DE. TALMAGEVS SERMON SUNDAY'S DISCOURSE BY THE NOTED DIVINE. Bubject: The Triumph of Christianity The Chureli of ChrlHt 1h the Most En «learliiK I institution on Karth—lt» Un surpassed Growth—.lnfidelity Refuted. (Copyright 1901.1 WASHINGTON, D. C. Although Dr. Talmage was hindered from attending the great annual meeting of the Christian En deavor Society at Cincinnati, his sermon shows him to be in sympathy with the gveat movemtnt; text. Amoa ix, 13, "Be hold the day# come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper." Unable because of other important du ties to accept the invitation to take jiart in the great convention of Christian En deavorers at Cincinnati, I preach a ser mon of congratulation for all the members of that magnificent association, whether now gathered in vast assemblage or busy in their places of usefulness, transatlantic and cisatlantic. And. as it is now harvest time in the fields and sickles are Hashing in the gathering of a great crop, 1 find mighty suggestiveness in my text. It is a picture of a tropical clime, with a season so prosperous that the harvest reaches clear over to the planting time and the swarthy husbandman, busy cut ting the grain, almost feels the breath of the horses on his shoulders, the horses hitched to the plow preparing for a new crop. "Behold the days come, saith the Lord, that the plowman shall overtake the reaper." When is that? That is now. That is this day, when hardly have you done reaping one harvest of religious result than the plowman is getting ready for another. In phraseology charged with all venom ni>d anuse and caricature 1 know that in fidels and agnostics have declared that Christianity has collapsed; that the Bihle is an obsolete book: that the Christian church is on the retreat. I shall answer that wholesale charge to-day. Between 3.000,000 and 4.000.(100 Endeav orers sworn before high heaven that they will do all they can to take America for (lod, Europe for God, Asia and Africa for God —are i>ot the signs most cheering? Or, to return to the agricultural figui-e of my text, more than a million reapers are over taken by more than a million plowmen. Besides th.R, there are more people who believe in the Bible than at any time in the world's existence. But now let us see whether the book is a last year's almanac. Let us see whether the church of God is a Bull Hun retreat, muskets, canteens and haversacks strew ing all the way. The great English histor ian Sharon Turner, a man of vast learning and great accuracy, not a clergyman, but an attornev as well as a historian, gives this overwhelming statistic in regard to Christianity and in regard to the number of Christians in the different centuries: In the first century 500,000 Christians, in the second century 2.000.000 Christians, in the third century 5,000,000 Christians, in the fourth centnry lO.OOO.tKHI Christians, in the fifth century 15,000,000 Christians, in the sixth century 20.000.000 Christians, in the seventh century 24.000, OIK) Chris tians, in the eighth century 30,000,000 Christians, in the ninth century 40.0()0,000 Christians, in the tenth century 50.000.000 Christians, in the eleventh century 70.- 000,000 Christians, in the twelfth century 80.000,000 Christians, in the thirteenth century 75,000,000 Christians, in the four teenth century 80.000.ii00 Christians, in the fifteenth century 100.000.000 Christians, in the sixteenth century 125.000,000 Chris tians, in the seventeenth century 155.000.- 000 Christians, in the eighteenth century 200,000,000 Christians—a decadence, as you observe, in only one century and more than made up in the following centuries, while it is the usual computation that there were at the close of the nineteenth century 470,000,000 Christians, making us to beiieve that before this century is close the millennium will have started its boom and lifted its hosanna. Poor Christianity! What a pity it has no friends! How lonesome it must be! Who will take it out of the poorhouse? Poor Christianity! Four hundred mill ions in one century. At the beginning of the nineteenth cen tury 150 missionaries: at the close of that century 84.000 missionaries and native helpers and evangelists. At the beginning of the nineteenth century there were only 50,000 converts; now there are over 1,000.- 000 converts from heathendom. So Christianity is falling back and the Bible, they say, is becoming an obsolete book! I go into a court, and wherever I find a judge's bench or a clerk's desk I find a Bible. Upon what hook could there be uttered the solemnity of an oath? What book is apt to be putin the trunk of the yoniig man as he leaves for city life? The Bible. What shall I find in nine out of every ten homes in this city? The Bible. In nine out of every ten homes in Christendom? The Bihle. Voltaire wrote the prophecy that the Bible in the nineteenth century would become extinct. The century is gone, and I have to tell you that the room in which Voltaire wrote that prophecy not long ago was crowded from floor to ceiling with Bibles from Switzerland. Suppose the Congress of the United States should pass a law that there should be no more Bibles printed in America and no Bibles read. If there are 60."00.000 grown people in the United States there would be 60,000,000 people in an army to put down such a law and defend their right to read the Bible. But suppose the Congress of the United States should make a law against the reading or the publication of any other book —how many people would go out in such a crusade? Could von get 60,000.000 people togo out and risk their lives in the defense of Shakespeare's tragedies or Gladstone's tracts or Macaulay's "History of Eng land?" You know that there are a thou sand men who would die in defense of this book where there is not more than one man who would die in the defense of any other liook. You try to insult my common sense by telling me the Bib!e is fading out from the world. It is the most popular hook of the centuries. Oh," sav people, "the church is a col lection of hypocrites, and it is losing its power, and it is fading out from the world." Is it? A bishop of the Metho dist church told nie that that denomina tion averages two new churches every d«\. In other words, they build 730 churches in that denomination in a year, and tnere are at least 1500 new Christian churches built in America every year. Does that look as though the Christian church were fading out, as though it were a defunct institution? What stands near est to the hearts of the American people to-day 1 ? Ido not care in what village or whsQt city or what neighborhood you go. What is it? Is it the postoffice? Is it the hotel? Is it the lecture hall? Ah. you know it is not. You know that that which stands nearest to the hearts of the American people is the Christian <hurch. Vou may talk about the church being a collection of hypocrites, but when the dipjhtheria sweeps your children off. whom do [you send for? The postmaster? The Atflorney-General? t The hotel keeper? Alderman? No. You send for a minister of J this Bible religion. And if there is a soijig to be sung at the obsequies, what do you want? What does anybody want? Die "Marseillaise Hymn?" "God Save Ui t j Queen?" Our own grand national air? Nil. They want the Tivmn with which tney sang their old Christian mother into Mr last sleep, or tliev want snug the Sab biith-school hymn which their little girl fifing the last Sabbath afternoon she was tit before she got that awful sickness hich broke your heart, i appeal to your immon sense. You know the most en _>aring institution on earth to-day the lurch of the Lord Jesus Christ. A mail a fool that does not recognize it. The infidels say: "There is great liberty now for infidels—freedom of platform. Infidelity shows its i»ower from the fact that it is everywhere tolerated, and it can say what it will." Why, my friends, in fidelity is not half so blatant in our day as it was in the davs of our fathers. Do you know that in the days of our fathers there were pronounced infidels in public authority, and they could get any political position? Let a man to-day declare him self antagonistic to the Christian religion, and what city wants him for mayor, what State wants him for Governor, what na tion wants him for President or for king? Let a man openly proclaim himself tne enemy of our glorious Christianity, and he cannot get a majority of votes in any State, in any city, in any county, in any ward of America. The Christian religion is mightier to-day than it ever was. These opponents say that science is overcoming religion in our day. They look through the spectacles bf the infidel scientists and they say: "It is impossible that this book be true. People are finding it out. The Bible tias got togo over board." Do you believe that the Bible account of the origin of life will be over thrown by infidel scientists who have fiftv different theories about the origin of life? If thev should all come up in solid phalanx, all agreeing on one sentiment and one theory, perhaps Christianity might be damaged, but there are not so many differences of opinion inside the church as outside the church. Oh. it makes me sick to see these liter ary fops going along with a copy of Dar win under one arm and a case of transfixed grasshoppers and butterflies under the other arm. telling about the "survival of the fittest" and Huxley's protoplasm and the nebular hypothesis. The fact is that some naturalists, just as soon as they find out the difference between the feelers of a wasp and the horns of a beetle, begin to patronize the Almighty, while Agassiz, glorious Agassiz, who never made any pre tension to being a Christian, put both his feet on the doctrine of evolution and says: "I see that many of the naturalists of our day are adopting facts which do not bear observation or have not passed under ob servation." These men warring with each other —Darwin warring against Wallace warring against Cope, even Her schel denouncing Ferguson. They do not agree about anything. Then you have noticed a more significant fact if you have talked with people on the suhjeetA-that they are getting dissatisfied with worldly philosophy as a matter of comfort. They say it does riot amount to anything when you have a dead chiW in the house. They tell you when they were sick and the door of the future seemed opening the only comfort they could find was the gospel. People are having dem onstrated all over the land that science and philosophy cannot solace the troubles ami woes of the world, and they want some other religion, and they are taking Christianity, the only sympathetic reli gion that ever came into the world. You just take a scientific consolation into that room where a mother has lost her child. Try in that case your splendid doctrine of the "survival of the fittest." Tell her that child died because it was not worth as much as the other children. That is your "survival of the fittest." .lust try your transcendentalism, your philosophy, your science, on that widowed soul, and tell her it was a geological necessity that her companion should be taken away from her, just as in the course of the world's history the megatherium and the ichthyo saurus had to pass out of existence, and then you goon in your scientific consola tion until you get to the sublime fact that 50,000.000 years from now we ourselves may be scientific si>ecimens on the geo logic shelf, petrified specimens of an ex tinct human race, and after you have got all through with your consolation, if the poor afflicted soul is not crazed by it, we will send forth from any of our churches the plainest Christian we have, and with one half hour of prayer and reading of Scripture promises the tears will be wiped away, and the house from floor to cupola will be flooded with the calmness of an Indian summer sunsei. There is where I see the triumph of Christianity. People are dissatisfied with everything else. They want God: they want Jesus Christ. The fact is that infidelity and agnosti cism are founded on ignorance geological, ignorance chemical, ignorance astronomi cal. ignorance geographical. We have heard what the enemies of Christianity have had to testify. Now I put before you the testimony of the church on earth and the church in heaven. Not fifty, not a thousand, not a million, but all of the church on earth and all of the redeemed in heaven. Will you* take the evidence of those who have witnessed as well as telt the power of religion, or will you prefer the testimony of those who begin by declar ing that they have never witnessed or felt its power? You tell me that on a certain 4th of March, twenty years ago, a Presi dent of the United States was inaugu rated. How do I know it? You tell me there were 20.000 persons who distinctly heard his inaugural address. I deny both. I deny that he was inaugurated. I deny that his inaugural address was delivered. You ask why? 1 did not see it. I did not hear it. But you say that there were 20.000 people who did see and hear him. Is not the testimony of the 20.000 who were present worth more than the testi mony of one who was absent? Now, there are some men who say they have never seen Christ crowned in the heart, and they do not believe it is ever done. There is a group of men who say they have never heard the voice of Christ, that they have never heard the voice of God. They do not believe that anything like it ever oc curred. I point to twenty, a hundred thousand or a million people who say: "Christ was crowned in our heart's affec tions. We have seen Him and felt Hin in our soul, and we have heard His voice. We have heard it in the storm and dark ness. We have heard it again and again." You say morphia puts one to sleep. You say in time of sickness it is very use ful. I deny it. Morphia never puts any hodv to sleep. It never alleviates pain. You ask why I say that. I have never tried it.l never took it.l deny that morphia is any soothing to the nerves or any quiet in limes of sickness. I deny that morphia ever put anybody to sleep. But here are twenty persons who say they have all telt the soothing effects of a phy sician's prescribing morphine. "S'oung man, do not be ashamed to be a friend of the Bible. Do not put your thumb in your vest, as young men some times do. and swagger about, talking of the glorious light of nature and of there being no need of the Bible. They have the light of nature in India and China and in all the dark places of the earth Did you ever hear that the light of nature gave them comfort for their troubles? rhey have lancets to cut and Juggernauts to crush, but no comfort. Ah, my friends, you had better stop your skepticism. Sup pose you jire putin a crisis like that of Colonel Ethan Allen. 1 saw the account and at one time mentioned it in an ad dress. A descendant of Ethan Allen, who is an infidel, said it never occurred. Soon after I received a letter from a professor in one of our colleges, who is also a de scendant of Ethan Allen and is a Chris tian. He wrote me that the incident is accurate; that my statement was authen tic and true. The wife of Colonel Ethan Allen was a very consecrated woman. The mother instructed the daughter in the truths of Christianity. The (laughter sick ened and was about to die. and she said to her father. "Father, shall I take your instruction, or shall I take mother's in struction? I am going to die now. I must have this matter decided." That man who had been loud in his infidelity said to his dying daughter: '"My dear, you had better take your mother's religion." My advice is the same to you, O youug man! You know how religion comforted her; you know what she said to you when she was dying. You had better take you» mother's religion. Papers Build Up Towns, The effort of any newspaper to anild up a town Is practically nullified unless it is backed up by the business men of the town. A stranger turns from the news columns of a paper to its advertising columns, and if he fails to find there the business cards of the merchants and professional firms he comes to the conclusion that the ed itor is not appreciated, in which case It is a good place to keep clear from. No town ever grew up without the active assistance of its papers. Nor can papers grow and build up their localities without the assistance of the town. Business men should realize this, ana remember that in lending support to their local paper they are not only building up their own business, but are helping to support that which is steadily working for the growth of the whole town. In fact the newspaper is so impor tant ton community's welfare that •112 there is a town struggling along without one the merchants are keep ing money out of their own pockets by not seeing to it that one Is established. An Interesting Possibility. The market for bridges is far great er in the United States than elsewhere. The States have now 190,000 miles of railways, and it has been estimated '.hat there is an average of one span Df metallic bridge for every three miles of • railway. This gives 53,000 oridges on existing lines, without in ?luding those required for new lines. The increase in the United States of the weight of ears and engines has re sulted in wonderful economic changes. This Increase of weight of rolling stock has led to the renewal of the 53,000 Did bridges by stronger and heavier ones. This demand has brought into existence many bridge building com panies, and they can well afford to ?quip themselves with the best labor saving and accurate working machin ery, regardless of first cost, as they know it would seldom, if ever, lie idle. -Baltimore News. An Epidemic of Bsldneftft. The ladies of Osaka, in Japan, are In a state of the utmost terror lest they should lose their beautiful hair through a disease which results in baldness. It is not unusual for a fair one to have her hair dressed one day in a most olaborate manner, and a few days later to find every hair come out in the comb. This remarkable epidemic pre vailed in the China perfecture last spriag, and now it is devastating hu man heads in Osaka. The disease has also claimed a few victims in Tokio, where the police have issued stringent regulations te barbers regarding the disinfectias of their scissors, combs, razors, etc. The germ of the disease, according to one doctor, is of an "ex tremely line sort," and more dangerous to the hair of women than to that of men.—London Dally Mail. Woman of Seventy Clluilis a Tree. Illinois has many active women who have passed the limit of three score snd ten, but none of them surpassed the feat of Mrs. Klchard Furley, of Cearfoss, Md. This lady, who Is nearly seventy and who has done a deal of work In her long life, besides bearing her own share of the cares that fall to most mortals, astonished her friends', but not herself, by climb ing a tree fifty feet high, cutting off a limb on which bees hail swarmed and descending in safety to the ground, where she hived the bees. She went up the tree much as an active boy would do it, proving that sixty years ago there were girls in Maryland who were Hot too delicate to learu boy tricks, iu eludlag tree climbing.—Chicago Rec ord-HeralU. Dlfttaiit Mars. With the best telescope it is impos sible to see Mars any batter than the moon can be seen with an ordinary opera glass. The planet is always at least lltf times further from us than is the moon. PUTNAM FADELESS DYES ILO not stain the hands oi spot the kettle. Sold by all drug gists. No man ever made a great name for himself by writing anonymous communi cations. There are in use in the world at present BKOU tons of gold and 170,000 tons ot silver. ■lttl I'or ilie Bowels No matter what nils yon. headache to a cancer, you will never get well until your bowels are put light. CASCAUETH help nature, cure you without a gripe or pain, produce easy natural movements, cost you just 10 cents to start getting your health back. CAS CAIIETS Candy Cathartic, the genuine, put up in metal boxes, every tablet has 0.0. C. stamped on it. lleware ot imitations. Paris burns the wood of 1000 acres of forest a week. Are Tom ( king Allen's Foot-Knar ) It is the only cure for Swollen, Smarting, Tired. Aching, Hot, Sweating Feet, Corns and Bunions. A*k for Allen's Foot-Kase, a powder to be shaken into the shoes. Cures while you walk. At all Druggists and Shoe Stores, iiftc. Sample Bent 1 lIEE. Address, Allen S. Olmsted. L?Roy, N. Y. The disagreeable man is apt to get bald. Even his hair has a falling out with him. FITS permanently cured. No tits or nervous ness after tirst day's use of Dr. Kline's Great Nerve Restorer. *2l rial bottle and treatise free Dr. K. H. KLINE, Ltd., 981 Arch St., Phila. l'n. Fewer people proportionately keen their o —n carriages in Paris than in London. E. A. Rood, Toledo, Ohio, says: "Hall's Ca tarrh Cure cured uiv wife of catarrh fifteen years ago and she has had no return of it. It's a sure cure." Sold by Druggists, 75c. Glasgow was the tirst British town to receive a license for municipal telephones. Mrs. Winslow's Soothing Syrup for children teething, soften the gums, reduces inflamma tion,allays pain, c ures wind colic. 26c a bottle Fame is a bubble that sometimes comes to the man who dace the most blowing. Piso's Cure cannot be too highly spoken ol as a cough sure.—J. W. (J Brikn, 322 Third Avenue, N., Minneapolis, Minn., Jan. 6, 1900. Cases of twins occur once in every sixty nine births. As an Kdsestsr, Churches advertised lii newspapers, newspaper reading rooms In churches, and newspapers In schools and col leges, snys the Printer Journalist, are Indications that those who are seek ing after goodness and knowledge, taught through a living record of hu man events and endeavors, are coming more and more to prize the free, out spoken American press, which has be<'ii rightly called "the epitome of contemporaneous history, the concen trated news of the universe, each paper the handiwork of a thousand men." As the conveyor of more facts, more truths, more messages, more in formation than any other, It Is the greatest teacher of the age. Cheap and Costly Funerals. A paragraph in one of the English weeklies says that the sum of $175,000 required to defray the expenses of Queen Victoria's obsequies Is $115,000 less than the cost of Lord Nelson's funeral. Pitt was burled at a cost of $200,000. King Edward VII. witnessed the most gorgeous funeral ceremony of the nineteenth century In London. It was that of the Duke of Welling ton, on which about $350,000 is said to have been spent. Marborough's fun eral was less magnificent. It cost bare ly $-25,000. Mr. Gladstone's involved an expenditure of only about $12,000. The costliest and most Imposing cere mony in the United States was that of Grant. _____ Dark " I have used Ayer't H«ir Vigor for a great many years, and al though I am past eighty years of age, yet I have not a gray hair in my head." Geo. Yellott, Towson, Md. We mean all that rich, dark color your hair used to have. If it's gray now, no matter; for Ayer's Hair Vigor always re stores color to gray hair. Sometimes it makes the hair grow very heavy and long; and it stops falling of tne hair, too. SI.N a battle. All droffliU. If your druggist cannot supply you, send ub one dollar and wc wjll sxprsss you a bottle. Ba sure and gi*f> ths nam* Ol your naurest express office'. Addrass, J. C. A VVR CO., Lowsll, Mass. Constipation Does your head,ache ? Pain back of your eyes? Bad taste in lt's lt's your liver! JT'S Pills are liver pills. They cure consti pation, headache, dyspepsia. 25c. All druffflst*. ss - ■ ■■ ■—■■■■■■ , - ■ - ■ Waut jour moustache or beard a beautiful brown or rich black? Then use BUCKINGHAM'S DYESWi&r, _6O CT». ■■■ IN CHILDREN AUG W APVH9 veritable demo us. ■■ ||| 111 V and must be removed WW U1 ally or serious results mnMsnam* follow. The medicine which for fin years has held the record for successfully ridding children of these pests Is Krey'sVermitujte—made entirely from vegetable products, containing no calomel. IT ACTS 4S* TONIC. SS,;' by mail. F.. AS. FRKY, Haltlniore. Md "Thrttannethat made West Point fataaut.'' McILHENNY'S TABASCJ. I'iSratrSa Thompson's Eyo Watar LION COFFEE A LUXURY WITHIN THE REACH OP ALL! U "MY MARY ANN." Lion m J&iSL s, . Can be sung to the air of "My Maryland.") Coffee i?\Lr In the kitchen she h s sway— 1S no ' : f"nn There she rules throughout the day, GLAZED. xTciSrEßff Mary Ann, my Mary Annl COATED, " If I [ * J Breakfast. unch and dinner fair 4 /ll \ Excellently she'll prepare, or Otherwise / ( * I Served with LION COFFEE rare treated with I 1 I Mary Ann, my Mary Annl mixtures, 112 \ j J J Shf chemicals, You can bet she knows her book— She will use no other brand / Than the grand— f Mary my Mary Affpp Well she knows not glazed,-* VUIIVV Mary Ann, my Mary Annl jg That in million homes 'tis praised! Watch Ollf n6Xt BdVertiS6lT)6nt« Mary Ann, my Mary Annt Pure Coffee. One pound package, in the bean, Just try a package of LION COFFEE and you will Lion head on wrapper seen. ' Premium List inside will mean Undcfttind the fCiSOfl of its poptllarfty. Presents ioT my Mary Annl LION COFFEE is now used in millions of homes* In every package of LION COFFEE you will find a fully illustrated and descriptive list. No housekeeper, fact, no woman, man. boy or girl will fail to find in the list some article which will contribute to their happin< comfort and convenience, and which they may have by simply cutting out a certain number of Lion Heads fx the wrappers of our one pound sealed packages (which is the only form in which this excellent coffee is sold). WOOL-SON SPICE CO., TOLEDO, OHI BAT H MILLIONS 01; MOTHERS USE CUTICURA SOAP ASSISTED BY CUTI CURA OINTMENT THE GREAT SKIN CURE For preserving, purifying, and beautifying; the skin of infants and children, for rashes, itchings, and chafings, for cleansing the scalp of crusts, scales, and dandruff, and the stopping of falling hair, for softening, whitening, and soothing red, rough, and sore hands, and for all the purposes of the toilet, bath, and nursery. Millions of Women use Cuticura Soap in the form of baths for annoying irritations, inflammations, s-nd excoriations, for too free or offensive perspiration, in the form of washes for ulcerative weaknesses, and for many sanative, antiseptic p' -->ses which readily suggest themselves to women, esp Sers, No amount of persuasion can > induce those who have'bnce used these great skin purifiers and beautifiers to use any others. Cuticura Soap combines delicate emollient properties derived from Culicura, the great skin cure, with the purest of cleansing ingredients and the most refreshing of flower odors. It unites in ONE SOAP at ONE PRICE, the BEST skin and complexion soap and the BEST toilet, bath, and baby soap in the world. COMPLETE EXTERNAL AJiD INTERNAL TREATMENT FOB ETERT HIHOR, Consisting of CCTICCRA SOAP, to cleanse the skin of crusts ■ 111 If* 11 rjl and scales aud soften the thickened cuticle, CT'TictißA ( iint \UblvUl U MKJST, to instantly allay itching, inflammation, and irrita tion, and soothe and heal, and CPTICUBA RESOLVENT, to TUC CET cool and cleanse the blood. A SINGLE BET is often suffl- IllL OL I cienttocure the most torturing, disfiguring, itching, burn ing, and scalv skin, scalp, and blood humors, with loss of hair, when all else ff.ils. Sold throughout the world. British Depo'.: V. NEWUKBY <& SONS, 27 -28, Charter house Sq., London, POTTER DBUO AND CUKM. COW., Sole Props., Briton, U.S. A. ___ nDADQV NEW DISCOVERT: cITM U\J WP I quick relief and earee wortl etNi Book of testimonials and 10 da ye' treatment Free. Dr. H- H. OIIKM'BBORS, Box B, ▲tlaata. «a. ADVERTISING 118 g Beet Cough Syrup. TaMas Good. Use PI
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers