SOME GREAT EVENTS.
Dr. Talmage Discourses on the
World’s Advancement.
Soya It Is In the Right Direction
Present Time Wonderful for
Disaster and Wonderful
for Blessing.
^Copyright, 1901, by Louis Klopsch, N. Y.J
Washington, Dec. S.
In this discourse Ur. Talmage recites
some great events and shows that the
world is advancing in the right direc
tion; text, Joel 2:30: “1 will show
wonders in the heavens and in the
earth.”
ur. summing—great ana good man
•—would have told us the exact time
of the fulfillment of this prophecy.
As 1 stepped into his study in London
on my arrival from Paris, just after
the French had surrendered at Sedan,
the good doctor said to me: "It is
just what I have told you about France.
People laughed at me because I talked
about the seven horns and the vials,
but 1 foresaw' all this from the book
of Daniel and the book of Revelation.”
Not taking any such responsibility in
the interpretation of the passage, 1
simply assert that there are in it sug
gestions of many things in our time.
Our eyes dilate and our heart quick
ens in its pulsations as we read of
events in the third century, the sixth
century, the fourteenth century, but
there were more far-reaching events
crowded into the nineteenth century
than into any other, and the last 20
years eclipse any preceding 20. We
read in the daily newspapers of events
announced in one paragraph and with
out any special emphasis—events
which a Herodotus, a Josephus, a
Xenophon, a Gibbon would have taken
whole chapters or whole volumes to
elaborate. Looking out upon our
time we must cry out, in the words of
the text: “Wonders in the heavens
and in the earth.”
I propose to show you that the time
in which we live is wonderful for dis
aster and wonderful for blessing, for
there must be lights and shades in this
picture as in all others. Need 1 argue
that' our time is wonderful for disas
ter? Our world has had a rough time
since by the hand of God it was bowled
out into space. It is an epileptic earth
•—convulsion after convulsion; frosts
pounding it with sledge hammer of
iceberg and fires melting it with fur
naces seven times heated. It is a
wonder to me it has lasted so long.
Meteors shooting by on this side and
grazing it and meteors shooting by
on the other side and grazing it. none
of them slowing up for safety. Whole
fleets and navies and argosies and
flotillas of worlds sweeping all about
us. Our earth like a fishing smack off
the banks of Newfoundland, while the
Majestic and the St. Paul and the
Kaiser Wilhelm der Grosse rush by.
Besides that, our world has by sin been
damaged in its internal machinery,
and ever and anon the furnaces have
burst, and the walking beams of the
mountains have broken, and the is
lands have shipped a sea, and the great
hulk of the world has been jarred with
accidents that ever and anon have
threatened immediate demolition.
But it seems to us as if the last hun
dred years were especially character
ized by disaster—volcanic, oceanic,
epidemic. 1 say volcanic because an
earthquake is only a volcano hushed
up. When StromDoli and Cotopaxi
and Vesuvius stop breathing, let the
foundations of the earth beware!
Seven thousand earthquakes in two
centuries recorded in the catalogue ot
the British association! Trajan, the
emperor, goes to ancient Antioch and
amid the splendors of his reception is
met by an earthquake that nearly de
stroys the emperor’s life. Lisbon, fair
and beautiful, at one o’clock on the
1st of November, 1775, in six minutes
60,000 have perished, and Voltaire
writes of them: “For that region it
was the last judgment, nothing want
ing but a trumpet!” Europe and
America feeling the throb—1.500chim
neys in Boston partly or fully de
stroyed !
Look at the disasters epidemic. I
speak not of the plague in the fourth
century that ravaged Europe and in
Moscow and the Neapolitan domin
ions and Marseilles wrought such
terror in the eighteenth century,
but I look at the yellow fevers, and
the choleras and the diphtherias and
the scarlet fevers and the typhoids
of our time. From Hurdwar, India,
where every twelfth year 3.000,000
devotees congregate, the caravans
brought the cholera, and that one
disease slew IS,000 in IS days in the
Bossorah. Twelve thousand in one
summer slain by it in India and 125,
000 in Egypt. Disasters epidemic.
Home of the finest monuments in
Greenwood and Laurel Hill and
Mount Auburn are to doctors who
lost their lives battling with southern
epidemic.
But now I turn the leaf in my sub
ject, and I plant the white lilies and
the palm tree amid the nightshades
and the myrtle. This age no more
characterized by wonders of disaster
than by wonders of blessing—blessing
of longevity; the average of human
life is rapidly increasing. Forty
years now worth 400 years once. Now
1 can travel from Manitoba to New
York in less than three days. In
other times it would have taken
three months. In other words, three
days are now worth three months of
other days. The average of human
life, practically greater now than
when Noah lived, with his n.r>0 years,
and Methusaleh lived his 9G!) ears.
Blessings of intelligence: The Sal
mon P. Chases and the Abraham Lin
colns and the Henry Wilsons of the
coining time will not be required to
learn to read by pine knot lights or
seated on shoemaker’s bench, nor will
the Fergusons have to study astron
omy while watching the cattle.
Knowledge rolls its tide along every
poor man’s door, and his children
may go down and bathe in them. If
the philosophers of a hundred years
ago were called upon to recite in a
class with our boys and girls those
old philosophers would be sent down
to the foot of the class because they
failed to answer the questions! Free
libraries in all the important towns
and cities of the land. Historical al
coves and poetical shelves and mag
azine tables for all who desire to
walk through them or sit down at
them.
Blessing's of quick information;
Newspapers falling' all around us
thick as leaves in a September equi
noctial. News three days old rancid
and stale. We see the whole world
twice a day—through the newspaper
at the breakfast table and through
the newspaper at the teatable, with
an “extra” here and there between.
Blessings of Gospel proclamation:
Do you know that nearly all the mis
sionary societies have been born with
in a hundred years and nearly all the
Bible societies and nearly all the
great philanthropic movements?
Christianity is on the march, while in
fidelity is dwindling into imbecility.
While infidelity is thus dwindling the
wheel of Christianity is making about
a thousand revolutions a minute. All
the copies of Shakespeare and of Ten
nyson and of Disraeli and of any ten
of the most popular writers of the
day less in number than the copies of
the Bible going out from our printing
presses. A few years ago in six
weeks more' than 2,000,000 copies of
the New Testament purchased—not
given away, but purchased, because
the world will have it. The most pop
ular book to-day is the Bible, and the
mightiest institution is the church,
and the greatest name among the
nations and more honored than any is
the name of Jesus.
Wonders of self-sacrifice: A cler
gyman told me in the northwest that
for six years he was a missionary at
the extreme north, living 400 miles
from a postoffice, the thermometer 4C
degrees below zero, he slept out ol
doors in winter, wrapped in rabbit
skins woven together. I said: “Is it
possible? You do not mean 40 de
grees below zero?” He said: “I do,
and I was happy.” All for Christ!
Where is there any other being that
will rally such enthusiasm? Mothers
sewing their fingers off to educate
their boys for the Gospel ministry,
For nine years no luxury on the table
until the course through grammai
school and college and theological
seminary be completed. Poor widow
putting her mite into the Lord’s
treasury, the face of emperor or pres
ident impressed upon the coin not sc
conspicuous as the blood with which
she earned it. Millions of good men
and women, but more women than
men, to whom Christ is everything
Christ first and Christ last and Christ
forever.
Why. this age is not so character
ized by invention and scientific ex
ploration as it is by Gospel proclama
tion. You can get no idea of it unless
you can ring all the church bells in
one chime and sound all the organs in
one diapason and gather all the con
gregations of Christendom in one
“Gloria In Excelsis.” Mighty camp
meetings! Mighty Ocean Groves!
Mighty Chautauquas! Mighty conven
tions of Christian workers! Mighty
general assemblies of the Presbyteri
an church! Mighty conferences of
the Methodist church! Mighty associ
ations of the Baptist church! Mighty
conventions of the Episcopal church!
There may be many years of hard
work yet before the consummation,
but the signs are to me so encourag
ing that 1 would not be unbelieving
if I saw the wing of the apocalyptic
angel spread for its last triumphant
flight in this day’s sunset or if to
morrow morning the ocean cables
should thrill us with the- news that
Christ the Lord had alighted on
Mount Olivet to proclaim universal
dominion.
All dead churches, wake up! Throw
back the shutters of stiff ecclesias
tic-ism and let the light of the spring
morning come in! Morning for the
land! Morning for the sea! Morning
of light and love and upeace! Morn
ing of a day in which there shall be
no chains to break, no sorrows to as
suage, no despotism to shatter, no
woes to compassionate. Blessed
Christ, descend! Scarred temple, take
the crown! Bruised hand, take the
scepter! Wounded feet, step on the
throne! “Thine is the kingdom.”
These things I say because 1 want
you to be alert. I want you to be
Watching all these wonders unrolling
from the heavens and the earth. God
has classified them, whether calamit
ous /jr pleasing. The Divine purposes
are harnessed in traces that cannot
break and in girths that cannot slip
and in buckles that cannot loosen
and are driven by reins they must
answer. 1 preach no fatalism. A
swarthy engineer at one of the
depots at Dakota said: “When will
you get on the locomotive and take
a ride with us?” “Well,” I said,
“now, if that suits you.” So I got
on one side of the locomotive, and a
Methodist minister, who was also in
vited, got on the other side, and be
tween us were the engineer and the
stoker. The train started. The en
gineer had his hand on the agitated
pulse of the great engine. The
stoker shoveled in the coal and shut
the door with a loud clang. A vast;
plain slipped under us, and the hills
swept by, and that great monster on
which we rode trembed and bounded
and snorted and raged as it hurled
us on. I said to the Methodist min
ister on the other side of the loco
motive: “My brother, why should
ministers quarrel about the decrees
and free agency? You see that
track, that firm track, that iron
track; that is the decree. You see
this engineer’s arm; that is free
agency. How beautifully they work
together! They are going to take us
through. We could not do without
the track, and we could not do with
out the engineer.”
So I rejoice day by day. Work for
all to do, and we may turn the crank
of the Christian machinery this way
or that, for we are free agents. But
there is the track laid so long ago
no one remembers it—laid by the
hand of the Almighty God in sockets
that no terrestrial or Satanic pres
sure can ever affect. And along- the
track the car of the world’s redemp
tion will roll and roll to the Grand
Central depot of the millennium, t
have no anxiety about the track. I
am only afraid that for our indo
lence and unfaithfulness God will dis
charge us and get some other stoker
and some other engineer. The train
is going through with us or without
us. So, my brethren, watch all the
events that are going by. If things
seem to turn out right, give wings
to your joy. If things seem to turn
out wrong, throw out the anchor of
faith and hold fast.
When Titans play quoits, they pitch
mountains, but who owns these gigan
tic natural forces we are constantly
reading about? Whose hand is on the
throttle valveof the volcanoes? Whose
foot, suddenly planted on the foot
stool, makes the continents quiver?
God! I must be at peace with Him.
Through the Lord .lesus Christ, this
God is mine and lie is yours. 1 put the
earthquake that shook Palestine at
the crucifixion against all the down
roekings of the centuries. This God
on our side, we may challenge all the
centuries of time and all the cycles of
eternity.
Years ago I was at Fire Island,
L. I., and I went up in the cupola
from which they telegraph to
New York the approach of vessels
| hours before they come into port.
I There is an opening in the wall, and
the operator puts his telescope
through that opening and looks out
and sees vessels far out at sea. While
1 was talking with him he went up
and looked out. lie said: “We are ex
pecting the Arizona to-night.” I
said: “Is it possible you know all
those vessels? Do you know them as
you know a man’s face?” He said:
“Yes. I never make a mistake. Be
fore I see the hulls 1 often know them
by the masts. 1 know them all—I have
watched them so long.” Oh, what a
grand thing it is to have ships tele
graphed and heralded long before
they come to port, that friends may
come down to the wharf and welcome
their long-absent ones! So to-day we
take our stand in the watch-tower,
and through the glass of inspiration
we look off and see a whole
fleet of ships coming in. That is
the ship of peace, with the star
of Bethlehem floating above the
top gallants. That is the ship of the
church, mark of salt water high upon
the smokestack, showing she has had
rough weather, but the Captain of
Salvation commands her, and all is
well with her. The ship of heaven,
mightiest craft ever launched, mil
lions of passengers waiting for mil
lions more, prophets and apostles and
martyrs in the cabin, conquerors at
the foot of the mast, while from the
rigging hands are waving this way as
it' they knew us, and we wave back
again, for they are ours. They went
out from our own households. Ours!
Hail, hail! Put ofT the black and put
on the white. Stop tolling the funeral
bell and ring the wedding anthem.
Shut up the hearse and take the
chariot.
Now the ship comes around the
great headland. Soon she will strike
the wharf and we will go aboard her.
Tears for ships going out. Laughter
for ships coming in. Now she touches
the wharf. Throw out the planks.
Block not up that gangway with em
bracing long lost friends, for you will
have eternity of reunion. Stand back
and give way until other millions
come aboard her. Farewell to sin!
Farewell to struggle! Farewell to
sickness! Farewell to death! “Blessed
are all they who enter in through the
gates into the city.”
Knife wounds heal quicker than
those caused by a caustic tongue.
SCIENCE AND INDUSTRY,
A farm journal says that in the crop
of one dead quail were found 101 po
tato bug’s.
In Java there is an orchid, the gram
matophyllum, all the flowers of which
open a.t once, as if by the stroke of a
fairy wand, and they also all wither
together.
As a rule, trees which grow in moist
ground produce wood that is more
sappy and less durable than those
which grow on dry earth. To this rule,
however, there are several notable ex
ceptions.
A large aerolite has fallen on the
village of Wysienki, near Kieff. Four
teen houses were burned, and a boy
three years old was killed. The noise
caused by the fall of the aerolite was
heard 15 miles off.
Senor Horres, an ingenious engineer
of Madrid, has invented a little ma
chine for the solution of mathematical
problems. Those who have tested it
say that within 30 seconds it can solve
the most difficult equation that can be
framed.
Recent investigations made by the
department of agriculture show that
mushrooms are about equal to pota
toes in the element of nutrition that
goes to make flesh and blood, but that,
on the other hand, they do not hold
much of the fuel stuff required to keep
the body machine running.
, The scientific construction of roads
in Austria began after the peace of
1815, and from that time until 1875 no
less than 60,000 miles of road for mil
itary and commercial purposes were
built, together with 60 passes over the
Alps, to connect Austria proper with
Steyermarek, Tyrol, Lombardy and
Venetia.
A German scientist estimates that
under ordinary conditions the whole
amount of blood in the body passes
through the heart in 32 beats. In a
man of 170 pounds there are about 13
pounds of blood, which passes through
his heart two and a quarter times a
minute. Estimating the flow at 30
pounds to the minute, we have 1,800
pounds an hour and 43,200 pounds a
day passing through thishumnn pump.
Expressed in mechanical energy, the
work done in a day is equivalent to
540,000 foot pounds.
HOW HE WAS QUEERED.
The Olil Woman on tlie Train Took
Them for a Bridal
Couple.
“I am afraid that it is all off,”
sighed the young man. “Just as the
prospects looked brightest, too!
When all-the-world-to-me left to visit
an aunt who lives in the central part
of the state it happened that I had
business that took me the same way,
and I chanced to take the same train
that she did, and naturally I took a
seat at her side. She was very much
surprised to see me and acted very
distant at first, evidently not believ
ing my story about important busi
ness taking me the same way she
was going. I was just succeeding
in breaking the ice, when the train
stopped at a station, and a motherly
old fool, wearing corkscrew curls and
smelling of peppermint, who sat. just
back of us, took advantage of the
lull to lean over the back of our seat
and with a beaming face that was
meant for friendly interest said:
jii(ii i ini, uiu i \ c ,
“The suddenness of the question
left me incapable of answering.
“‘Of course you be!’ she cackled
again, like a pullet with her first
egg. ‘I suppose ye think it is fash
ionable to spt apart like old mar
ried folks when yc are jes’ dyin’ to
lovey-dovey each other! The land
sakes! when me an’ Josiah got mar
ried we held each other's hands an’
said “lovey” an’ “ducky” all we want
ed to! Now, young man, you jes’ set
up close an’ put your arm around
her! We won’t mind, will we?’ she
said, turning to the passengers, who
were roaring.
“Then the train started and gave
us a respite, during which the girl
turned to me with a burning face and
whispered fiercely that if I didn’t get
off at the next stop she would never
speak to me again.
“I am too good a soldier not to
obey orders, so I dropped off at the
next stop. It turned out to be noth
ing but a flag station, and I spent
the rest of the day watching the
through trains go past. I managed,
at last to bribe a freight conductor
to take me away.
“Up to date no sort of explanation
goes with the girl,” continued the
young man, sadly, according to the
Detroit Free Press. “She says that
if I hadn’t been there it wouldn’t
have happened.”
MotorM for Connumpti von.
A medical man is urging the use
of the motor car for consumptives.
He states that he has observed a
marked benefit from riding- on a
motor, and recommends that the
motor car should be added to the
open air treatment in sanatoria.—
London Hospital.
A Bit of Description.
Mrs. Dash—It’s a shame for Mrs.
Crash to name her baby “Jane.”
Mrs. Hash—Oh! I don’t know. You
haven’t seen it, have you? It is one
of those Jaue-looking babies!—Puck.
PRINCESS VIROQIM, M. D.
Endorses Lydia E. Pinkham’s
Vegetable Compound After
Following Its Record For
Years.
“ Dear Mrs. Pinkham : —Ilealth is
the greatest boon bestowed on human
ity and therefore anything that can
restore lost health is a blessing. I
consider Lydia E. Pinkham’s Veg
etable Compound as a blessing to
State and Nation. It cures her moth
ers and daughters and makes them
well and strong.
Practicing Physician ami Lecturer.
“ For fifteen years I have noted the
effect of your Vegetable Compound in
curing special diseases of women.
“I know of nothing superior for
ovarian trouble, barrenness, and it
has prevented hundreds of dangerous
operations where physicians claimed
it was the only chance to get well.
Ulceration and inflammation of the
womb has been cured in two or three
weeks through its use, and as I find it
purely an herbal remedy, I unhesitat
ingly give it my highest endorsement.
— Fraternally yours, Ur. P. Viboqua,
Lansing, Mich.”—$5000 forfeit if above tes
timonial is not genuine.
If you are ill do not hesitate to
get a bottle of Lydia E. Pink
ham’s Vegetable Compound at
once, and write to Mrs. Pink
ham at Lynn, Mass, for special
advice; it is entirely free.
Mytholosy in Kansas.
“Some one in Kansas proposed that a
statue of Ceres be placed on the dome of the
new statehouse, but now he wishes he
hadn’t made the proposition,” remarked the
Exchange editor, as he laid down a Kansas
paper.
“What’s the objection?” asked the tele
graph editor.
“It is urged that no one in Kansas knows
the lady, and that she probably was an ac
tress, anyhow. It is the opinion that the
figure of Chief Fewclothes, an Indian, would
ae more appropriate as an ornament to the
dome of the Kansas statehouse.”
“Well, I should think that a statue of
Chief Fewelethes would be a nude depar
ture, at any rate.”—Pittsburg Gazette.
Holidny Excursion to the Southeast
via Southern Railway.
Railroads in Arkansas. Texas, Indian Ter
ritory and Oklahoma Territory will sell
round-trip Christmas Holiday Excursion
tickets over the Southern Ry. to points in
the Southeast, including States of Tennes
see, Mississippi, Alabama. Florida. Georgia,
North Carolina and South Carolina, at re
duced rates. Tickets will be sold December
21st, 22d and 23d. 1901, limited to return
thirty days from date of sale. The service
offered by the Southern Ry. is the. very,
best, and schedules and sleeping car ar
rangements are unexcelled. Parties con
templating a trip to their old home in the
Southeast should see that their tickets read
via bhe Southern Ry. For further informa
tion call on the nearest Ticket Agent, or
address C. A. De Saussure, D. P. A., Mem
phis, Tcnn.. .T. H. Knight. T. P. A., Hous
ton, Tex., M. H. Bone. W. P, A., Dallas, Tex.
To Suit tlie Case.
Jake—Cora has an aquiline nose, hasn’t
she?
Fake—How could I know’ She always
turns it up at me.—Harlem Life.
A Dose in Time Saves Nine of Hale’s
Honey of Horehound and Tar for Colds.
Pike’s Toothache Drops Cure in one minute.
Some men walk as if they were the smart
est on earth.—Washington (la.J Democrat.
Piso’s Cure for Consumption is an infalli
ble medicine for coughs and colds.—N. W.
Samuel, Ocean Grove, N. J., Feb. 17,190(X.
Every man hides his deformity.—Atchi
son Globe.
Half an hour is all the time required to
dye with PUTNAM FADELESS DYES.
The less luck a man has the more he de
spises it.—Chicago Daily News.