Rensselaer Republican, Volume 22, Number 36, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 8 May 1890 — VOICES OF THE INANIMATE [ARTICLE]

VOICES OF THE INANIMATE

Dr. Talmago on the Articulate and Ha> monions Voices of Satnra^j^jjfc Satan Withered Under the Touch of ffin, and Wounded Creation Sent Up Her Fro* testing Voice In the Ho tea of the Thorn, the Brier and the Thistle and itt the Bumbling Storm— The Trees, the Birds, livers and Skies to Enjoy a Millennium. Sunday morning at the Brooklyn Academy of Music Rev. T. DeWitt Talmage preached from Isa. 60:13. “The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir tree, the pine tree, «*id the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary.” On our way from Damascus we saw the mountains of Lebanon white with snow, and the plaoes from which the cedars were hewn, and then drawn by ox-teams down to the Mediterranean Sea, and theij. floated in great rafts to Joppa, and then again drawn by ox-teams up to Jerusalem to build Solomon’s temple. Those mighty trees in my text are called the “glory of Lebanon.” Inanimate nature felt the effects of the first transgression. When Eve touched the forbidden tree, it seems as if the sinful contract had smitten not only that tree, but as if the air caught the pollution from the leaves, and as if the sap had earned the virus down into the very soil until the entire earth reeked with the leprosy. Under that sinful touch nature withered. The inanroate creation, as if aware of the damage done it, sent up tho thorn and brier and nettle to wound, and fiercely oppose, the human race. Now as the physical earth felt the effects of the first transgrossion shall also feel the effect of 4he Saviour’s mission. As from that one tree in Paradise a blight went forth through the entire so from one tree on Calvary another force shall speod out to interpenetrate and cheek, subdue and override, the evil. In the end it shall be found that the tree of Calvary has more potency than the tree of Paradise. As the nation* are evangelized, I think a corresponding change will be effected In the natural world. I verily believe that the trees, and the birds, and the rivers, and the skies will have their millennium.- If man’s sin affected the ground, and the vegetation, and the atmosphere, shall Christ’s work be less powerful or less extensive! Doubtless God will take the irregularity and fierceness from the elements so as to make them congenial to the race, which will then be symmetrical and evangelized. The ground shall not be so lavish of weeds and so grudgeful of grain. Soils which new have peculiar proclivities toward certain forms of evil production will be delivered from their besetting sins. Steep mountains, ploughed down into more gradual ascent, shall be girded with flocks of sheep and shocks of corn. The wet marsh shall become the deep-grassed meadow. Cattle shall eat unharmed by caverns once haunted of wild beasts. Children will build play-houses in what was once a cave of serpents; and, as the Scripture saith, "The weaned ohild shall put his hand on the cockatrioe’s den.” Oh what harvests shall be reaped when neither drouth, nor excessive rain, nor mildew, nor infesting inseots shall arrest the growth, and the utmost capacity of the fields for production shall be tested by an intelligent and athletic yeomanry. Thrift and competency characterizing the world’s inhabitants, *thoir dwelling-places shall be graceful and healthy and adorned. Tree and arbor and grove around about Will look os if Adam and Eve had got back to Paradise. Great cities, now neglected and unwashed, Bhail be orderly, adorned with architectural symmetry and connected with far distant seaports by present modes of transportation carried to their greatest perfection, or by new inventions yet to spring up out of the water or drop from the air at the beck of a Morse or- —a Robert Fulton-tw-longing to future generations. Isaiah in my text seems to look forward to the future condition of tho physical earth as a condition of great beauty and excellence, and then prophesies that as the strongest and most Ornamental timber in Lebanon was brought down to Jerusalem and constructed into the ancient temple, so all that is beautiful aud excellent in the physical earth shall yet contribute to the Church no w being built in the world. “The glory of Lebunon shall come unto thee; the firtree, the pine-tree, and the box together to beautify the place of my sanctuary.” Muoh of this prophecy has already been fulfilled, and I proceed to some practical remarks upon the contributions which the natural world is making to tho kingdom of God, and then draw some inferences. The first contribution that nature gives to the Church is her testimony in behulf of the truth of Christianity. This is an age of profound resoarch. Nature cannot evade men’s inquiries as once. In chemist’s laboratory she is put to torture and compelled to give up, her mysteries, Hidden laws have come out of their hiding-place. The earth and the heavens, since toey have been ransacked by geologist and botanist and astronomer, appe ir so different from what they once were that they may be called “the new heayens aud the new earth*” This research and discovery will have powerful effect upon tho religious world. They must either advance or arrest Christianity, make men bettor or make them worse, be tho Church’s honor or the Church’s overthrow. Christians, aware of this in the early ages of discovery, were nervous and fearful as to the progress of science. They feared that some natural law, before unknown, would suddenly spring into harsh collision with Christianity. Gunpower and tho gleam of swords would not so much have been feared by religionists as electric batteries, voltaic piles, and astronomical apparatus. It was feared that Moses and the prophets would be run o*er by sceptical chemists and philosophers. Somo of tho followers of Aristotle, after the invention of the telescope, refused to loo** through that instrument, lest what they saw would overthrow the teaohings of that great philosopher. Bnt the Christian religion has no such apprehen- ■ sion now. Bring on your telescopes and ‘ microscopes, and spectroscopes—and the more the better. Tho God of nature ia the God of the Bible, and in all the universe, and is all the eternities, Be has never once contradicted Himself. Christian merchants endow universities, and in them Christian professors instruct the children of Christian communities ’The wannest and most enthusiastic friends of Christ are the bravest and most enthusiastic friends of scienoa The Church rejoices as muoh over every discovery as the world rejoices. Good men have found that there is no war between science and religion* That which at first has seemed to be the weapon of the infidel has turned out to be the weapon of the i Christian. Scientific discussions may be divided into those which are concluded, and those which are still la progress, denanding tor decision upon future investigation. Those which are esMlnded have invariably rendered their verdict for Christianity, and we have fatth to believe that those which are vtUltapneeontlon will seme to as fever-

able a ooectosien. The great systems of error are falling before these discoveries, which have only demonstrated the truth es the Bible, and so reinforced Christianity. Mohammedanism and paganism in their tea theneand forms have been proven false, and by great natural laws shown to be impositions. Buried cites have been exhumed, and the troth of God found written on their coffin-lids. Bartlett, Robinson, and Layard have been , not more the apostles of Boienoe than the apostles of religion. The dumb lips of the pyramids hare opened to preach the gospel. Expeditions have been fitted out for Palestine, and explorers have come hack to say that they have found among mountains, and among ruins, and on the shore of waters, living and undying evidences of our glorious Christianity. Men who have gone to Palestine infidels have come bade Christiana. They who were blind and deaf to the truth at home have seemed to see Christ again preaching upon Olivet, and have beheld in vivid imagination the Son of God again walking the hills about Jerusalem. C&viglia once rejeoted the truth, bnt afterward said, “I came to Egypt, and the Scriptures and the pyramida converted me.” When I was in Beyrout, Syria, last Deoember, our beloved American missionary, Rev. Dr. Jessup, told me of his friend who met a sceptic at Joppa, the seaport of Jerusalem, and the unbeliever said to his friend: “Lam going into the Holy Land to show up the folly of the Christian religion. lam going to visit all the so-called ‘sacred places,’ and write them up and show the world that the New Testament is an imposition upon the world’s credulity.” Months after, Doctor Jessups friend met the sceptic at Beyrout, after he had completed his journey through the Holy Land. “Well, how is it!” said the aforesaid gentleman to the soeptio. The answer was: “I have seen it all, and I tell you the Bible is true I Yes, it is all true !” The man who went to destroy came back to defend. After what I myself saw during my recent absence, I conclude that anyone who oan go through the Holy Land and remain an unbeliever, is either a bad man or an imbecile. God employed men to write the Bible, bnt He took many of the same truths which they reqprded, and with His own almighty hand He gouged them into the rocks, and drove them down into dismal depths, and, as documents are put in the corner-stone of a temple, so in the very foundation of the earth He folded up and placed the records of heavenly troth. The earth’s cornerstone was laid, like that of other sacred edifices, in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost The Author of revelation, standing among the great strata, looked upon Moses, and said, “Let us record for future ages the world’s history; you write it there on papyrus; I will write it here on the boulders.” Again, nature offers an invaluable contribution to Christianity by the illustration she makes of divine truth. The inspired writers seized npon the advantages offered by the natural world. Trees and rivers and clouds and rocks broke forth into holy and enthusiastic utterances. Wonld Christ Bet forth the strength of faith. He points to the sycamore, whose roots spread out, and strike down, and clinch themselves amid great depth of earth, and He Baid that faith was strong enough to tear that up by the roots. Would Christ teaoh the precision with which He looks after yon, He says Ha counts the hairs of your head. Well, that is a long and tedious count if the head have the average endowment It has been found that if the hairs of the bead he black there are about 120,000, or if they be flaxen there are about 140,000. But God knows the exact number: “The hairs of your bead are all numbered.” Would Christ impress us with divine watchfulness and care, He speaks of the sparrows that were a nuisance in those tunes. They were caught by the thousands in the net They were thin and scrawny, and had comparatively no. meat on their bones. They seemed almost valueless, whether living or doad. Now, argues Christ if my Father lakes care of him will He not take care of you? Christ would have the Christian despondent over his slowness of religious development go to his corn-field for a lesson. He watches first the green shoot pressing up through the clods, gradually strengthening into a stalk, and last of all the husk swelling out with the pressure of the corn; “First the blade, then the ear, after that the full oorn iu the ear.” Would David sot forth the freshness and beauty of genuine Christian character—he sees an eagle starting from its nest just after the moulting season, its old feathers shed, and its wings and breast decked with new down and plumes, its body as finely feathered as that of her young ones just beginning to try the speed of their wings. Thus rejuvenated and replumed is the Christian’s faith and hope, by every season of communion with God. “Thy youth is renewed like the eagle’s.” Would Solomon represent the aenoyanoe of a oontentious woman’s tongue, he points to a leakage in the top of his house -or tent, where, throughout the stormy day, the water comes through, falling upon the floor—drip! drip! dnpl and he says, “A continual dripping in a very rainy day and a contentious woman are alike” Wonld Christ set forth the character «i those who make great professions of piety but have no fruit, He compares them to barren fig-trees, which have very large and showy leaves, and nothing but leaves. Would Job illustrate deceitful friendships, he speaks of brookß in these climes, that wind about in different directions, and dry up when you want to drink out of them: “My brethern have dealt deceitfully as a brook, and as the stream of brooks they pass away.” David when he would impress us with the despondency into which he had sunk, compares it to a quagmire of those regions, through which he bad doubtless sometimes tried to walk, but sunk in up to his neck, and he cried, “I sink in deep mire where there is no standing.” Wonld Habakkuk set forth the capacity whioh God gives the good man to walk safoly amid the wildest perils, lli points Ur the wild animal called the hind walking over slippery rooks, and leaping from wild crag to wild crag, by the peculiar make of Its hoofs able calmly to sustain itself in the most dangerous plaoes: “The Lord God is my strength, and he will make my feet like hind’s feet” Job makes all natural objects pay tribute to the royalty of his book. As yon go through some chapters of Job yon feel as it it were a b right spring morning, and, as you see the glittering drops from the grass under your feet, yon say with that paWiaroh, “Who-hath bagotten the drops of the dew?” And now, as yon read on, yon aeem.in the silent midnight to behold the waving of a great Hght upon your path, and yon look up to find It thj» aurora borealis, which Job described so long age as **tho bright light in the donds and the splendor that cometh eat of the north.” As you read on, there is darkness hurtling in the heavens, and the showers break loose till the birds fly tor hidiagpUoe and the mountain torrents in red fury foam over the rocky shelving*, and with the same post yon exclaim, “Who oan , number the donds in wisdom, «r who osn stay the bottles of heaven?” As yen read on, yon feel yourself coming in frosty dimes, and, In fancy, wading through the ■oow, yon say, with that some Inspired writer, "Hast thou entered Into fee

treasures of toe snow!” And wKU toe sharp steel drives in your face, and fee hail stings your cheek, yon quote him again: “Hast then seen the treasures of the haiM” In the Psalmist’s writings I bear fee voices of the seat “Deep osltefe unto deep;" and the roar of forests: “The Lord shakefe fee wilderness of Kadesh;” and fee load peal of fee black tempest: “The God of glory feunderefe;” and fee rustle of the long silk on fee well-filled husks: “The valleys are covered wife oera;” and the ory of wild beasts: "The young lions roar after their prey;” The Jhnrn of palm-trees and oedars; “The righteous shall flourish like s palm-tree, be shall grow like a cedar in Lebanco. fee songh of wings and the swirl ot fins: “Dominion over fee fowl of the air anl fee fish of the sea.” The troths of the gospel might have been presented in technical terms, and by fee means of dry definitions, but under these the world would not have listened or fell How could the safety of trusting upon Christ have been presented, were it not for the figure of a rook? How could fes gladdening effect of the gospel have been net forth, had not Zacharias thought of the dawn of fee morning, exclaiming: "The day-spring from on high visited ns to give light to them that sit in fee darkness.” How could the soul’s intense longing for Christ have been presented so well as by the emblem of natural hunger sad natural thirst? As the lake gathers into its bosom the shadows of hills around, and the gleam of stars above, so, in these great deeps of divine truth, all objects in .nature are grandly reflected. We walk forth in the springtime, and everything breathes of the Resurrection. Bright blossom and springing grass speak to us of the coming up of those whom wa have loved, when in the white robes of their Joy and coronation they shall appear. And when in fee autumn of the year Nature preaches thousands of funeral sermons from the text, “We all do fade as a leaf,” and scatters her l elegies in,our path, we cannot help bnt think of sickness and the tomb. Even winter, -“being dead, yet speaketh.” The world will not be argued into the right, It will be tenderly illustrated into the right. Tell them what religion i 9 like. When the mother tried to tell her dying child what heaven was, she compared it to light. “Bub that hurts my eyes,” said the dying girl. Then the mother compared heaven to music, “But any sound hurts me; I am so weak," said the dying child. Then she was told that heaven was like mother’s arms. "Oh, take me there 1” she said. "If it is like mother’s arms, take me there I” The appropriate simile had been found at last.

Another contribution whioh the natural world is making to the kingdom of Christ, la the defence and aid whioh the elements axe compelled to give to the Christian per- j sonally. There is no law in nature bnt is . 1 sworn for the Christian’s defence. In Job j this thought is presented as a bargain made between the inanimate creation and the righteous man: “Thou shalt be in ‘ league with the stones of the field.” What ( a grand thought that the lightnings, and the tempests, and the hail, and thejf roots, which are the enemies of unrighteousness,, are all marshalled as the Christian’s body-1 guard. They fight for him. They strike with an arm of fire, or clutch with their fingers of ice. Everlasting pease is declared between the fiercest elements of nauire and the good man. They may in their fury seem to be indiscriminate, smiting down the righteous with the wicked, yet they cannot damage the Christian’s soul, although they may shrivel his body. The wintry blast feat howls about your dwelling, you may call your brother, and the south wind com ing upon a June day by way of a flowergarden, you may call your sister. Though so mighty is circumference and diameter, the sun and the moon have a special charge concerning you. “The sun shall not smite thee by day, nor fee moon by night.” Elements and forces hidden in fee earth are now harnessed and at work ia producing for yon food and clothing. Soma grainfield that you never saw presented you' this day wife your morning meal The great earth and fee heavens are fee busy loom at work for you: and shooting light, and silvery stream, and sharp lightning are only woven threads in fee great.’ loom, with God’s foot on fee shuttle. The l same Spirit feat converted your soul has also converted fee elements from enmity toward you into inviolable friendship, and furtherest star and deepest cavern, regions of everlasting cold as well as climes of eternal summer, all haven mission of good, director indirect, for your spirit Now I infer from this that the study of natural objeats will increase our religions knowledge* If David and Job and John and Patti could not afford to let go without observation one passing dead, or rift of snow, or spring blossom, you cannot afford to let them go without study. Men and women of God most eminent In all ages for faith and zeal, indulged in such observa- , tions— Pay son and Baxter and Doddridge and Hannah More. That man is not worthy the name of Christian who saunters listlessly among these magnificent disclosures of divine power around, beneath, and above us, stupid and uninstructed. They are sot worthy to live in a desert, for that has its fountains and palm-trees; nor in regions of everlasting ice, .or even there the stars kindle their lights, and auroras flash, and huge icebergs shiver in fee morning light, and Gad’s power sits upon them as upon a great white throne. Yet there are Christians in the Church who look upon all such tendencies of mind and heart as soft sentimentalities, and because they believed this printed Revelation of God are oon .ent to be infidels in regard to all feat has been written In this great Book of fee universe, written in letters of stars, in paragraphs of constellations, and illustrated wife sunset and thunder-cloud and spring morning. Oh for more sympathy with tbe natural world, and then we should always have a Bible open before us, and we oould take a lesson from the most fleeting circumstances, as when a storm came down upon England Charles Wesley sat in a room watching it through an open window, and frightened by the lightning and thunder a little bird flew in, and nestled in the bosom of fee sacred poet, and as be gently stroked it and felt the wild beating of its heart, he tamed to his desk and wrote feat hymn whioh will be song while the world lasts:

ItoasVonvc <st x&y Let me to th y bosom fly, While the billows near me roll While the tempest siili is high; Hide me, O my tiavior, hide, TUI the storm of life be pest, {Me Into, the haven guide, - O receive my soul at last la lUmmi. Stewardess: “Madame, I’ve attended to you the best I knew how, supplied every want, but you ore still unsatisfied. What do you want nowP” Seasick lady passenger: “I want the earth." —Boston Courier. This world is simply the threshold ol our vast life; the first stepping stones from nonentity into the boundless expanse of possibility, it is tbe infant school of the souL—T. Star King.