The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1880-06-17
A Sermon by Talmage.

Week before last l took a carriage
and wound up Lookout Mountain; Up,
up, up standing there on the tip-top
rock, | saw five states of the Union.
Scene stupendOus and overwhelming!
One almost is disposed to take off his
hat at the presence of what seems to
be the grandest prospect on this cOnti-
nent. There is Missionary Ridge, the
beach against which the red pillows of
Federal and Confederate courage surg
ed and broke. There are the Blue
Mountains Of North and South Caro-
lima. With strain of vision, there is
Kentucky, there is Virginia. At our
feet Chattanooga and Chickamauga,
the pronunciation of which proper
names will thrill ages to come with
thoughts of valor and desperation and
agony. Looking each way and any
way from the top of that mountain,
earthwOrks, earthwOrks-the beauti-
ful Tennessee winding through the val
let, making letter IS" after letter IS, ,"
as if that letter stood for shame, that
brothers should have gone into masa-
ere with each other. while God and ma
tions looked on. / have stood on
Mount Washington, and on the Sierra
Nevadas, and Oh the dps, but never
saw so far as from the top Of Lookout
Mountain. Why, sirs looked back
seventeen years, and l saw rolling up
the side Of that mountain the smoke Of
Hooker's storming party, while the
| foundations of eternal rock quaked
with the canonade. Four years of in
ternecine strife seemed to come back,
and without any chronological order
saw the events; Norfork Navy-yard on
fire; Fort Sumter on fire; Charleston
on fire; Richmond on fire.
And / saw Ellsworth fall, and Me-
Pherson fall, and Bishop Potter fall,
and Stonewall jackson fall, And L
saw hundreds of grave trenches after
wards cut into two great gashes across
the land, the one for the dead men of
the North, the other for the dead men
Of the South. And my ear as we'll as
my eye was quickened, and heard the
tramp, tramp of enlisting armies, and
1 heard the explosion of mines and
gunpowder magazines, and the crash
of fOrtifcation walls, and the "swamp
angel" and the groan of dying hosts
falling across the pulseless heart of
other dying hosts; and | saw still fur
ther out, on the banks of the Penob-
scot, and the Oregon, and the
Ohio, and the Hudson, and the
Roanoke, and the Yazoo, and the
Alabama, widowhOod and orphantage
Il.
grief and Others stark mad. and / said:
Enough, enough have l seen into the
past from the top of Lookout mountain,
| Oh! God, show me the future" And
standing there, it was revealed to me.
| And / looked out, and | saw great
populations from the North moving
South, and great populations from the
South, moving North, and | found
that their footsteps obliterated the
hoof-marks of the war chargers. And
/ saw the Angel of the Lord of Hosts
standing in the national cemeteries,
trumpet in hand ,as much as to say, 81
will wake these soldiers from their long
encampment And | looked and |
saw such snowy harvests of cotton land
such golden harvests Of corn as l had
never imagined; and found that the
earthworks were down, and the gun
carriages down, and the war-barracks
were all down, and saw the
rivers winding through the valley,
making letter IS" after letter IS ,"
no more for shame but IS" for
salvation. And as I saw that all
the weapons of war were turnel
into agricultural implements, l was
alarmed, and said, SIS this safe?"
And standing there OH the tip-tOp rock
of Lookout Mountain, l was so near
heaven that heard two voices which
some way slipped from the gate. and
they sang: ''Nation shall not lift up
sword against nation, neither shall
they learn war any more" And 1
recognized the two voices. They were
the voices of two Christian soldiers who
fell at Shiloh; the one a Federal, and
the other Confederate. And they
were brothers!