The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1881-04-07
E1tscell
REV, 7. Dewitt TALMAGE.
QUESTIONS OF GRAVE INTEREST
TO HUMANITY,
And Of Incompatible Importance to Every
Man and WOmAn-.-What Provision Have
You Made for Eternity
SUBJECT -"QUEsTIoN OF QUE,TIoNs,"

SUBJECT -"QUEsTIoN OF QUE,TIoNs."
Text-Acts 1880; "Sirs, what must l
do to be saved"
In the cell of Phillippian dungeon, a
place cold lark, hideous, unilumined
save by the torch Of an official who
comes to see ifthey are yet alive, are TWO
ministers of the Gospel, their feet fastin
an instrument Of torture, their backs
dripping from the stroke Of leather
thongs, their mouths hot with MhAmma.
ton Of thirst, their heads faint because
they may not lay down, All still now
in the corridors and the dungeons, save
occasionally the hard breathing of some
one who can find no rest in his chains,
or the hollow cough of Consumptive
amid the dsmpness Of ths place, or a
horrid dream comes upon ruffian Pris
oner. In the same building, but on COM
Portable couch, sleeps paid officer ofthe
Government, whose business is to super
wise the prison. take him to have been
a moral man, or he would not have been
intrusted with so responsible position.
But the hour has come for God to deliver
Paul and Silas and in the darkness God
lays his hand on that stoutly built place.
At midnight crash goes the prison wall,
and Paul and Silas, the incarcerated
Clergymen, are free. The Supervisor,
though for long time accustomed to
the darkness and horrors that hover
around dungeons startled beyond bounds
rushes, fambeau in hand, amid the fall
ing walls, and throwing himself down
before his Christian prisoners, cries out,
"Sirs, what must do to be saved?"
There must be hundreds of men and
women in this house with more or less
earnestness asking the same question. l
meet you in the tremendous crisis with |
a message from heaven. There may be
some here who could surpass me in skill |
fullness of argument, some who could |
draw upon larger resources of knowledge |
and dive in deeper profounds Of science
There are many before me whom in
many respects would be willing to bow
the inferior to the superior. But in
one thing 1 yield to none VINO are before
me, and that is in the desire to have your
souls redeemed by the power Of the ON.
nipotent Gospel, and with an all-Consum-
ing desire that sometimes well.nigh
takes away my utteranGe, | stand here
today to beg your acceptance of life i'm
mortal.
l proceed to characterize the question
of the agtated Jail keeper First, re
mark it was courteous question. He did
not rush in and say to Paul and 81 as:
"You vagabonds, what are you doing
with my prison? Go back to your places,
you criminals l have had enough
trouble with you. After destroying the
peace of our city with your infamous
doctrines, you are now trying to break
jail" No; that word of four letters tells
the story, That word is equivalent to
Lords. Thus the jailor recognizes their
manhood and the honor OF their mission.
If we come with a captiOus spirit to in.
quire about the way to heaven, we can
not expect any light. If we begin by
saying that the professors Of religion are
hypoCrites and the church is a fraud and
make irritable inquiries about the mys.
terious and inscrutable, saying in spirit,
"Come, my wise man, explain this and
explain that" we might better make no
inquiry at all. 1t was decent, gentle
manly and deferential mode of address,
when the prison keeper cried out to his
apostolic prisoners, "Sirs."
Again 1t was a practical question. He !
might have asked his distinguished pris !
oners why God let sin come into the
world; or how it was possible for the Je !
sus, of whom they preach, to be both {
God and man, or what they meant by |
the DEGREES. or whom Cain married, or {
"
he hurls one question hot from the heart |
into the ear of the apostle, and that was :
in regard to his present and eternal safe |
ty. Multitudes of men want to be Chris ,
tisns, but they have five thousand ques. q
tions to ask about non-essentias. They i
search the Bible for queer things, for I
things. They have all a
their lives been fishing Tor Swapping tur- |
ties. What if man should have as &
many questions to ask about the light /
that he should stay in dark room all '
his life, instead of going out to see the q
one and feel the other. Yet there are G
men in such indeCision about the chem /
istry of the Gospel, that year after year E
they shut themselves in the dungeon of
their unbelief, when God has all the time v
been calling them to come out into the q
noontide and warmth of the sun of right O
eousness. The question you are most in. {
terested in is not whether Calvin or Ar. '
minus was right; not whether in holy v
ordinance handful of water or bap v
tistry is the better; not whether foreor o
1inatiOn and free agency can be harmo- v
1ized, but whether you are going to {
spend eternity in gladness or sorrow. t.
Further, characterize the question of e
.he Jail keeper as personal to himself. / n
suppose he had hundreds of friends, some q
of them good, some bad. He did not ask h
about them. / suppose there were men c
IN the wards of that prison unfit to die c
and If the wall during the earth quake g
should fall down on them, their cause Q
would be desperate. But the weight of q
his question hinged on his own deliver. a
snCe-what shall l do2 As soon as a
nan is safe himself, he begins to look b
after others. But the first thing with q
avery man ought to be his own soul. q
What is my constitution What is to be n
,ome Of me? What shall do? The r
ruth is we shuttle of these matters n
lpon others. We prophecy bad end to d
hat inebriate, and q terrible exposure to a
hot nratnuAaV nd Il IL, | n