DR. TALMAGE'S SERMON: The Remnant of the Century, “Amen! Aflelluia!l * Rev. 10: 4 The Nineteenth century 1s departing. After it has taken a tew more steps, if each year be a step, it will be gone into the eternities. In a short time we shall be in the last decade of this cen- tury, which fact makes the solemnest book outside the Bible the almanac, and the most suggestive and the most tremendous piece of machinery in all the earth the clock. THE LAST DECADE of this ceutury, upon which we shall goon enter will be the grandest, might jest, and most decisive decade in all the chronologies. I am glad it is not to come 1mmediately, for we need by a new baptism of the Holy Ghost to prepare for it. The last ten years of the Nineteenth century-—may we all live to see them! Does any one say that this division of time is arbitrary? Oh, no; in other ages the divisions of time may have been, but our years date from Christ. Does any one say that the grouping of ‘ten together is an arrapgement abitrars? Oh, no; next to the figure seven, ten is with God a favorite num- ber, Abraham dwelt ten years In Canaan. Ten righteous men would have saved Sodom. In the ancient tabernacle were ten curtains, their pillars ten and their sockets ten. In the anclent temple were ten lavers, and ten candlesticks, and ten tables, and a molten sea of ten cubits. And the Commandments written on the granite of Mount Sinai were ten, and the kingdom of God was likened to ten virgins, and ten men should lay hold of Lim that was a Jew, and the reward of the greatly faithful is that they shall reign over ten cities, and in the effort to take the census of the New Jeru- salem the number ten swings around the thousands, crying *‘ten thousand times ten thousand.” So I come to look toward the closing ten years of the Nineteenth ceutury with an Inten- sity of interest 1 can hardly describe. I have also noticed that the favorite TIME FOR GREAT EVENTS in many of the centuries was the clos- ing fragment of the century. Is Ame- rica to be discovered—it must be In the last decade of the Fifteenth cen- tury, namely, 1402. Was free oonstl- tutional government to be well estab- ished in America—the last years of the Eighteenth century must achieve it. Were three cities to be submerged by one piteh of scorim— Herculaneum and Stable and Pompell in the latter part of the First century must go under. The Fourth century closed with the most agitating ecclesiastical war of history— Urban the Sixth against Clem- ent the Seventh, Alfred the Great closes the Ninth century, and Edmund | Ironsides the Eleventh century, with thelr resounding deeds. The Sixteenth | century closed with the establishment of religious independence In the United | Netherlands, Ah, almost every century has had its peroration of overtowering achievements, As the closing years of the centuries seem a favorite time for great scenes of smancipation or disaster, and as the number ten seems a favorite number in the Scriptures, written by divine di- rection, and as we are soon lo enter upon the last ten years of the Nine- teenth century, what does the world propose? What does the Church of Christ propose? What do reformers propose? I know not; but now in the presence of this consecrated assembly I propose that we make ready to get all our batteries planted, and all our plans well laid, in what remains of this decade, and then in the last decade of the Nineteenth century march up and take this round world for God. When 1 say we, I mean the five hun. dren million Christians now alive. But, as many of them will not have | enough heart for the work, i LET US COPY GIDEON, i and as he had thirty-two thousand men | in his army to fight the Midianites, but many of them were not made of the right stuff, and he promulgated a military order, saying: * Whosoever is fearful and afrald let him return and depart early from Gilead,” and twenty. two thousand were afraid of getting hurt, and weat home, and only ten thousand were left, and God told them that even this reduced number was too large a number, for they might think they had triumphed independent of divine help, ard so the number must be still further reduced, and only those three hundred men with the battle shout, “The sword of the Lord and of Gideon,’ scattered the Midianites like leaves in an equinox; so out of the five hundred million nominal Chnstians of to-day let all unbelievers and cowards go home and get out of the way. And su we have only four handred million left, suppose only two hundred million left, suppose we only have fifty million left, we will undertake THE DIVINE CRUSADE, and each one just scooping up a palm full of the river of God's mercy In one hand, and a palm full of the river of God's strength in the other, let us with the ery, ‘The sword of the Lord and of Gideon,” the sword of the Lord and of John Knox, the sword of the Lord and of Matthew Simpson, the sword of the Lord and of Bishop McIlvaine, the Lord and of Adoniram { A and am willing to be the how this leprosied world may in the final decade of the Nineteenth century bave its flesh come again as the tlesh of a little child, The whole trouble 18 that we put off the completien of the world’s relemp- tion to such long and indefinite dis- tances, The old proverb, that “what is everybody's business is nobody’s business,” might be changed a little, and be made truthfully to say what is the gospel business of all the agesis the gospel business of no age. We are fighting at too long a range, That gun called the Swamp Angel’ was a nuis- auce. It shot six miles, but it hardly ever hit anything, It did its chief destructive work when it burst and killed those who were setting it off. Short range is the effective kind of work, whether it be for worldly or religious purpose. Some man with his eyes half shut drones out to me the Bible quotation, *‘*A thousand years are as one day;” that is, ten centuries are not long for the lord. But why do you not quote the previous sen- tence, which says that one day 18 with the Lord as a thousand years? That is, He could do the work of ten cen- turies in twenty-four hours. The mightiest obstacle to Christian work is the Impression that the world’s evan- gelization 18 away off. Many of us act as though we thought that when Macaulay's famous New Zealander in the far distance is seated on a broken arch of London bridge sketching the ruins of St. Paul's, his grandchild might break in and jolt his pencil by asking him if he thought the milen- nium ever would appear. Men and women of the eternal God! sons and daughters of the Lord Almighty! we may have it start in the decade that is soon to commence, and 1t will be done if we can pursuasde the people to get ready for this work. What makes me think done? First, because GOD 18 READY. He needs no long persuasion to do His work, for if He is not willing that any should perish, Ho is not willing that any of the people of the next decade shall penish; and the whole Bible is a chime of bells ringing out *“Comel come! come!” But He is walling, as He sald He would, for the co-operation of the Church. When we are ready, God is ready. And He certainly has all the weaponry ready to capture this world for the truth, all the weapons of kindness or devastation. On the one hand the Gospel and sunshine, and power to orchardize and gardenize the earth, and fountains swinging in rain- bow and Chatsworthian verdure, and aromas poured out of the vials of heaven, while on the other hand He has the weaponry of devastation, thunderbolt and conflagration, and forces planetary, solar, lunar, stellar, or meteoric, that with loose rein thrown on the neck for a second would leave constellations and it can be and shivered | wheels on the boulevards of heaven. | Blessed be His glorious name! 11. If you continue to ask me why I think that the world can be saved in the final decade of the Nineteenth cen- tury, I reply, Because it is not a great undertaking, considering THE NUMBER OF WORKERS that will go at it, if once persuaded, it can be douse. We have sifted the five hundred million of workers down to four hundred million, and three huu- dred million, and two hundred million, and one hundred million, aod to Gfty million. 1 went to work to cipher out how many souls that number could bring to God in ten years, if each one brought a soul eyery year, and if each soul so brought should bring another each succeeding year. 1 found out, alded by a professor in mathematics, that we did not need anything like such a number of workers enlisted. You see it Is a smmple ques. in geome- trical progression. Then I gave to the many persons would it require to start with if each one brought a soul into the kingdom each year for ten years, and each one brought another each suc- ceeding year, in order to have fourteen hundred milllon people saved, or the population of the earth at present? His answer was, Two mililon seven hundred and fifty-four “thousand three hundred and seventy-five workers, So you see that when I sifted the five hundred million nominal Christians of the earth down to fifty milion and stopped there, I retained for this work forty-seven million people too many, There It is in glorious mathematics, quod er at demonstrandum, DIVINE MATHEMATICS, Do you tell me that God does not care for mathematics? Then you have never seen the Glants’ Causeway, where God shows his regard for the hexagonal In whole ranges of rocky columns with six sides and six angles. Then you have not studied the geometry of a bee's honeycomb with six sides and six angles. Then you have not noticed what regard God has for the square, the altar of the ancient tabernacle four uare, the b late four square, the court of the Temple in Ezekiel’s vision four square, the New Jerusalem laid out four square, Or you have not noticed his regard for the circle by making 1t His throne, *‘sitting on the circle of the earth,’ and fashioning sun and moon and stars in a circle, and sending our planetary system around other systems in a cirele, and the universe sweeping around the throne of God in a circle, 80 I enlist mathematics for the demon stration of the easy possibility of bringing the world to God in the com- ing by simple process of solicl- tation, each one only having to bring one & year; although I want to take in forty and I know men now alive who I think, by pen or voles, or both, directly or indirectly, will take hundreds of thousands each. So you’ gee that that will discharge some of 2.754.875 from the necessity of taking “i some blind tell some of the Seigadier-genersls. of the Lord of hosts oF pods ia ments of the human family, We can- not say to onedenomination, You take Persia, and another, You take China, and another, You take India, because there are all styles of temperament In ull nations, And some denominations are especially adapted to work with people of sanguine temperament, or phlegmatic temperament, or cholerle temperament, or bllious temperament, or nervous temperament, or lymphatic temperament, The Episcopal Church will do 1ts most effective work with those who by taste prefer the stately and ritualistic. The Methodist Church will do its best work among the emo- tional and demonstrative, The Pres- byterian Church will do its best work among those who like strong doctrine. and the stately service softened by the emotional, bo each denomination will have certain kinds of people whom it will epecially affect. So let the work be divided up, There are the seven hundred and fifty thousand Christians of the Pres- byterian Church North, and other hun- dreds of thousands in the Presbyterian Church South, and all foreign Presby- terlans, more especially Scotch, Eng- lish, and Irish, making, 1 guess, about two million Presbyterians; the Metho- dist Church is still larger; the Church of England on both sides of the sea still larger; and many other denomina- tions as much, if not more consecrated than any I have mentioned Divide up denominations after they are persuaded it can be done before the Nineteenth century 1s dead, and the last Hotten- tot, the last Turk, the last Japanese, the last American, the last European, the last Asiatic, the last African, will see the salvation of God before he sees the opening gate of the Twentieth cen- fury. THE MACHINERY READY, IV. Again, I feel the whole world can be saved in the time specified, be- cause we have all manner of machinery requisite. It 1s not as though we had all bullt, and running day and night, those printing religious papers (925 of those religious papers in this country), those printing religious tracts and those printing religious books. And thousands of printing-presses now In the service of the devil could be brought and set to work in the ser- vice of God, Why was the printing preas invented? To turn out bill-heads, and circulars of patent medicines, and tell the news which in three weeks will be, of no Importance? From the old-time Franklin print. ing-press, on up to the Lord Stanhope press, and the Washington press, and the Victory press, to Hoe's perfecting printing press, that machine has been improving for its best work, and its final work, namely, the publica- tion of the glad tidings of great joy which shall be to all people. We have the presses, or can have them before the first of January, when the new Adam and Eve, V. Bat this brings me to the adjoining thought; namely, we have THE MONEY TO DO THE WORK. [ mean the fifty million of Christians have it. Ay, the two million seven nundred and fifty-four thoumud Chris. tians have it; and the dam which is beginning to leak will soon break, and there will be rushing floods of hundreds and millions and billions of dollars in the wealthy men of the kingdom of God that the speedy conversion of the world is a possibility. I have no sympa- thy with this bombardment of rich men. Almost every paper [ take up tells of some wealthy man who has endowed a college, or built a church or a free library, and that thing is going to multiply unt the treasury of all our denominations and reformatory organi. zations will be overwhelmed with of wealth that the world’s evangeliza tion is possible, and that they may live to see 1L with their own eyes, I have always cherished the idea that when the world Is converted, we would be allowed to come out on the battle. ments of heaven and see the bannered procession and the bonfires of victory. But I would like to see the procession closer by, and just be permitted my- self to throw en a fagol for a bigger bonfire. And if you persuade our men of wealth that there is a possi. bility for them to join on earth the glee of A REDEEMED PLANET, instead of laborious beseeching for funds, and arguing and fattering, in order to get a contribation for Chris tian objects, our men of wealth will stand in line as at a post office window or a railroad ticket office, but in this case waiting for their turn to make charitable deposit. The Gentiles are not long going to allow themselves to be eclipsed by Mr. Hirsch, the Jew, who hgg just given forty million dollars for schiOOls in France, Germany and Russia, I rejoice that so much of the wealth of the world is coming into the possession of Christian men and’ women. And although the original Church was very poor, and its mem- bes were {ish dealers on the banks of Galilee, and only had such stock on hand as they could take in their own net, to ay in the hands of Christian men and women there Is enough mone to print Bibles and build churches support missionaries under God in ten years to save the world. Vi. Again, I think that the world’s evangelization can be achieved in the time specified, because we have already five gravel stones skilfully flung, sent sprawling the bragging ten-footer, his mouth into the dust, and his heels into the air. W hat but such a consummation could AFIT CLIMAX to this century? You notice a tendency in history and all about us to a climax. The creation week rising from herbs to fish, and from fish to bird, and from bird to guadruped, and from quad- ruped to immortal man, The New Testament rising from qulet genea- logical table in Matthew to apocalyptic doxology in Revelation, Now, what can be an appropriate climax to this century, which has heard the puff of the first steamer, and the throb ef the first stethoscope, and the click of the first telegraph, and the clatter of the first sewing machine, and saw the flash of the first electrict light, and the revolution of the first steam plough, and the law of storms was wrilien, and the American Bible society and American Tract soclely were born; and instead of an audience laugh- ing down Dr, Carey for advocating foreign missions, as was dene at North- ampton in England in the last century, now all dsnominations are vying with each other as to who shall go the furth. est and the soonest into the darkest of | the New Hebrides; and three hundred | thousand souls have been born to God { in the South Sea Islands; and Microne- sia have been set in the crown of Christ, and David Livingstone has unveiled Africa, and the last bolted gate of barbaric nations has swung wide open to let the gospel in. What, I ask, with a thousand interrogation points uplifted, can be a fit, an appro~ priate and sufficient, climax except it be a world redeemed ? INVISIBLE COADJUTORS. viii. Yea, I believe it can be done if we get prepared for it, because the | whole alr and the whole heaven is full fof willing help. “Are they not all ministering spirits sent forth?” We make an awful mistake if we calculate only on the forces we can ses, The { mightiest army Is in the air. My | brethren, so much of selishness and | pride and rivalry and bad motives of ali | kinds get into our work bere that we { are hindered. But the mighty souls i natures, are on our side, SUNDAY SCHOOL LESSON, Buspay May 5, 1550, The Command to Watch, LESSON TEXT. Mark 13 : 4-1. Memory verses, 8-37.) LESSON PLAN. Toric or Tar QUARTER : ishing Hix Work. Gorpex Texr von rae Quanren : J have glorified thee on the earth, having accomplished the wor k which thou haxt given me to do, John 17 : 4. Jesus Fin- Lessox Toric: Watehfulness to the End, { 1. The Appointed End, ve I 8 The Indubitable” —_ Lesko OUTLINE :< * The IDAUBAADY Tokens | 8. The Universal Duty, vs Goroes Texr : Take ye heed, watch and pray: for ye know not when the Mark 13 ; 38. time is. Dany Hose Beapines M. Mark 13 ;: 24-37. to the end. T.~—~Matt. 24 : 20-51. parallel narrative W.—Luke 21 : 25-86. Luke's paral- lel narrative. Zeph. 1 wrath. F.—Mal 3 Lord. 8.—Matt, 25 : 51-46, judged. 8.~1 Thess, 4 : 13-18, Cs his saints, Watchiulness Matthew's T. 1-18. The day of 1-18. The coming The ng for min LESSON ANALYSIS, Y THE APPOINTED EXD. I. Tokens in the Heavens : The sun shall be darkened, and the moon shall not give her light (24). The sun shall be darkened in his going forth (Isa. 138 10). I will cover the sun with a cloud (Ezek. 33:7) and the moon into blood (Acts 2 : 20). The sun became black hair (Rev. 6 : 12) 11. Coming in the Clouds | The t with great power (26, x s iis of heaven | There came with the clon we Jil $13 h ¢ an on iiN HOG & SOD OF Nan world, until from exhaustion some of { decline their help. Irenmus Prime! | forgotten the work toward which you gave for more than half a century your { 111. Gathering the Elect: Gather togethe y wi i. Nol David Then come Brainerd! { your matchless pen? {down and help, delirious amid the {the swamp? No! Then come down {and help. Moncrieff and Freeman {and Campbelll Have you forgotten | Lucknow and Cawnpore? Nol! Then | come down and beip. I rub out of my eyes the stupidity and unbelef, {and I, the servant of these great Ellishas in the Gospel, see the moun- | tains all around about are fall of horses {of fire and chariots of fire; and they | head this way, Hovered over are we by { down | Clouds of apostles in the alr led on by | Paull Clouds of martyrs In the air led jon by Stephen! Clouds of prophets in {the air led on by Isaiah! Clouds of | patriarchs in the air led on by Abra { ham! Clouds of ancient warrior in the | warrior at whose prayer {once halted over Ajalon and Gibson ‘seems now to ft one hand toward the | descending sun of this century, and the {| pther baud toward the moon of the last | decade, saying: **Stand thou still till | the Church of God gets the victory!” | Then let us take what remains of | this decade to get ready for the final | decade of the Nineteenth century. You | and 1 may not live to see that decade or may pot live to see its close, but that shall not under me from de- claring the magnificent possibility. I confess that the mistake of my life has been, not that I did not work hard for I could not have worked barder and lived, a8 God knows and my family knows-—but that I have not worked under the realization that the salvation of this world was a nearby possibility. Dut whether wo see the be- ginning or the closing of that decade is of no importance, if only that decade can get the coronation; and then all de- cades shall kneel before this enthroned decade, and even the gray-grown oen- turies will cast their crowns before it, and it will be the most honored decade between the time when the morning stars sang together as the libretto of worlds was opened, and the time when the mighty angel, robed in cloud and landed in minbow, shall, with one oot on the land, swéar by Him that livetn forever and ever that time shall be no longer. Alleluia! Amen! Texan Debts of Gratitude. he attendant decisive aim “Th angels, nt his elect The ©» EUPErvis en shall inistering angels; ng Lord; (4 assembly. IL THE INDUNITABLYE | 1. Tokens in Nature: When he Tr branch | Jeaves, . . . .summer is nigh ( The fig tree repineth in blossom (Song of Sol. 2:13) The earth bringeth forth her bud (Isa 61 : 11). Ye know how to discern the face of the heaven (Matt. 16 : 3). Ye know that the summer is nigh (Matt. 24 : 32) Il. Tokens in Grace: When ve see these things... ye that he is nigh (29). 1 do see my bow in the cloud, token (Gen. 9: 13). Ye eannot discern the signs of the times (Matt. 16:3). TOEESRS putteth forth its a the Vines are k now dora that he is nigh (Matt, 24 : 33). When ye see these things, . .. .the king- dom of God is nigh (Luke 21 : 31). 111. Positive Statements: This generation shall not pass away, until all. . . . be accomplished (30). man cometh (Matt. 24 : 44). I come ssrain, and will receive you unto myself (John 14 : 8). This Jesus. ...shall so manner (Acts 1 : 11). come in like heaven (1 Thess. 4 : 16), 1. “Now from the fi parable.” (1) The Sorts command; (1) The figdree’s teaching; (3) The disciples’ gain. “When ve see these things, .... know ye." (1) Tokens appointed; (23 Observation required; (3) Know- ledge gained. 8. “My words shall not pass sway.” (1) The mutability of material things; (2) The permanence of spiritual things. 111. THR UNIVERSAL DUTY. 1. The Absent Lord: It is as....a man, sojourning in an- other country (34). A householder... .went into another country (Matt. 21 : Itisas. . country (Matt. 25 : 14). A certain nobleman went into a far country (Luke 19 : 12). unto the Father (John 14 : 28), t 2. iL. The Universal Duty. What 1 say unto youn I say unto all, Watch (37). Watch therefore (Matt. 25 : 13). Take ve heed, watch and pray (Mark 13 : 39). Watch ve, stand fast in the faith (1 Cor. 16 : 13). Let us not sleep, {1 Thess, bh . 6. 1. “Of that day or that hour knoweth (1; The great day; (2) The hour; The inevitable 43 The world-wide uncer ,. but let us watch LO One i decisive (3) coming; tainty. 2, “Take ye heed, watch and pray.” (1) An imperative command; (2) A double duty. ~{1} Caution: (2) Watchfulness: (3) Prayer 8. “Lest coming suddenly he find yon sleeping.” (1) Budden coming; (2) Culpable negligenee, --{(1) Approach; (2) Burprise; (3) Detection; (4) Doom, LESSON BIBLE READING, WATCHPULNESS, Commanded (Mark 13 : 37 : Urged {1 Thess. 5 : 6 * Neglected (Matt, 14 ; With prayer (Luke With thanksgiving With stedfastnes At all times (Pr In all thing Blessed (LL TH ae ai 21 Col ¥ LESSON SUBROUNDINGS The pre } is clusion of Mark's report of the discourse of which the be 1 lesson That por ITI TIT OF EYP i 43 Vas ¥ formed the inst red to the de the wont 1 ¥ ary y fag ent lesson contains © Cone m evidently refer- traction of Jerusals m, # BCINs 10 pois ¢ iY ~ intervening to the wider re ence, still future, is accepted by many, a8 indicated in the ‘ is « this lesson, “In thos tribulation;” esp« view of the application of the latter part of the dis- course, and of the more SAIN even at a words of that opening after davs, CIALLY In explicit ments and the added parsbles in + state- Mat- thew 25. The place is still the mount of Olives The time, Tuesday ey of Nisan {JH rhaps £ gun) April 5, yea: { D. 30. 12th Paralls 1 passage 5. | 44 ; Lake 21 : 25-36 - oe Quan! Bayings of Children. A MATRON « 0 fron s on from Byrox OTHE whe irom the rocking ow Nurse was giving Merle his bath, and presently arose a great commotion and als of de Light. Mamma hast- ened to the rescue, and found her wee won girded about with a towel—guiltiess of rainment-and dancing around poor nurse, who was looking damp and lismayed. “OO! O! mammal!” Merlo shrieked gleefully, “I are John Baptist, don’t ¥« An’ I'm been bapper- . g Nursie! shrill sque © 58 mn see? | tasin : : aan | Not long ago Mrs. Boo was teach | ing her Little son the Sunday-school les- | son about Jonah and his tarrying in the { whale three days. Suddenly the small i listener interrupted with: * “My! didn’t {be get a long free ride, though, | mamma!” i an {| A small four-year-old friend went to | the Universalist Church on Children’s | Day, albeit her parents are Congrega- tionalistx, {| The minister talked pleasantly to the | little folks, and in closing, expressed a | desire to see all the bright hittle faces | next Sunday. As he made a slight { pause, one little maiden lifted up hex | sweet small voice and said: “I tan't | tome, minister, for tause my mamma's | a Northerdox.™ The Hair, Whether there are outward applica tions which ean have any effect in re- storing gray hair, or cause it to grow on bald places, is a question to which we shall not attempt %o give an answer. There are some things however regard- ing the treatment of the hair, which medical science and practice have full established, and which it is well enon for every one to keep constantly before the mind. The nutrition of hairs is effected through vessels in close con- tact of their tissne without enteri jute wor structure, so Jat & causes af- ecting especiale x the condition of the My act power. lly upon the nutrition of the hair. Cleanliness of the skin and a healthful circulation of the blood from i
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers