Knoxville daily chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1882, 1878-11-14
TALNAGE ON THE POOR.

TAIN AGE ON 1HE POOR.
New York city always has a SEN
sation. Just now it is pulpit SEN
satiOn. The great clerical sensa-
tionalist of the nineteenth century.
Rev. 7. De. Witt Talmage is preach
ing a series of sermons in which he
proposes to lay bare the iniquities
AMI miseries of the metropolitan
city. A few weeks ago, in company
with a policeman and two or three
other gentlemen, he visited the
gambling houses and other dens of
iniquity in New York. He gave the
world the benefit of his observation
in a discourse from the pulpit, ex-
tracts from which have appeared in
the CHRONICLE. His picture of IL
centiOusness, harlotry and general
dissipation was an awful one. Since
then he has made night visit to the
slums of poverty and vice, which he
described in his peculiar style to an
audience of five thousand persons
last Sunday morning.
His picture is a dark one.
After reminding his hearers that he
had shown them the gilded palaces
of sin he told them how he pro
posed to lead them into the lower
strata of crime and poverty. Out
of a population of 100000 in
New York 100000, he said,
are helped by charity. After
speaking of the barefooted and
homeless children, the regiments of
boOt-blacks and news-boys and
battaliOns of rag-pickers, and tell
ing how he had gone to places
bounded on the north by want,
on the south by suffering, on the
east by anguish, and on the west
by despair" he closed by saying:
IF you desire, by all means, send
quilted c0verIids 10 Central Africa to
keep the natives warm 10 summer
time. aud iCe-cream freeZaTs to Green
land, but let Us do something for the
relief Of the cities where we live
cities that want more bread, more
shoes. more hats, more coats, more
Christ.
" There is nothing more entertain
ing and impressive than a skillluI
magic lantern, when the room is
darkened and the picture is thrown on
the canvas. l close with two such ex-
hIbitiOn.-.he magic lanterns of the
police and Of the home. First, having
darkened all these emblazOned win
dOws, | set up the magic lantern of
the home, and throw OH the wall the
eight scene of a Christian mother
putting her little ones TO bed. She is
trying 10 hush the risky and giggling
group for their evening prayer, their
heads against the figured canopy, their
crooked tongues unable to make intel
ligIble to anyone else the petition, /
pray the Lord my soul to keep then,
LAID in the snug nest, covered to the
chin, with warm good might kiss,
they are left to the guardian spirits,
that all night long canopy with wings
the trundle-bed.
Now 4 throw on the wall picture |
from the police lantern. A boy ken !
Helled for the night under the stair |
way of a hall through which the wind |
sweeps, or on the cold ground OF the
cellar. He had no pareutage, but was
kicked iUlO the world by some merci-
less lncOgnitO. No one puts him TO
bed; he has no bed. His cold fingers
thrust through his tumbIed hair. his
only pillow He did not sup; he will
not break fast-Rn Outcast, a waif.
ragamuffin. Poor boy, when he laid
down to sleep he said no prayer, for
he never knew the name of God and
Christ except something to swear by.
The wings that hover over him are
damp and bat-like; the wings Of neg
leet and penury and want.
Again throw the magic lantern
of the nome on the canvas, and see
that Christian daughter has just died;
carriages rolling up TO the door in sym
pathy flowers in crosses and anchors
aud crowns cover the casket, and the
silver plate says, Aged 49," funeral
service intoned amid groups OF the
shawled and gold braceleted long pro-
cessiOn TO beautiful family plat in un-
paTalIeled Greenwood, where sculptor
will set up monument of FURNISHED
Aberdeen, with epitaph, "She is not
dead, but sleepeth."
LOOK upon the canvas and see that
4 waif OF the street has just expired.
Where are the good Christians? They
are Erocking chAired in their loose