Rensselaer Republican, Volume 25, Number 22, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 26 January 1893 — AMETHYSTINE PALACES. [ARTICLE]

AMETHYSTINE PALACES.

TheJowelledFoundationsof the Wall of Heaven. -IttlWitlW! Mentioned by St. Joh—n Glories of lhe New Jerusalem— Dr. Talma re's Sermon. ■ J _ __*e± ' ■ ! . V" Dr. Talmage, having returned from "ids Southern tour, preached at Brooklyn, last .Sunday. Sujbject: “The Walls of Heaven.” Text: Revelation, xxi, 19— “The foundations of the wall of the city were garnished with gall manner cf precious stones.” He said; Shall I be frank and tell you what are my designs on you to-day? They are to make you homesick for heaven ; to console you concerning your de darted Christian friends by giving you some ideas of the brilliancy of lhe scenes in which they now commingle; to give aU who love the Lord a more elevated idea of as to where they are going to pass the most of the years of their existence, and to set all the indifferent and neglectful to quick and immediate preparation, that they may have it likewise. My text stands us in the presence of the most stupedous splendor of the universe, and that is the wall of heaven, ,’nd says of its foundations that they are garnished with all manner of precious stones. AJ the ancient cities had walls for safety,.and heaven has i wail for everlasting safety. Now I propose this morning, so ar as the Lord may help me, to atempt to climb not the wall of heaven. but the foundations of the wall, md I ask you to join me in the at-' ' empt to scale some of the heights. Che first layer of the foundation; -eaching all around the city and for , 500 miles, is a layer of jasper. The asper is a congregation of many •olors. It is brown; it is yellow'; it s green; it is vermillion; it is red; t is purple; it is black, and is so striped with colors that much of it is called ribbon jasper. I\ is found in Siberia and Egypt, ut it is rare in most lands and of ;reat value, for it is so hat’d the or'.inary processes cannot break it off tom the places- where it has been eposited. The workmen bore holes uto the rock of jasper, then drive nto these holes sticks of dry birchvood, and then saturate the sticks md keep them saturated until they well enough to split the rock, and lie fragments are brought out and polished and transported and cut into cameos and put behind the glass doors of museums. But we must pass up in this infection of the foundations of the p eat wall of heaven, and after leaving the: jasper the next precious reached is sapphire, and it -weeps around the city 1,500 miles. All lapidaries agree in saying that 'the sapphire of the Bible is what we low call lapis lazuli. Job speaks with emotion of “the place of sapphires,” and God toought so. much of bhis precious stone that he put it in the "breast-plate of the high priest, commanding, “The second row shall be an emerald, a sapphire and a diamond.” The sapphire is a blue, but varies Tom faintest hue to deepest ultramarine. It is found a pebble in the rivers of Ceylon. It is elsewhere in compact masses. Persia and Thibet And Burmah and New South Wales and North Carolina yield exquisite specimens. Its blue is seen in the valley of the Rhine. Sapphire based an jasper, a blue sky over a fiery sunset. St. John points to it in .Revelation.and says, 1 ‘The second,. sapphire,” and this suggests to me that though our eaath» and all its furniture of mountains and seas and atmospheres are to collapse and vanish we will throughout all eternity have in some way kept the most beautiful of earthly appearances, whether you take this sapphire of the second layer as literal or figurative. Oh, lam so glad that St. John told us about it! ‘“The second, sapphire!” A step higher and you come to chalcedony, another layer in the foundation of the wall and running 1,500 miles around the heavenly city. Chalcedony! Translucent. A devine mixture of agates and opals and cornelians. Striped with white and gray. Dashed of pallor, blushing into red and darkening into purple. Iceland and Hebrides hold forth beantiful specimens of chalcedony. But now we must make a swift ascent to the top of the foundation wall, for we or nnot minutely examine all the layers, and so, putting one foot on the chalcedony of which wc have been speaking, we spring to the emerald, and we are one-third of the way to the top of the foundation for the fourth row is emerald. That, I would judge, is God’s favorite among gems, because it holds what seems evident is his favorite color on earth, the green, since that is the color most widely diffused across the earth’s continents —the grass, the foliage, the everyday dress of nature. The emerald! Kings used it as a seal to stamp pronunciamentoes. The rainbow around the throne, of God is by St. John compared to it. In the Kremlin museum at Moscow there are crowns and scepters and outspread miracles of emeralds. Ireland is called the Emerald Isle not because of its verdure, but because it was presented to Henry II of England with an emerald ring. But upward still and you put your foot on a strattum of sardonyx, white and red, a seeming commingling oi snow and fire, the snow cooling the fire, the fire melting the snow. Another climb and you reach the sardius. named after the city of Sardius. Another climb and you reach the chrysolite. A specimen of this

belonging to Epiphanus, in the fourth dentury, was said to be so brilliant that whatever was put over to conceal it was shown through, and the emperor of China has a specimen that is described as having such penetrating radiance that it makes the night as fight as day: — — — A higher climb and you reach the -beryl. Two thousand years ago the Greeks used this precious stone for engraving purposes. It accounted among the royal treasures of Tyre. The hilt of murat’s sword was adorned with it. It glows in the imperial crown of Great Britian. But stop not here. Climb higher and you come to topaz, a bewilderment of beauty and named after an island of the. Red seaClimb higher and you come to chrysoprasus, of greenish golden hue and hard as flint. Climb higher and you reach the jacinth, named after the flower hyacinth and of reddish blue. ; Take one more step and you reach the top, hot of the wall, but the top of the foundations of the wall, and St. John cries out, “The twelth, an amethyst!” This precious stone, when found in Australia or India or Europe, stands in columns and pyramids. For color it is a violet blooming in stone. For its play of light, for its deep mysteries of color, for its uses in Egyptian, in Etruscan, in Roman art it has been honored. The Greekt thought the stone a ‘preventive of drunkenss. The Hebrews thought it a . source of pleasant dreams. For all lovers of gems it is a subject of admiration and suggestiveness. Yes the word amethyst means a preventive of drunkeness. Long before the New Testament made reference to the amethyst in the wall of heaven the Persians thought that clips mad 6 of amethyst would hinder any kind of liquor from becoming intoxicating. But. of all, the amethystine cups from which the ancients drank pot one had any such results of prevention? Ah, it is the amathystine cups that do the wildest and worst slaughter. The smash of the filthy goblets of the rummeries would long ago have taken place by law, but the amathystine chalices prevent —thechaliees out of which Legislatures and Congresses drink before and after they make laws. Amathystine chalices have been the friends of intoxication instead of its foes. Over the fiery lips of the amathystine chalices is thrust the tongue which biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an adder. But, some one will say, why have you brought us to this amathyst, the top row of the foundation of the heavenly wall, if you are not able to accept the theory of the ancient Greeks, who said that the amathyst was a jeharm against intoxication, or if you are not willing to accept the theory of the ancient Hebrews that the amathyst was a producer of pleasant dreams? My answer is, I have brought you to the top row, the twelfth layer of the foundation of the heavenly wall of 1,500 miles of circling amethyst to put you in a position where you can get a new idea of heaven; to let you see that after you climbed up twelve strata of glory you are only at the base of the eternal grandeurs: to let you, with enchantment of soul, look far down and look far up; and to force upon you the conclusion that if all our climbing has only shown us the foundation of the wall, what must the wall itself be; and if this is the outside, of heaven, what must the inside be; and if all this is figurative, what must the reality be? Oh, this piled up magnificence of the heavenly wall! Oh, this eternity of decoration! Oh, this opalescent, florescent, prismatic miracle of architecture! What enthronement of all colors! A mingling of the blue of skies, and the surf of seas, and the green of meadows, and the upholstery of autumnal forests, and the fire of August sunsets! All the splendors of earth and heaven dashed into those twelve rows of foundation wall! All that, mark you only typical of the spiritual glories that roll over heaven like the Atlantic and Pacific oceans swung in one billow. Oh, my soul! If my text shows us only the outside, what must the inside be? While riding last summer through the emperor’s park, near St. Petersburg, I was captivated with the groves, transplanted from all zones, and the flower beds, miles this way and miles that way, incarnadined with beauty, and the fountains bounding in such revel with the sunlight as nowhere else is seen. I said: “This is beautiful. I never saw anything like this before." But when I entered the palace and saw the pictured walls, and the long line of statuary, and aquariums afloat with all bright scales, and aviaries a-chant with bird voices, and the inner doors of the palace were swung back by the chamberlain, and I saw the emperor and empress and princes and princesses, and they greeted me with a cordiality of old acquaintanceship, I forgot all the groves and floral bewitchment I had seen outside before entrance. And now I ask, if tho outside of heaven attracts our souls to-day, how much more will be the uplifting when we get inside and see the King in his beauty and all the princes ana princesses of the palaces of amethyst? Are you not glad that we did not stop in our ascent this morning until we got to the top round of the foundation wall of heaven, the twelfth row, the amethyst? i s . f It is proposed by National Guardsmen of California to establish a bicycle battalion as a part of the National Guard of the State, and the proposition is meeting with a good deal 1 of support.