REY. DR. TALMAGE. THE BROOKLYN DIVINES SUN. DAY SERMON, Subject: “God Among the Shells” Text: “And the Lord said unto Moses, Take unto thee sweet spices, stacte and | onycha." Exodus xxx. 84. color, prism on prism, and their adaptation ing jor bolsterous seas, The me the thought of th God. g o provi What is the use of all this architecturs of the shell, and why is it pictured from thes outside lip clear down into its labyrinths of construction? Why the infinity of skill and radiance in a shell? What is the use of the all dash upon | color and exquisite curve of a thing =o in. | significant as a shellfish? Why, when the | conchologist by dredge or rake fotohss the crustaceous specimens to the shore, does he find at his feet whole alhambras and coli- You may not have noticed the shells of | Sums and parthenous and crystal palaces of the Bible, although in this early part of the | beauty in miniature, and these bring tolight sacred book God calls you to consider and | only an infinitesmal part of the opulence in employ them as He c¢:lled Moses to consider | and employ them. The onycha of my text is a shell found on the banks of the Red Sea, and Moses and his army must have crushed | many of them under foot as they crossed | the bisected waters, onycha on the beach and onycha in the unfolded bed of the deep, I shall speak of this shell as a beautiful and practical revelation of God, and as true as | ] | tween, | Not only is this shell, the onycha, found | fathoms, or 14,210 feet deep, the first chapter of Genesis and the last chapter of Revelation or everything be- at the Red Sea, but in she waters of India. | 1t not only delectates the eye with its convo- | lutions of beauty, white and lustrous and | serrated, but blesses the nostril with a pun- | gent aroma, I'his shelifish, uccustomed to | feed on spikenard, is redolent with that | odorous plant—redolent when alive and re- dolent when dead. Its shells waen burned bewitch the air with fragrance. In my text God commands Moses to mix this onchya with the perfumes of the altar | in the ancient tabernacle, and I propose to mix some of its perfumes at the altar of | Brooklyn Tabernacle, for, baving spoken to | you on the “Astronomy of the Bible: or, iod Among the Stars;” the “Chronology of | the Bible; or, God Among the ( enturies " | the “Ornithology of the Bible, er, God | Among the Birds" the “Mineralogy of the Bible; or, God Among the Amethysts:” the “Ichthyology of the Bible: or, Goi Among the Fishes,” [ now come to speak of the “Conchology of the Bible, or, God Among the Snells.” | It 15a secret that you may keep for me, for I bave never before told it to any one, that in all the realms of the natural world there is nothing tome so fascinating, so compietely absorbing, so full of surgestive ness, asa shell. Woat? More entertaining than a bird, which can sing, when a shell cannot ging? Well, there vou have made a great mistake, Pick up the onycha from the banks of the Red Sea or pick up a bivalve from the beach of the Atlantis Ocean and listen, and you hear a whole choir of marine volces—Dbass, alto, soprano--in an unknown tongue, Lut seeming to chant, as I to my ear, “The His and He made it others singing, * way, O God t sea.” others hymuing, * of ts it them ’ eraleth ther the sea.’ “What,” says some on shell impress Some respects, shell and cl cannot ha must study § millions of ‘Wi more flower? 8, for it has fa ties and far greater richn could sh 1% its Deanty {te that th tury after which the hoof of Pharaoh aside in the chase of the [wm Red Sea may have kept its hour, Yes, they are so part many colored that you might pile then until you would have a wall with all « rs of the wall of heaven, fr e ja per the bottom to the amethyst at the top | Bb, the shells! The petrified foam of the sea, Ob, the shells! The hardensd bubbles of the deep, Ob, the shells, which are the diadems ows by the ocean to the feet of the continents, How the shells are ribbed, 4 oved, cylindered, mottled, iridescent hey were used as coin by some of the N tions, They were fastened in belts by others, and made in handles of wooden im piements by still others, Moliusks not only of the sea, but mollusks of the land. Do you know how much they bave had to do with the world’s history? They saved the church of God from extinguishment The liruelites marched out of Egypt 000.000 strong, besides flocks and herds, The Bible says **the people took their dough before it was leavened, their kneading troughs being bound up in the clothes om their shoulders. They were thrust forth out of Egypt and could not tarry; neither had they prepared for themseves any victuals” Just think of it? Forty yearsin the wilder ness, Infidelity triumphantly asks, How could they live forty years in the wilderness without food? You say manos fell, Oh, that was after a long while, They would bave starved fifty times before the manna fell, The they were chiefly kept alive by the meliusks of the land or shelled creatures, Mr. Fronton and Mr. Sicard took the same route from Egypt toward Canaan that the Israelites took, and they give this as their testimony. “Although the childran of [srasl must have consisted of about 2,000 with baggage and innumerable flocks and herds, they were not experience any in- | convenience in their march, Several thou. sand persons might walk abreast with the greatest ease in tle very narrowest part of the valley in which they first began to file off, It soon afterward expands to above | leagues in width, With respect to forage they would be at no loss. The ground is covered with tamarisk, broom clover and saint foin, of which latter Spm lally camels are passionately foo 1, be. tides almost every variety of odoriferous plant and herb proper for pasturage. “The whole sides of the valiey through | which the children Israel marched are still tufted with brushwood. which doubt. less afforded tood for their beasts, together with many drier sorts for lighting fire, on which the Israelites could with the greatest ease bake the dough they brought with them on small iron plates, which form a constant appendage to the baggage of an oriental traveler, Lastly, the herbage underneath these trees and shrubs is completaly covered | with snails of a prodigions wae and of the | best sort, and, however uniuviting such a repast ought appear to us, they are here es teemied a great delicacy. They are so plenti- ful in this valley that it may be literal y said | that it is difficult to take one step without treading on them.” Bo the shelled creatures saved the host of Jeraclites on the march to the promised land, and the attack of infidelity at this point is defeated by the facts, as infidelity is i always defeated by facts, vines itis founded | on ignorance, In writing and printing our interrogation point has at the bottom a mark | like a period and over it a flourish like the swing of a tesuster’'s whip, and we put this interrogation point at the ead of a question, but in the Spanish language the ivterroga. tion nt is twice uml for each question, At the beginning of the question toe Inter tion point is presented upside down, and at the close of the question right side When infidelity puts a question about the Seri ures, as it always indicates igoo- | rance, the question ought to be printed with two interrogation points, one at the begin- ning and one at the close, but both upside down, Thank God for the wealth of mollusks all up and down the earth, whether fealing Israelites on their way to the land flow - ing with milk and honey, or, as we are bet. ter acquainted with the mollusks, when flung to the beach of lake or sen, Theres are three great families of them, If I should a. century, y yn tt o - fact =, 0) souls likely to 3 . ’ of | depths of 1000 fathoms, { science, found { have wardrobe and shelter? | Rives an ivory palace t that God heip: them to b slp themselves house of stone of carbonate fortunes when and, fortu own oot itself built one, to crustace every flake of their © suough to stand a large estate ance dropped smotion, | stacte and onyoha | of the onyoha, put it over the fire, and as it 16 great subaqueous world, Lisonmus counted 2300 species of shells, but conchology | bad then only begun its achievements, While expioging the bed of the Atlantic Ocean in preparation for laying the cable sholled animals were brougnt up from When lifting the telegraph wire from the Mediterransan and ol Seas, shelled creatures were brought up from depths of 2000 fathoms. The Eog- lish admiralty, exploring in behalf of mollusks at a depth of 2435 What a realn awlul for vastoess! As the shell is only the houss and the wardrobe of insignificant animals of the deep, why all that wonder and beauty of Comstruction, God's care for them is the only reason. Aud if God provide so munifl- cently for them, will He not that you Wardrobe and shelter for a periwinkle! Shall there not be wardrobe and shelter fora man? Would God give a coat of mail for the defense of a nautilus and leave you no defense against Lhe storm? Does He build a stone house for a creature that lasts a season and leave with- oR] | out home a soul that takes hold on centuries | and eons? Hugh Miller found “the Footprints of the Creator in the old red sandstone,” and | | hear the harmonies of God in the tinkle of | the sea shells when the tides come in. The same Christ who drew a lesson of providen- tial cars from the fact that God clothes with grass the fisld instructs we to draw the same lesson from the shells, In almost every man's life, however wall born and prosperous for years, and in al- most every woman's life, there comes a very dark time, at least onc A conjunction of circumstances will threaten bankruptoy and homelessness and starvation, It may be that these words will mest the ear or will meet the eye of those who are it foreboding, C a state of how God 1 such ne, then, and see ) a water an you could cover with a ten-cont Wihes in armor against all attack no bigger than a snowflake, that God will take better care than of one of His hildren I rake to Yo with the the most thorough w His creatures, 1 inds of shells t A most comforting faith, and look at these wanded a wa ir fest evidences of God pile around y } may tsa iy. Od, ve of littl ws of coraline shell fit jusen n day, wo fallen rainbows olor, and ex. Walk among 10 thesa lilies ne, these 1 “tone, micas i 0 Dave yourt clear nights gin Mar Lain a fe tempesis be totaed Lt be jos nd and lesson of od creatures ndry But while vou get this pointad pre vidential care from the shel f the dea tics in their tioa This in which they lve is not iropped on them and is not built around thew. The material for it exudes from their wn bodies and is adorned with a colored fluid from the pores of own neck. It i* a most intarasting thing to sos thew tacean animale fashion their own homes of Hae and membrane yy W their of thin shells for still ponds and thick coat. ential caro of will have to get fixel un befors there or they will make trouble hy out to ng: ‘Keep off that gras ™ do you mean by nlucking that “Show your tickets I” Oh, how many Christian propls need to obey my text and take into th sir worship and their behavior and their o msocintions and presbyteries and general ass 'm lies and conferences more onycha! I have some times gone in a very gala of spirit into the presence of some disacrasable ( hristians and in five ninules folt wretohed, and at some other time I have gone depressed into the company of suave and genial souls, and in a few moments 1 felt exhilarant. What was the differance? It was the difference in what they burned on their censers. The one burned onycha: the other burned asafetida, In this conchiological study of the Bible 1 also notices that the molusks or shelled ani- mals furnish the purple that you sea richly darkening 0 many Scriptura chapters, The purple stuff in the ancient tabernacle, tha purpie wirdle of the priests, the purple mantle of Roman Emperors, the apparel of Dives in purple and fine linen—aye, the purple robe which in mockery was thrown upon Christ—were colored by the purple of the shells on the shores of the Maditerra. nean. It was discoversd by a shepherd's dog having stained his mouth by breaking one of the shells, and the purple aroused ad- miration, Costly purple! Six pounds of the purple liquor extracted from the shellfishes wore used to prepare one pound of wool. Purple was also used on the pages of booke, Bibles and prayer books appeared in purple vellum, which may still be found in some of the nue tional libraries of Europe, Plutarch speaks of the purple which keot his beauty for 19) years. Dut after awhile the purple became easier to get, and that which had been a sign of imperial authority when worn mn robes was adopted by many people, and so an emperor, jealous of this appeopriation of the purple, made a law that anv one except royalty wearing purple should be put to death, Then, as if to punish the world for that outrage of ex , God obliterated the color frem the earth, as much as to say, “If all cannot have it, none shall have it.” jut though God bas deprived the race of that shellfish which afforded the purple there are shells enough left to make us glad and worshipiul. Ob, the entrancement of ius and shape still left all up and down the beaches of all the continents! These creatures of the sea have what roofs of enameled por- calain! They dwell under what pavilions blue as the sky and flery as a sunset and mysterious as an aurora! And ami not right in leading you for a few moments through this mighty realm of God #0 neg- lected by human eye and human footstep? it is said that the harp and lute ware in. they ¢n calling “What flower?’ WEI VO 088 nted from the fact that in Egypt the Nile rflowed its banks, and when the waters | ratreated tort on all and | face t | turning the mm f th or { find the climax of this conehiol doh has this disti pems~that it ie in the ari, w ADOYe all other y human hand wr spent of it Dons with with § the pearl, product i ive right { Ceviona nt 80 18 axon » pearl 1 do was made out of ire risag to the chemistry of nature a solid You wil t wonder ir on FUT. y take it and quid into | soe why the Bible makes s0 much of the | pear] in its {i MINen i sail | divers Ad all of this is a mighty lesson to those | Who are waiting for others to they ought to go to work mollusks, build their own of their own brain, out of their sweat, out of their own ind: a moliugk on all the beaches of seas would have a house of shell Do rot wait for others you. All the the earth Xs the nes out Wires all the shelter you or creatures prosper a of ridge of their tiny castles on Pacific and Mediterranean coasts * Halp yourssl!, while Gol helps you to help yourself.’ Those people who are waiting for their father or rich old uncle to die and leave them | a fortune are as silly as a mollusk would be to wait for some other mollusk to drop on t a shell equipment, It would kill the mol. usk as in most cases it destroys a man, Not mn parson otal of a huadred ever was strong by inherit. him in a chunk, Have great expectations from oaly two parsons «- God and yourself, Lot the onycha of my text become your precsptor But the more I examine the more | am impressed taat Gol is a God Many sooff at emotion and seem to think that God is a God of cold geometry and iron laws and sternal apathy and en- throned stoicism. Nol! Nol The shells with overpowering emphasis deny it, While law and order reign in the universe, you have but to see the lavishness of color on the erustacen, all shades of crimson from faint est blush to blood of battlefield, all shades of green, all shades of all colors from deepest black to whitest light just called out on the shells with no more order than a mother premeditates or calculates how many kisses and hugs she shall give her babe waking up in the morning sunligat You, my God is an emotional God, and He says, “We must have colors and let the sun paint all of them on tha scroll of that shell, and we must have music, ani here is a caro on shells of | for the robin, and a psalm for man, anl a doxology for the seraphim, and a resurrec- tion call for the archangel.” Aye, He showed Himself a God of sublime emotion when He flung Himself on this world in the personality of Christ to save it, without re- gard to the tears it would take, or the blood it would exhaust, or the agonies it would erash out, When | see the Louvres and the Luxem. bourgs and the Vaticane of Divine paintin strewn along ths 8000 miles of coast, and hear in a forest On a summer MOrning mus loal soademies and Handel societies of fall | orchestras, | say God is a God of emotion, and if He observes mathematios it is mathe. mation set to music, and His figures are writ. ten not in white chalk on bilackboards, but written by a finger of sunlight on walls of Jasmine and trumpet creeper In my study of the conchology of the Bible this onyohs of the text also impresses me with the fact that religion Is perfumed, | What eles coul God have meant when He mid to Moses, “Take unto thes sweet spices, Moses took that shell erumbled into ashes it exhaled an odor that hung in every enrtain and filled tas ancient tabernacle, and its sweet smoke esoapsd from the sacred precincts and saturated the outside air, Perfume! That is what religion ls. Bat instead of that some make it a or, of maki could ~ build their | udes if you . ! of It. Boats with divers from the island of Ceviesn., ten to each boat Thirtecn men and manaze the boat Down the dangerous depths amid sharks that whirl around them, plunge the divers, while 80.0 pe pie anxiously guy Alter three or four minutes’ abs:noe m the air the diver ascends, nine-tanths iguiated and blood rushing from ears and nostrils, and flinging his pearly treasure m know how it costs to out tht 1 guide into { on the sand falls into unconsciousness. | peri [Ar if it had | from | wearing and from every | th Atlantic and | say, | the | | | | Ob, It is an awful exposurs and strain and 10 fish for pearie, and yet thay & #6, Msitnotaw ler that to get that which the Bible calls the pearl of great price, worth more than all other pearis put together, there should 1 little anxiety, so little iaam? Would God as wise as the merchantman commended, “who when be had yd one pear! of great price, went and that he had and bought it" what thrills me with suggestiveness ta the material out which all pearls are made, They are (ashionad from the wound of the shellfish he exudation from that wound is fized and hardened and enlargsd into a pear The ruptured vessels of the water animals fashioned the gem that now adorns finger or earring, or sword hilt or king's crown ut of the wounds of earth will come # pearis of heaven, Oat of the wound of ement the poar! of solace, Out of the of loss the pearl of gain, Out of the round of the grave the pearl of resur. rection Joy, Out of the wounds of a Saviour's life and a Saviour's death the rich, the radiant, the everiasting pearl of heaven. ly giadness “And the 12 gates were 13 pearls” Takes the consolation, all ye who have been hart, whether hurt in body, or hart in mind, or hurt in soul, Get your troubles sanctified, if you suffer with Christ on earth, you will reign with Him in glory. The tears of eartn are the crystals of heaven, “Every several gate was of one pearl.” a 80 struggle, so little enth we were all ’ ~ be ot) Gave Maria a Lesson. Evidently there is no Bervant Girls’ Protective Union in London, or if there is the yonng woman mentioned below did not belong to it, Think of such a thing happening to one of our own top. lofty servant girls! A German merchant in London has a servant who at first was very forgetful, Th fault was especially annoying st meal times, when something esential was sure to be lacking from the table, One day the family were seated at the table, and the bell was rung as usual, The girl harried to the dining foom. “Maria,” said Herr Bowe, *‘just run and fetch the big step ladder down from the attic and bring it here,” Maria who had been disturbed at her dinner, gave a grunt of dissatisfaction, but ran up three flights of stairs to fetch the ladder, In about five minutes she returned to the room, panting with her exertion, “Now,” said Herr B—— ‘put it up at the other end of the room and climb to the top.” Maria did as she was told, and when she was at the top Herr Bw quietly observed * “Maria, you have now a better view than we have; just look around and tell us if you can see any salt on the table, My wife and I could not find it.” This settled the business, Maria has Herald. A street organ grinders is tax posed by two London venrien mv: She Dresses Dog, A dog tailor flourishes in Paris, This tailor is & woman, and her reception rooms cunningly cater to both mistress and pet, Here Prince Bow.wow has rugs, water bowls and biscuit jars, to re- fresh him during the trying-on processes. Here are the daintiest water-color pat. tern books to choose from, and auything from senlskin to chamois is provided, A green broadcloth lined and edged with seal, is n blanket that especially becomes milady’s grevhound; but scarlet, edged with and lined with quiited satin, is a gay coat [or the toy terrier, A tallor-made doggie, with a gold clasp under his chin and a mono gn of Free silver cordings gram well toward his the Press, tail, 18s | 8 times in Detroit Frunc LH a ———————-—"" 5A DOD Found Petrified Palm Trees. W. C. 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