St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1885-12-14
Placing Upon It the Heroes and Heroines
of Toll, Charity, the Sick Room and
Domestic Injustice.
Mr.. Beecher, Inspired by Recent Nota-
BILE Demises, Discourses Eloquent1y
Upon the Subject of Death.
Men Shun the King of Terrors and
Choose Instead Shame, ,Ignominy,
Contumely and Poverty.
TaInlage,s Sermon.

Thou therefore endure hardness" Dr.
Talmage said: Historians are not slow to
acknowledge the merits of great military
chieftains. We have the full length portraits
of the Cromwells, the Washingtons. the
Napoleons and the WellingtOns of the world.
History is not written in black ink, but with
red ink of human blood. The gods of hui
man ambition do not drink from bowls made
out of silver or gold or precious stones, but
out of the bleached skulls of the fallen.
But l am now to unroll before you scroll
Of heroes that the world has never acknowl
edged; those who faced no guns, blew no
bugle- blast, conquered no cities chained no
captlves to their chariot wheels, and yet in
the great day of eternity will stand higher
than those whose names startled the ma
tions: and seraph and rapt spirit and arch
angel will tell their deeds to listening uni
verse. | mean the heroes of common,
everyday life. In this roll, in the first
place, find all the heroes of the sick room.
When Satan had failed TO overcome Job he
said to God: Put forth thine hand now
and touch his bone and his flesh, and he
viii curse thee to thy face" Satan had
found out what we have all found out, that
sickness is the great
TEST OF ONES CHARACTER.
A man who can stand that can stand any
thing-tO be shut in a room as fast as
though it were bastile; to be so nervous
you cannot endure the tap of a child'S foot;
to have luXuriant fruit, which temptS the
appetite of the robust and healthy, excite
your loathing and disgust when it appears
on the platter; to have the rapier of pain
strike through the side or across the tenn
pies like razor; or to put the foot into a
wise or throw the whole body into blaze
of fever. Yet there have been men and
women, more women than men, who have
acheerfully endured this hardness. Through
years OF eXhausting rheumatiSmS and eXcru-
tiating neuralgias they have gone. and
through bodily distresses that rasped the
nerves, and tore the muscles, and paled the
cheeks and stopped the shoulders. By the
dim light of the sick-rcom taper they saw
on their wall the picture of that land where
the inhabitants are never sick. Through
the dead silence of the night they heard the
chorus of the angels. The cancer ate away
her life from week to week and from day
to day, and she became weaker and weaker,
and every ''good night was feebler than the
good night" before, yet never sad. The
child looked up into her face and saw suf-
fering transformed into heavenly smile.
Those who suffered on the battlefield amid
SllOt dllu SlltIl, WClC UOG 81 luuCll lCIOtS
and heroines as those who in the field hos
pital and in the asylum had fevers which no
ice could cool and no surgery could cure,
no shout or comrade to cheer them. but
numbness and aching and inconsistencies;
yet willing to suffer, confident in God and
HOPEFUL OF HEAVEN.
Heroes of rheumatism, heroes of neuralgia,
heroes of spinal complaint, heroes of sick
~ Fa
heroes and heroneS, they shall reign for
ever and ever. Hark! l catch just one
note OF the eternal anthem: ''There shall
be no more pain" Bless God for that. In
this roll also find the heroes of toll, who
do their work uncomplainingly. 1t is COM
paratively easy to lead regiment into
battle when you know that the whole ma
ton will applaud the victory; it is compar-
atively easy to doctor the sick when you
know that your skill will be appreciated by
the large company of friends and relatives;
it is comparatively easy to address an audi
ence when in the cleaning eyes and flushed
cheeks you know that your sentiments are
adopted; but to do sewing where you eX
pect that the employer will come and thrust
his thumb through the work to show how
imperfect it is, or to have the whole garm-
ent thrown back on you to be done over
again; to build we'll and know there will
be no one to say you did it well. but only a
swearing employer bowling across the scat
fold; to work until your eyes are dim, and
your back aches, and your heart faints, and
to know that if you stop before night your
children will starve! Ah the sword has
not slain so many as the needle! The great
battIefields of our last war were not Gettys-
burg and Shiloh and South Mountain. The
great battlefeldS of the last war were in the
arsenals and in the shops, and in the attics,
where women made army jackets for six
pence. They toiled on until they died.
They had
NO FUNERAL EULOGIUM,
but in the name of God, this morning en-
roll their names among those of whom the
world was not worthy. Heroes of the
needle. heroes of the sewing machine,
heroes Of the attic, heroes of the cellar,
heroes and heroines, bless God for them.
You would not have to go far to find wife
who is a perpetual martyr. Something
heavier than the stroke of the fist, unkind
words; staggerings home at midnight and
constant maltreatment, which have left her
only wreck OF what she was on that day,
when in the midst of brilliant assemblage
the VOWS were taken and full organ played
the wedding march. and the carriage rolled
away with the benedicti0n of the people.
What was the burning of Latimer and Rid
ley at the stake compared with this? Those
men soon became unconscious in the fire,
but here is fifty years Giartyrdum, fifty
years putting to death, yet accomplishing.
No bitter words when the rollc1ing COM
panions at 2 o'clock in the morning. pitch
the husband dead drunk into the front en-
M hitter words Whom from,
the swollen brow the blood struck out in
midnight carousal: bending over the bat
tered and bruised form of him who, when
he took her from her fathers home, prom
ised love and kindness and protection; yet
nothing but sympathy and prayers and for
giveneSS, before they are asked for. No
bitter words when the family Bible goes for
rum, and the pawnbroker'S shop gets the
last decent dress. Some day, desiring to
evoke the story of her sorrows, you say:
''Well. how are you getting along now?"
And rallying her trembling voice and quiet
ing
HER oUIvERING LIP,
she says: Pretty well, thank you: pretty
WELL" She never will tell you. in the de-
lirium of her last sickness she may tell all
the secrets of her lifetime, but she will not
tell that. Not until the books of eternity
are opened on the throne of judgment will
ever be known what she has suffered. o,
ye who are twisting garland for the vic.
tor, put it on that pale brow! When she is
dead the neighbors will beg linen to make
her shroud, and she will be carried out in
plain box with no silver plate to tell her
years, for she has lived thousand years of
trials and anguish. The gamblers, the
swindlers who destroyed her husband, will
not come to the funeral. One carriage will
be enough for that funeral. 'one carriage to
carry the orphans and the two Christian
women who presided over the obseouies: