The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1886-10-08
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
a Discourse to Young Men About
to Enter City Life.
The Careers OF Two Young Mem trough
4dleness and Dissipation to Death
by Industry to Wealth and
Honor-An Earnest Appeal.

Ponder the path OF thy feet.-lProv. tx. 20,
and preached the following sermon on the
subjects
1.-Two young men who came TO live In
the city"
1t was on Monday, September 20, at a
country depot. Two young men are to
take the cars for the city. Father brought
them in a wagon with two trut ks. The
evening before at the old home was a sad
time. The neighbOrs had gathered in to
say good-by. Indeed, all the Sunday af-
ternoon there had been a strolIing that
way from adjoining farms, for it was gen
orally known that the two boys the next
morning were going to the city to live,
and the whole neighborhood was inter
ested'some hoping they would do we'll and
Others without saying anything, hoping
Tor them a city failure. Sitting on the fence
talking over the matter the neighbors
would interlard their conversation about
the wheat crop Of last summer, and the
apple crop yet to be gathered, with re-
mesks about the city prospects or Edward
and Nicholas, for those were the names Of
the two young men--Edward seventeen,
and Nicholas nineteenS but Edward, al
though two years younger, being a little
quicker to learn, knew as much as Nicho-
las. They were both brown-faced and
hearty, and had gone through all the cur
riculum OF hearty sports, by which muscle
Is developed and the chest filled out.
Father and mother on Monday morning
bad both resolved to 20 10 the depot with
the bows, but the mother at the last mo-
ment backed out, and she said that some
how she felt quite weak that morning, AMI
had no appetite for day or two, and so
concluded to say good bye at the front
door Of he old place, where she wept, and
what she did after the wagon left leave
other mothers to guess. The breakfast
things God almost tin noon before they
were cleared away But little was said on
the way to the railroad station. As the
locomotive whistle was heard comino
around the curve, the father put out his
hand-somewhat knotted at the knuckles
and one Of the Joints stifened years ago
by wound from a scythe-ani said:
''Good-byc, Edward; good-bve, Nicholas.
Take good care Of yourselves, and writ
as soon as you get there, and let US know
how they treat you. Your mother will be
anxious to hear"
Landed in the city, they sought out
with considerable inquiry of policemen on
street corners AMI questioning of car driv-
ers the two commercial establishments to
which they were destined, so far apart
that thereafter they seldom saw each
other, for il is astonishing how far apart
two persons can be in a large city, espe-
cially If their habits are different. Prac-
ticallv a hundred miles from Bowling
Green TO Canal street, or from Atlantic
avenue to Fulton.
Edward, being the youngest, we mus
look after him first. He never was in so
large a store in all his life. Such inter
minable shelves, such slxillfuI imitation OF
real men and women to display goods on,
such agility Of cash boys, such immense
stock OF goods, and a whole community Of
employees! His head is confused as he
seems dropped like pebble in the great
ocean of business life.
"Have you seen that greenhorn from the
country" whispers young man to young
man. "He is in such and such a depart
ment' We will have to break him in some
night"
Edward stands at his new place all dav
so homesick that at any moment he could
have cried aloud II his pride had not sup
pressed every thing. Here and there a
tear be carelessly dashed off as THOUGH il
were from fuenza or cold in the head.
But some of you know how a young man
feels when set down in a city Of strangers.
thereafter TO fight his own battles, and no
one near by seeming to care whether he
lives or dies. The center of q desert, a
months journey to the first settlement, is
not much more solitary,
But that evening, as the hour for closing
has come, there are two or three young
men who sidle up to Edward and ask him
how he likes the city, and where he ex-
poets to go that night, and If he would
like them TO show him the sights He
thanks them, and says he shall have to
take some evenings for unpacking
and making arrangements, as he had
just arrived, but says that after awhile he
will be glad to accept their company. AZ
ter spending two or three evenings in his
boarding-house room, walking up and
down, looking at the bare wall or an old
chromo hung there at the time that relig-
GUS newspapers by such prizes advanced
their subscription lists, and after an hour
toying with the Matchbox and ever and
anon examining his watch to see if it is
time to retire-and it seems that ten
O'Clock at N light or even nine O'Clock win
never come-he resolves to accept the
chaperoning of his new friends at the
store.
The following night they are all out to-
gether. Although his salary Is not arge,
he is quite flush with pocket money, which
the old folks gave him after saving by for
some time. He can not be mean, and
these friends are doing all this for his
pleasure, and 50 he pays the bills. At the
door Of places of enchantment his COM
panions can not End the change, and they
accidentally fan behind just as the ticket
office is approached, or they say they
will make 10 all right, and viii themselves
pay the next time. Edward, accustomed
10 farm life or village life, is dazed and
enchanted with the glitter OF spectacular
sin. Plain and blunt iniquity Edward
would have Immediately repulsed, but sin
accompanied by bewitching orchestra;
sin amid gilded pillars and gorgeous up
bolstery; sin arrayed in all the attrac-
tions that the powers OF darkness in COM
bination can arrange to magnetic
young man, is very different from sin in
Its loathsome and disgu ting shape.
But after few nights being very late
out, he says;
81 must stop. My purse won't stand this.
MY health won't stand this. My reputa-
zion won't stand this"
Indeed, one Of the business firm one
night from his private box, in which he
app auded play, m which attitu and
phraseologY occurred, which tax or ut
tered in his own parlor would have caused
him TO shoot OF stab the actor on the spot
from his high-prjced box sees in
cheaper place the new clerk of his store,
and is led 20 ask questions as to his habits,
and wonders how, on the salary the house
pays him, he can do as he does. Edward,
TO recover his physical vigor and his
finances, stopped awhile and spent a few
more evenings examining the chrome on
the wall and counting the matches in the
matchbox, or goes down into the board
ing-house parlor 70 hear the gossip about
the other boarders or a discourse on the