of my soul, we cried out for God's rescue. Somehow\nit did not come. In many a household only the physician and pastor\nknow it--the physician called in for physical relief, the pastor\ncalled in for spiritual relief, and they both fail. The physician\nconfesses his defeat, the minister of religion confesses his defeat,\nfor somehow God does not seem to hear a prayer offered for an\nopium-eater. His grace is infinite, and I have been told there are\ncases of reformation. I never saw one. I say this not to wound the\nfeelings of any who may feel this awful grip, but to utter a potent\nwarning that you stand back from that gate of hell. Oh, man, oh,\nwoman, tampering with this great evil, have you fallen back on this as\na permanent resource because of some physical distress or mental\nanguish? Better stop. The ecstasies do not pay for the horrors. The\nParadise is followed too soon by the Pandemonium. Morphia, a blessing\nof God for the relief of sudden pang and of acute dementia,\nmisappropriated and never intended for permanent use.\n\nIt is not merely the barbaric fanatics that are taken down by it. Did\nyou ever read De Quincey's \"Confessions of an Opium-Eater?\" He says\nthat during the first ten years the habit handed to him all the keys\nof Paradise, but it would take something as mighty as De Quincey's pen\nto describe the consequent horrors. There is nothing that I have ever\nread about the tortures of the damned that seemed more horrible than\nthose which De Quincey says he suffered. Samuel Taylor Coleridge first\nconquered the world with his exquisite pen, and then was conquered by\nopium. The most brilliant, the most eloquent lawyer of the nineteenth\ncentury went down under its power, and there is a vast multitude of\nmen and women--but more women than men--who are going into the dungeon\nof that awful incarceration.\n\nThe worst thing about it is, it takes advantage of one's weakness. De\nQuincey says: \"I got to be an opium-eater on account of my\nrheumatism.\" Coleridge says: \"I got to be an opium-eater on account of\nmy sleeplessness.\" For what are you taking it? For God's sake do not\ntake it long. The wealthiest, the grandest families going down under\nits power. Twenty-five thousand victims of opium in Chicago.\nTwenty-five thousand victims of opium in St. Louis, and, according to\nthat average, seventy-five thousand victims of opium in New York and\nBrooklyn.\n\nThe clerk of a drug store says: \"I can tell them when they come in;\nthere is something about their complexion, something about their\nmanner, something about the look of their eyes that shows they are\nvictims.\" Some in the struggle to get away from it try chloral. Whole\ntons of chloral manufactured in Germany every year. Baron Liebig says\nhe knows one chemist in Germany who manufactures a half ton of chloral\nevery week. Beware of hydrate of chloral. It is coming on with mighty\ntread to curse these cities. But I am chiefly under this head speaking\nof the morphine. The devil of morphia is going to be in this country,\nin my opinion, mightier than the devil of alcohol. By the power of the\nChristian pulpit, by the power of the Christianized printing-press, by\nthe power of the Lord God Almighty, all these evils are going to be\nextirpated--all, all, and you have a work in regard to that, and I\nhave a work. But what we do we had better do right away. The clock\nticks now, and we hear it; after awhile the clock will tick and we\nwill not hear it.\n\nI sat at a country fireside, and I saw the fire kindle and blaze, and\ngo out. I sat long enough at that fireside to get a good many\npractical reflections, and I said: \"That is like human life, that fire\non the hearth.\" We put on the fagots and they blaze up, and out, and\non, and the whole room is filled with the light, gay of sparkle, gay\nof flash, gay of crackle. Emblem of boyhood. Now the fire intensifies.\nNow the flame reddens into coals. Now the heat is becoming more and\nmore intense, and the more it is stirred the redder is the coal. Now\nwith one sweep of flame it cleaves the way, and all the hearth glows\nwith the intensity. Emblem of full manhood. Now the coals begin to\nwhiten. Now the heat lessens. Now the flickering shadows die along the\nwall. Now the fagots fall apart. Now the household hover over the\nexpiring embers. Now the last breath of smoke is lost in the chimney.\nThe fire is out. Shovel up the white remains. Ashes! Ashes!\n\n\n\n\nWHY ARE SATAN AND SIN PERMITTED?\n\n    \"Wherefore do the wicked live?\"--JOB xxi: 7,\n\n\nPoor Job! With tusks and horns and hoofs and stings, all the\nmisfortunes of life seemed to come upon him at once. Bankruptcy,\nbereavement, scandalization, and eruptive disease so irritating that\nhe had to re-enforce his ten finger-nails with pieces of earthenware\nto scratch himself withal. His wife took the diagnosis of his\ncomplaints and prescribed profanity. She thought he would feel better\nif between the paroxysms of grief and pain he would swear a little.\nFor each boil a plaster of objurgation.\n\nProbably no man was ever more tempted to take the bad advice than\nwhen, at last, Job's three exasperating friends came in, Eliphaz,\nZophar, and Bildad, practically saying to him, \"You old sinner, serves\nyou right; you are a hypocrite; what a sight you are! God has sent\nthese chastisements for your wickedness.\"\n\nThe disfigured invalid, putting down the pieces of broken saucer with\nwhich he had been rubbing his arms, with swollen eyelids looks up and\nsays to his garrulous friends in substance, \"The most wicked people\nsometimes have the best health and are the most prospered,\" and then\nin that connection hurls the question which every man and woman has\nasked in some juncture of affairs, \"Wherefore do the wicked live?\"\n\nThey build up fortunes that overshadow the earth. They confound all\nthe life-insurance tables on the subject of longevity, dying\noctogenarians, perhaps nonagenarians, possibly centenarians. Ahab in\nthe palace, Naboth in the cabinet. Unclean Herod on the throne,\nconsecrated Paul twisting ropes for tent-making. Manasseh, the worst\nof all the kings of Juda, living longer than any of them. While the\ngeneral rule is the wicked do not live out half their days, there are\nexceptions where they live on to great age and in a Paradise of beauty\nand luxuriance, and die with a whole college of physicians expending\nits skill in trying further prolongation of life, and have a funeral\nwith casket under mountain of calla-lilies, the finest equipages of\nthe city jingling and flashing into line, the poor, angle-worm of the\ndust carried out to its hole in the ground with the pomp that might\nmake a spirit from some other world suppose that the Archangel Michael\nwas dead.\n\nGo up among the finest residences of the city, and on some of the\ndoor-plates you will find the names of those mightiest for commercial\nand social iniquity. They are the vampires of society--they are the\ngorgons of the century. Some of these men have each wheel of their\ncarriage a juggernaut wet with the blood of those sacrificed to their\navarice. Some of them are like Caligula, who wished that all the\npeople had only one neck that he might strike it off at one blow. Oh,\nthe slain, the slain! A long procession of usurers and libertines and\ninfamous quacks and legal charlatans and world-grabbing monsters. What\napostleship of despoliation! Demons incarnate. Hundreds of men\nconcentering all their energies of body, mind, and soul in one\nprolonged, ever-intensifying, and unrelenting effort to scald and\nscarify and blast and consume the world. I do not blame you for asking\nme the quivering, throbbing, burning, resounding, appalling question\nof my text, \"Wherefore do the wicked live?\"\n\nIn the first place, they live to demonstrate beyond all controversy\nthe long-suffering patience of God. You sometimes say, under some\ngreat affront, \"I will not stand it;\" but perhaps you are compelled to\nstand it. God, with all the batteries of omnipotence loaded with\nthunderbolts, stands it century after century. I have no doubt\nsometimes an angel comes to Him and suggests, \"Now is the time to\nstrike.\" \"No,\" says God; \"wait a year, wait twenty years, wait a\ncentury, wait five centuries.\" What God does is not so wonderful as\nwhat He does not do. He has the reserve corps with which He could\nstrike Mormonism and Mohammedanism and Paganism from the earth in a\nday. He could take all the fraud in New York on the west side of\nBroadway and hurl it into the Hudson, and all the fraud on the east\nside of Broadway and hurl it into the East River in an hour. He\nunderstands the combination lock of every dishonest money-safe, and\ncould blow it up quicker than by any earthly explosive. Written all\nover the earth, written all over history are the words, \"Divine\nforbearance, divine leniency, divine long-suffering.\"\n\nI wonder that God did not burn this world up two thousand years ago,\nscattering its ashes into immensity, its aerolites dropping into\nother worlds to be kept in their museums as specimens of a defunct\nplanet. People sometimes talk of God as though He were hasty in His\njudgments and as though He snapped men up quick. Oh, no! He waited one\nhundred and twenty years for the people to get into the ark, and\nwarned them all the time--one hundred and twenty years, then the flood\ncame. The Anchor Line gives only a month's announcement of the sailing\nof the \"Circassia,\" the White Star Line gives only a month's\nannouncement of the sailing of the \"Britannic,\" the Cunard Line gives\nonly a month's announcement of the sailing of the \"Oregon;\" but of the\nsailing of that ship that Noah commanded God gave one hundred and\ntwenty years' announcement and warning. Patience antediluvian,\npatience postdiluvian, patience in times Adamic, Abrahamic, Mosaic,\nDavidic, Pauline, Lutheran, Whitefieldian. Patience with men and\nnations. Patience with barbarisms and civilizations. Six thousand\nyears of patience! Overtopping attribute of God, all of whose\nattributes are immeasurable. Why do the wicked live? That their\noverthrow may be the more impressive and climacteric. They must pile\nup their mischief until all the community shall see it, until the\nnation shall see it, until all the world shall see it. The higher it\ngoes up the harder it will come down and the grander will be the\ndivine vindication.\n\nGod will not allow sin to sneak out of the world. God will not allow\nit merely to resign and quit. This shall not be a case that goes by\ndefault because no one appears against it. God will arraign it,\nhandcuff it, try it, bring against it the verdict of all the good, and\nthen gibbet it so high up that if one half of the gibbet stood on\nMount Washington and the other on the Himalaya, it would not be any\nmore conspicuous.\n\nAbout fifteen years ago we had in this country a most illustrious\ninstance of how God lets a man go on in iniquity, so that at the close\nof the career his overthrow may be the more impressive, full of\nwarning and climacteric. First, an honest chairmaker, then an\nalderman, then a member of congress, then a supervisor of a city, then\nschool commissioner, then state senator, then commissioner of public\nworks--on and up, stealing thousands of dollars here and thousands of\ndollars there, until the malfeasance in office overtopped anything the\nworld had ever seen--making the new Court House in New York a monument\nof municipal crime, and rushing the debt of the city from thirty-six\nmillion dollars to ninety-seven millions. Now, he is at the top of\nmillionairedom.\n\nCountry-seat terraced and arbored and parterred clear to the water's\nbrink. Horses enough to stock a king's equerry. Grooms and postilions\nin full rig. Wine cellars enough to make a whole legislature drunk.\nNew York finances and New York politics in his vest pocket. He winked,\nand men in high place fell. He lifted his little finger, and\nignoramuses took important office. He whispered, and in Albany and\nWashington they said it thundered. Wider and mightier and more baleful\nhis influence, until it seemed as if Pandemonium was to be adjourned\nto this world, and in the Satanic realm there was to be a change of\nadministration, and Apollyon, who had held dominion so long, should\nhave a successful competitor.\n\nTo bring all to a climax, a wedding came in the house of that man.\nDiamonds as large as hickory nuts. A pin of sixty diamonds\nrepresenting sheaves of wheat. Musicians in a semicircle, half-hidden\nby a great harp of flowers. Ships of flowers. Forty silver sets, one\nof them with two hundred and forty pieces. One wedding-dress that cost\nfive thousand dollars. A famous libertine, who owned several Long\nIsland Sound steamboats, and not long before he was shot for his\ncrimes, sent as a wedding present to that house a frosted silver\niceberg, with representations of arctic bears walking on\nicicle-handles and ascending the spoons. Was there ever such a\nconvocation of pictures, bronzes, of bric-\u00e0-brac, of grandeurs, social\ngrandeurs? The highest wave of New York splendor rolled into that\nhouse and recoiled perhaps never again to rise so high. But just at\nthat time, when all earthly and infernal observation was concentered\non that man, eternal justice, impersonated by that wonder of the\nAmerican bar, Charles O'Connor, got on the track of the offender.\nFirst arraignment, then sentence to twelve years' imprisonment under\ntwelve indictments, then penitentiary on Blackwell's Island, then a\nlawsuit against him for six million dollars, then incarceration in\nLudlow Street jail, then escape to foreign land, to be brought back\nunder the stout grip of the constabulary, then dying of broken heart\nin a prison cell. God allowed him to go on in iniquity until all the\nworld saw as never before that \"the way of the transgressor is hard,\"\nand that dishonesty will not declare permanent dividends, and that you\nhad better be an honest chairmaker with a day's wages at a time than\na brilliant commissioner of public works, all your pockets crammed\nwith plunder.\n\nWhat a brilliant figure in history is William the Conqueror, the\nintimidator of France, of Anjou, of Brittany, victor at Hastings,\nsnatching the crown of England and setting it on his own brow,\ndestroying homesteads that he might have a larger game forest, making\na Doomsday Book by which he could keep the whole land under despotic\nespionage, proclaiming war in revenge for a joke uttered in regard to\nhis obesity. Harvest fields and vineyards going down under the cavalry\nhoof. Nations horror-struck. But one day while at the apex of all\nobservation he is riding out and the horse put his hoof on a hot\ncinder, throwing the king so violently against the pommel of the\nsaddle that he dies, his son hastening to England to get the crown\nbefore the breath has left his father's body.\n\nThe imperial corpse drawn by a cart, most of the attendants leaving it\nin the street because of a fire alarm that they might go off and see\nthe conflagration. And just as they are going to put his body down in\nthe church which he had built, a man stepping up and saying, \"Bishop,\nthe man you praise is a robber. This church stands on my father's\nhomestead. The property on which this church is built is mine. I\nreclaim my right. In the name of Almighty God I forbid you to bury the\nking here, or to cover him with my glebe.\" \"Go up,\" said the ambition\nof William the Conqueror. \"Go up by conquest, go up by throne, go up\nin the sight of all nations, go up by cruelties.\" But one day God\nsaid, \"Come down, come down by the way of a miserable death, come down\nby the way of an ignominious obsequies, come down in the sight of all\nnations, come clear down, come down forever.\" And you and I see the\nsame thing on a smaller scale many and many a time--illustrations of\nthe fact that God lets the wicked live that He may make their\noverthrow the more climacteric.\n\nWhat is true in regard to sin is true in regard to its author, Satan,\ncalled Abaddon, called the Prince of the Power of the Air, called the\nserpent, called the dragon. It seems to me any intelligent man must\nadmit that there is a commander-in-chief of all evil.\n\nThe Persians called him Ahriman, the Hindus called him Siva. He was\nrepresented on canvas as a mythological combination of Thor and\nCerberus and Pan and Vulcan and other horrible addenda. I do not care\nwhat you call him, that monster of evil is abroad, and his one work is\ndestruction. John Milton almost glorified him by witchery of\ndescription, but he is the concentration of all meanness and of all\ndespicability. My little child, seven years of age, said to her mother\none day, \"Why don't God kill the devil at once, and have done with\nit?\" In less terse phrase we have all asked the same question. The\nBible says he is to be imprisoned and he is to be chained down. Why\nnot heave the old miscreant into his dungeon now? Does it not seem as\nif his volume of infamy were complete? Does it not seem as if the last\nfifty years would make an appropriate peroration? No; God will let him\ngo on to the top of all bad endeavor, and then when all the earth and\nall constellations and galaxies and all the universe are watching, God\nwill hurl him down with a violence and ghastliness enough to persuade\nfive hundred eternities that a rebellion against God must perish. God\nwill not do it by piecemeal, God will not do it by small skirmish. He\nwill wait until all the troops are massed, and then some day when in\ndefiant and confident mood, at the head of his army, this Goliath of\nhell stalks forth, our champion, the son of David, will strike him\ndown, not with smooth stones from the brook, but with fragments from\nthe Rock of Ages. But it will not be done until this giant of evil and\nhis holy antagonist come out within full sight of the two great\narmies. The tragedy is only postponed to make the overthrow more\nimpressive and climacteric. Do not fret. If God can afford to wait you\ncan afford to wait. God's clock of destiny strikes only once in a\nthousand years. Do not try to measure events by the second-hand on\nyour little time-piece. Sin and Satan go on only that their overthrow\nmay at last be the more terrific, the more impressive, the more\nresounding, the more climacteric.\n\nWhy do the wicked live? In order that they may build up fortresses for\nrighteousness to capture. Have you not noticed that God harnesses men,\nbad men, and accomplishes good through them? Witness Cyrus, witness\nNebuchadnezzar, witness the fact that the Bastile of oppression was\npried open by the bayonets of a bad man. Recently there came to me the\nfact that a college had been built at the Far West for infidel\npurposes. There was to be no nonsense of chapel prayers, no Bible\nreading there. All the professors there were pronounced infidels. The\ncollege was opened, and the work went on, but, of course, failed. Not\nlong ago a Presbyterian minister was in a bank in that village on\npurposes of business, and he heard in an adjoining room the board of\ntrustees of that college discussing what they had better do with the\ninstitution, as it did not get on successfully, and one of the\ntrustees proposed that it be handed over to the Presbyterians,\nprefacing the word Presbyterians with a very unhappy expletive. The\nresolutions were passed, and that fortress of infidelity has become a\nfortress of old-fashioned, orthodox religion, the only religion that\nwill be worth a snap of your finger when you come to die or appear in\nthe Day of Judgment. The devil built the college. Righteousness\ncaptured it.\n\nIn some city there goes up a great club-house--the architecture, the\nfurniture, all the equipment a bedazzlement of wealth. That particular\nclub-house is designed to make gambling and dissipation respectable.\n\nDo not fret. That splendid building will after a while be a free\nlibrary, or it will be a hospital, or it will be a gallery of pure\nart. Again and again observatories have been built by infidelity, and\nthe first thing you know they go into the hand of Christian science.\nGod said in the Bible that He would put a hook in Sennacherib's nose\nand pull him down by a way he knew not. And God has a hook to-day in\nthe nose of every Sennacherib of infidelity and sin, and will drag him\nabout as He will. Marble halls deserted to sinful amusements will yet\nbe dedicated for religious assemblage. All these castles of sin are to\nbe captured for God as we go forth with the battle-shout that Oliver\nCromwell rang out at the head of his troops as he rode in on the field\nof Naseby: \"Let God arise and let His enemies be scattered!\" After a\ngreat fire in London, amid the ruins there was nothing left but an\narch with the name of the architect upon it; and, my friends, whatever\nelse goes down, God stays up.\n\nWhy do the wicked live? That some of them may be monuments of mercy.\n\nSo it was with John Newton, so it was with Augustine, perhaps so it\nwas with you. Chieftains of sin to become chieftains of grace. Paul,\nthe apostle, made out of Saul, the persecutor. Baxter, the flaming\nevangel, made out of Baxter, the blasphemer. Whole squadrons, with\nstreamers of Emmanuel floating from the masthead, though once they\nwere launched from the dry-docks of diabolism. God lets these wicked\nmen live that He may make jewels out of them for coronets, that He may\nmake tongues of fire out of them for Pentecosts, that He may make\nwarriors out of them for Armageddons, that he may make conquerors out\nof them for the day when they shall ride at the head of the\nwhite-horse host in the grand review of the resurrection.\n\nWhy do the wicked live? To make it plain beyond all controversy that\nthere is another place of adjustment. So many of the bad up, so many\nof the good down. It seems to me that no man can look abroad without\nsaying--no man of common sense, religious or irreligious, can look\nabroad without saying, \"There must be some place where brilliant\nscoundrelism shall be arrested, where innocence shall get out from\nunder the heel of despotism.\" Common fairness as well as eternal\njustice demands it.\n\nWe adjourn to the great assizes, the stupendous injustices of this\nlife. They are not righted here. There must be some place where they\nwill be righted. God can not afford to omit the judgment day or the\nreconstruction of conditions. For you can not make me believe that\nthat man stuffed with all abomination, having devoured widows' houses\nand digested them, looking with basilisk or tigerish eyes upon his\nfellows, no music so sweet to him as the sound of breaking hearts, is,\nat death, to get out of the landau at the front door of the sepulcher\nand pass right on through to the back door of the sepulcher, and find\na celestial turnout waiting for him, so that he can drive tandem right\nup primrosed hills, one glory riding as lackey ahead, and another\nglory riding as postilion behind, while that poor woman who supported\nher invalid husband and her helpless children by taking in washing and\nironing, often putting her hand to her side where the cancerous\ntrouble had already begun, and dropping dead late on Saturday night\nwhile she was preparing the garments for the Sabbath day, coming afoot\nto the front door of the sepulcher, shall pass through to the back\ndoor of the sepulcher and find nothing waiting, no one to welcome, no\none to tell her the way to the King's gate. I will not believe it.\nSolomon was confounded in his day by what he represents as princes\nafoot and beggars a-horseback, but I tell you there must be a place\nand a time when the right foot will get into the stirrup. To\ndemonstrate beyond all controversy that there is another place for\nadjustment, God lets the wicked live.\n\nWhy do the wicked live? For the same reason that He lets us live--to\nhave time for repentance.\n\nWhere would you and I have been if sin had been followed by immediate\ncatastrophe? While the foot of Christ is fleet as that of a roebuck\nwhen He comes to save, it does seem as if he were hoppled with great\nlanguors and infinite lethargies when He comes to punish. Oh, I\ncelebrate God's slowness, God's retardation, God's putting off the\nretribution! Do you not think, my brother, it would be a great deal\nbetter for us to exchange our impatient hypercriticism of Providence\nbecause this man, by watering of stock, makes a million dollars in one\nday, and another man rides on in one bloated iniquity year after\nyear--would it not be better for us to exchange that impatient\nhypercriticism for gratitude everlasting that God let us who were\nwicked live, though we deserved nothing but capsize and demolition?\nOh, I celebrate God's slowness! The slower the rail-train comes the\nbetter, if the drawbridge is off.\n\nHow long have you, my brother, lived unforgiven? Fifteen, twenty,\nforty, sixty years? Lived through great awakenings, lived through\ndomestic sorrow, lived through commercial calamity, lived through\nprovidential crises that startled nations, and you are living yet,\nstrangers to God, and with no hope for a great future into which you\nmay be precipitated. Oh, would it not be better for us to get our\nnature through the Grace of Christ revolutionized and transfigured?\nFor I want you to know that God sometimes changes His gait, and\ninstead of the deliberate tread He is the swift witness, and sometimes\nthe enemies of God are suddenly destroyed, and that without remedy.\n\nMake God your ally. What an offer that is! Do not fight against Him.\nDo not contend against your best interests. Yield this morning to the\nbest impulse of your heart, and that is toward Christ and heaven. Do\nnot fight the Lord that made you and offers to redeem you.\n\nPhilip of France went out with his army, with bows and arrows, to\nfight King Edward III. of England; but just as they got into the\ncritical moment of the battle, a shower of rain came and relaxed the\nbow-strings so that they were of no effect, and Philip and his army\nwere worsted. And all your weaponry against God will be as nothing\nwhen he rains upon you discomfiture from the heavens. Do not fight the\nLord any longer. Change allegiance. Take down the old flag of sin, run\nup the new flag of grace. It does not take the Lord Jesus Christ the\nthousandth part of a second to convert you if you will only surrender,\nbe willing to be saved. The American Congress was in anxiety during\nthe Revolutionary War while awaiting to hear news from the conflict\nbetween Washington and Cornwallis, and the anxiety became intense and\nalmost unbearable as the days went by. When the news came at last that\nCornwallis had surrendered and the war was practically over, so great\nwas the excitement that the doorkeeper of the House of Congress\ndropped dead from joyful excitement. And if this long war between your\nsoul and God should come to an end this morning by your entire\nsurrender, the war forever over, the news would very soon reach the\nheavens, and nothing but the supernatural health of your loved ones\nbefore the throne would keep them from being prostrated with overjoy\nat the cessation of all spiritual hostilities.\n\n\nTHE END.","title":"New Tabernacle Sermons","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":97992}