The Tiffin tribune. (Tiffin, Ohio) 1868-1887, 1878-11-07
THE GATES or HELL.
i, Seen by Rav. T. Dewitt Tslma@e.

j. Seen by Re-. T. Dewitt Talmage
The third Of the series Of sermon
hy Rev. +. Dewitt Talmage, ID. d.. 81
The Night Side 81 CITY Life" :ts cN
pluTed by min in company with h!gl
officials. was delivered this morning q
the BROOKLYN Tabernacle. The iul
Inense building was crowded To its ut
most capacity, and the street in from
was blOckaded with 4 mass Of peOpl
unable 10 gain admittance. The SCI
vices werr opened by the vast audi
encr of 1000 people singing Hold In,
Fort led by Arbuckle'S cOrnet. am
the effect was electric. The deliver
Of the sermon was received with mucl
emotion. and the audience WAS dis
missed in tears. Brooklyn. and prOba
ably no other city, ever before witness
ed such scene. The following Is th'
full text of the sermon:
Matthew XVI, Is: The gates Of he'll shall no
prevail against IL
IT is only ten o'clock. said the polio,
officer. a. we were getting into the car
riage for our midnight exploration
-and it is too early, for the theater:
have not Vet dismissed What do
YOU mean by that :" | said. We'll,
said he, "the places Of iniquity are nO
in full blast till the people have haf
time to arrive from the theaters.
Then We concluded To lOiter on the
wax, and the officer told the driver tC
stop on the street where Is one of the
chief gambling establishments of the
I civ. Coming up IN front of the build
ing, every ching looked dark, the blinds
were closed. and thedOOr was carefully
/ guarded. But after whisper between
the officers and the guard the dOOI
I opened. and we found two tables
around one of which were eight or ten
men. all well dressed, and middle-aged
: in a silence broken only by the rattliAg
chips of the gaming table in one parlOI
and the revolving hall of the roulette
table in the other parlOr. Some OF
them we were told, had served terms
in prison, some Of Shem were ship
wrecked bankers and mOney-dealers
some of them were making their first
! rounds of dissipation, but all of them
! intent on the fortunes, large or small,
| moving up and down the table. There
| was an awfulneSS in the silence, in the
| eager gaze. in the suppressed emotion.
I None of them looked up. They had
money in the rapids, and some of them
may have seen horses and carriages
and home and family going down in
the vortex. In such a group mans
I life would not be worth farthing If
/ there were no officers to protect him,
and the keeper had supposed our er-
rand. Men came in by private keys or
passwords. or from recognition by the
burlv guard. NO one comes in here, "
says the officer, except he be known
as frequenteT, or is warranted for, or
by police mandate" \ Young man
stood at the roulette table. He had
probably been introduced by letter OF
pass, or had accompanied one of the
larger players He put his money
down again and again. and lost every
time. Then he searched diligently in
all his pockets for more money, but
found none, and severely silent turn
ed his back and passed out.
MISTAKEN IDEAS.
Having lost all. there was nothing
more to lose. All the literature about
the brilliancy of such places is untrue,
and written by clergymen who at
tempt to describe what they know
nothing about, or reported by some
cOuntryman, who, having prepared his
toilet by a looking glass as big as his
two hands, is overwhelmed with the
glitter OF big mirror. Men kept their
hats on and smoked, and there was
nothing III upholstery or furniture that
3 sz4lC
there, men lost property and soul.
MercileSs place! Not once in all the
years of the existence of that gamb-
ling house has one word of sympathy
for the losers been uttered. Horace
WalpOle tells of a man who dropped
dead in front of clubhouse in Lon
don. He was carried i'll, and the mem
berS Immediately began To bet as to
whether he was dead, and when it was
proposed to bleed him to find out, the
objection was that it was unfair to the
betters. The patTOniZers of these
places, when the last dollar has been
wrung ont of them, dare not utter a
cry or cOmpidlnt, lsNst 90 away. some
to drown their grief in strong drink,
some to ply the cOunterfeiter's pen
with which to repair then fortunes,
some of them to the suicides revolver
AL of them down. The most unu-
sual thing in the world is a gamblers
reform. The ruin goes on 1t has
been estimated that every day in
christendOm SS0,OOO,OO0 exchange
hands through gambling, or S123,1OO,-
OOOOOOin every year.
But" | said, 1t is after eleven
o'clock, and we must be off" We
passed out, and the black porter slam
med the door, and the carriage rolled
on towards the gates of hell. Of the
gates of heaven We have all heard.
There are twelve of them, three to
each point of the compass, and each of
solid pearl. But the gates of hell
who shall describe them? They are
FURNISHED till they glow and sparkle in
the city gaslight. They are mighty,
and set in sockets of deep and dreadful
masonry. They are high, so that those
inside may not climb over. They are
wide and heavy, but swing in very
easily for those who would enter. But
it is always safe to go where God COM
mandS YOU. He commanded me to go
and look and report and with three
officers of the law and two Christian
friends ! went. | saw both sides of
the gates of,hell, and by sermon this
morning will give you sketch of
them. During the FrancO-German
war / stood one day in Paris examining
the gates of the TuilerieS with their
exquisite sculpture. After standing a
long time looking at the masonry and
the bronze, | looked down, and 10! the
officers of the law were watching, sup
posing that | might be a German and
scrutinizing the gates for adverse pur-
poses. But | do not stand to-day eX-
amining merely the outside of the
gates of hell. | have examined both
sides, and shall tell you exactly what
they are made of. | shall ring q ham,
mer on all the panels and flash a lam
tern on all the hinges.
THE FIRST GATE.
The first gate of hell TO be mentioned
is infamous literature. Anthony Com
stock seized twenty tons of bad litera-
ture and plates and letter-press and
our Professor, Cochran, of the Poly
technic. poured the acids on the plates
until they smoked in the righteous an
Inhalation. But still there is much
that the law can not reach. and it is
scattered on your parlOr tables and in
your family libraries and your chill
dren read it after they retire at night,
the Gas burner swinging as near to the
pillow rs it is possible. Much of the
literature is under the title of the sci
entific information. One book agent
took one qf these internal books CLOSED
with scientific nomenclature and sold
more than one hundred copies in one
hotel III one day and sold them all to
women. 1t is appalling that men and
women who might get from family
physicians all the healthful informa-
tiOn needed, and without any cOntami-
nation, should wade chin deep through
accused literature for what is called
useful knowledge. and that publishing
houses that hope To be called decent
should lend their presses to such in
fanny. Father and mother, be not de
ceivetl with the words medical work.
Nine-tenths of such books are from the