The New York herald., 1873-11-10
sage s.ysngs or tho Pulpits.


In times of weakness, depression and
danger how good it is and how cheering to
know. that there is place of refuge and sal
vation for tho weak and weary, the down.
trodden and the pursued. Such . refuge DIR.
Talmage finds in Jesus whom he presented
yesterday to his large congregation as the
only refuge While forts built by human
hands have been captured again and again not
all the battering rams of hell can smite down
the walls of this refuge, into which the
righteous run and are safe. No storming
party can leap on its towers, for the weapons
with which it is defended are omnipotent. And
Christ is near refuge and easily accessible
to oil who desire to fee from the wrath
TO come. We have not to kneel in long pen
ance in the vestbule of God s mercy. nor need
we stand to be riddled and shelled in the
bombardment of perdition. One moments
faith can place us in this fortress. in which the
whole race may find refuge if they will. The
salvation of Christ is democratic salvation.
And there are candidates for imperial splendor
in Elm street and by the peat fire of the Irish
shanty. Christ has swung the door of heaven
open so wide that all the gentle and refined
and educated may go in if they repent. and all
the scoundrels, too. if they repent. This sal
vation is certainly as liberal, as free and as
easily conditioned as salvation could possibly
be. And yet there are some who think the
conditions too strict and pressing, and they
win not enter into this refuge and be saved.
Mr.. Beecher delivered an elaborately worded,
finely pointed metaphysical essay on ''The
Double Action of Man." or, in other words,
the development of the intellectual and moral
faculties from the physical. There was in it
good deal of the truth Of nature, but oompara-
lively little Of the truth of revelation. It was
q sermon to please rather than to save. and
we infer that it answered its purpose fully.
Mr.. Sheshesdri, the Bramin, preached in
Plymouth church, in the evening, sermon
which contained the elements that the morn
ing one lacked.
MI. Dowell made some statements yesterday
concerning the freedmen which we hardly
think would bear the test Of fact. Appealing
to the Christian Church to educate the mill
ions of colored people in the South be gave
as reasons why the Church should do this
the blacks are helpless ignorant, poor i'm
moral So far we have no doubt that the
same reasons would apply with equal if
not greater force to more than FIVE millions
Of white people, North and South. But then
Mr.. Dowen adds that these helpless, ignorant
poor and immoral creatures have religion
which is contradiction of Christianity, and
is, indeed, nothing more than their own
heathenism, which their ancestors brought
from Africa. This is bad showing for our
religious and political missionaries who have
been laboring SO zealously in the South for the
last ten years. And it also speaks badly for
the future progress of the race But we
hardly know how to characterize the illustra-
tions of this ignorance and heathenism with
which Mr.. Dowell favored his audience. For
tunately, however, he had bright side to
this dark picture, and we hope his congrega-
ton were moved to see the importance of Civ
ing Christian education to the freedmen of
the South.
This is the season devoted by the Catholic
Church, as we learn from Father McCready's
sermon, to prayer for s'the shortening of the
period of separation for those departed souls
who are yet detained from the society of their
brethren in glory" He leaves the place and
manner of their detention to be inferred by
his hearers. He presents practical contrast
between the results of setting our affections
on things in this life and placing them on
things above, and recommends as profitable
employment the contemplation Of the invisible
things of the life above.
If some of our wealthy men and women
who may or may not have been affected by the
panic, will read Mr.. Frothingham's discourse
they may gain some valuable hints for the
future therefrom. Mr.. rockingham handles
the ladies' waterfalls and bustles SO roughly
that we can account for il only on the sup
position that he has neither wife nor daughter.
If he has any lady friends OF all we pity him
for what may be in store for him when they
read the HERALD to-day. The women of the
upper classes, he says, have hearts, but
nothing to do with them they have heads
but nothing in them. But this last is balanced
by the capillary mass they have on them.
Mr.. Powers has arraigned the money kings
the monopolists the spectators, as the Dick
Turpins and the Robin Hoods Of the present
day. And it is the battle with these robbers
and outlaws Of Wall street, he thinks, that has
filed the land with the present distress and
with the killed and wounded financially. But
the practical thought which he brought out
of this indictment is that those who have made
money, and those who have saved it out Of
this panic, should not forget the poor in the
bard winter that Is almost upon us.
Dr. Steel preached q ''pan,cky" sermon
also, putting his text very appropriately as a
query to the masses, ''Havo you any meat2"
and their answer, 'No." II was labor