Public ledger. [volume] (Memphis, Tenn.) 1865-1893, 1883-09-24
An Old Text Handled in q skillful
and Learned Manner.
A Pure Gospel sermon, 'CaIeu-
lated 20 Edify and Build Up
Back-sIiding Christians.

truths about man 9 lie. The history
of this senpiahzed and destitute swine
herder is moret than the individual story
Of proaigacy and femorse and pardon;
it has to do with the question as to
whether earthly, brutal forces and
conditions make man and 6t him 10
themselves; or whether his mission is
to fise above them, conquering, CON
trolling and fitting them to himself.
Mechanical, immoral. bestial powers,
the workings Of nature" it is said,
have wrought out mani Nothing is
in him but the different kinds Of
swine's food, the husks whereby brute
nature acts, and wherein it fattensl
But this poor d@eller with the swine
proclaims that the environment"
which Goddess nature puts about
man has not made him what
he is, cannot fill his hunger; that hit
true place is not amidst the death,
the hopelessness, the brute like living
Of nature aud the flesh, but afar from
these, in a fairer home whose recollec
ton pervades his being, and with a
father who is the fullness Of AL in
all"-and not with the swine" ami
NAL living, materialistic Interpretation
of life, to perish with hunger. The
swine" tina cycle Of all immoral
forces, nature without Gods instant
will working and informing it, life
following mechanical instead Of divine
laws, so much taught to day as the
conditions which have made man and
among which he should live, these are
surroundings entirely foreign, contra.
dictory and repulsive to man, though
he is a prodigal. Their husks revolt
him; they are not fit for him; they
have no relation to him, and have not
by any right shaped his career. He,
though hungry and forsaken enough
10 have filled his belly with them,
fallen so as to have degraded himself
down to them, cannot but turn from
them; they shall be changed; they
shall not wake him, but be theml He
will arise; create his own "enyirOn
ment," give laws to creation around
him; put down all the immoral and
animal, and realize the blessedness OF
the true home and the presence
of the true creatorl Instead
OF mar having utilization with the
goddess, immoral, british, the
whole Of these are his malignant, mer-
ciless, unslumbering foes; Instead Of
their making and fitting him bis only
work is to resist, defeat and aunihilate
them and their effects. Far from
being evolved throughout by these
forces, or from holding kinship and
life with them, his only mission is tC
restrain their influence and contract
its sphere, and finally drive them from
the universe. All the swine" ma.
ture and man loosed from God, mai
recreant to the spiritual purpose il
him and going doWnwards in the seal,
of being, tae whole realm and reigI
of matter and 'the flesh, "-thesI
are so plainly the origin Of evil ant
death and pain, so much the minister
Of all despairs and woe, that man earl
in his earthly course made Nature
"swinish" and immoral nature, into al
J agency Of diabolic power, pursuing
haunting, beating him down. TbT
Mature" With no feeling and nj
brain, as its cultus is now upheld, il
reality is the only thing that bars th,
progress Of man Its course ''seemI
q course Of death" It alone defel
mans labor retreats, "shriekinl
with rayin against" his every creed
and turns back upon MIN, when he il
slack, to undo what he has done, anC
make the e.beginning more full O.
toll and p in 1t gives no return Il
him builds up in him nothing
moral and unearthly, till hC
has incarnated in it SO much of hiu.
self, till it is made up Of his study
his toll, his thought, his formulated
laws, his hopes and feelings. r0nly
then it speaks back TO him, and gives
no image ave what he himself hal
put there, Blank, dreary and foul a
was the most Of heather mythology
whep applied as an impulse to man
real life, it caught its teachings ex'
actly from what ii saw 10 this nature
from the reign Of seeming british
force, and what it taught is lust tn,
result, aud all the result, that mar
may win from life amidst these
"swinish" conditions" Uruerie
combats more blind than any Titan.
battles, marriages Of good and evil
more hideous than any incests OF th
old divinities, monster births OF NOR,
foul excellence and baseness than any
Centaur or Minotaur, physical gods OF
laws OF the universe sitting and eating
the flesh OF men %serenoly and without
rebuke." These are the foods a natur
OF brute powers gives to its greatest
monster, mani
"No moreg A monster. then, A dream.
a discordl Dragons Of the rim
That tear each other In tho slime,
Mhere mellow music matched with him. /"
But all mans victory thus Far in his
history has been won by his o
guest over the herds Of swine
over his own brute parts and
the deadly resistance OIL mechanical
nature. He has arisen, he has as.
serted the eternal, spiritual ego against
them he has mastered and fitted them
to himself; he is ever working with
God on his side, fighting in bis u
to increase, to establish the spirit over
the flesh, life over death. The Der
tect conquest, the return OF mar 10.
the home and the Creator be seeks,
the driving Of ell the swine into the
sea, the complete ordering, reeenera
ting, redeeming Of the universe from
brute influence, is by man and Christ
together building up the creative.
spiritual, will forces against their foes.
Christ is the true law 10 all this natu
raj world, and is the spiritual sight
and will in man which enable him 10
rise above the animal, conquer it. and
mount to God So mans will Is his
to make it Gods. NAILS