Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1886-01-08
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
a discourse on "winter, and How
to Meet It"
r,e Designations Incident to the Season
rorclbly Presented and illustrated
A Plea for Abstinence On the .
Natal Day of the New Year.

pav. T. Dewitt Talmage, on his recent
..trrn to Brooklyn from his Western lee
,.a tour. chose the above timely topic for
~, ~ f,st Sunday evening discourse, taking
for his text:
prov We that your flight be no in the win.
cor Mathew xiv, 20.
The inhabitants of the old cities were
,na told that they would have to fly for
.hoir lives. Such flight would be painful,
wan in the flush of spring time, but super
,a+;ycly ag%gravating if in cold weather;
i"', fore they We're told to pray that their
1'I.+ he not in the winter. There is some-
! n5,c in the winter season that not only
: .os+s our physical endurance but, especial
". in the city, tries our moral character.
:. is tht winter months that ruin morally
and forever many of our young men. We
o.. in the house on a winters night, and
hoor the storm raging on the outside and
:nogine the helpless crafts driven on the
"asst. but if our ears were only good
suaugh, we could on any winter night
,aor the crash of 100 moral shipwrecks.
Many who came last September to town,
~. tho first of March will have been blast.
~ II only takes one winter to ruin a
,,orno man. When the long winter even.
;ros have come many of our young men
nil improve them in forming a more init.
m,ta acquaintance with books, contract
inc higher social friendships and strength
en;nc and enrolling characters. But not
so with all. l will show you before l get
+hrouph that at this season of the year
formations are especially rampant, and
INV counsel is, look out how you spend your
winter nights!
| remark, first, that there is no season of
+ne wear in which vicious allurements are
co active. In warm weather places of dis
sination win their tamest triumphs. Peo-
nile do not feel like going in the hot nights
Of summer among the blazing gaslights or
breathing the fetid air of assemblages.
The receipts of most grog shops in a De-
cpmber night are three times what they
are in any night in July or August. I
doubt not there are larger audiences in the
Casinos in winter than in the summer
weather. Iniquity plies a moro profitable
trade. December, January and February
are harvest months for the devil. The
plavbills of the low entertainments then
are more charming, the acting is more ex-
ouisite, the enthusiasm of the spectators
more bewitching. Many a young man
who makes out to keep right the rest of the
wear, capsizes now. When he came to
town in the autumn his eye was bright,
his cheek rosy, his step elastic; but before
spring, as you pass him you will say to
Your friend: "What is the matter with
that Young man." The fact is that one
winter of dissipation has done the work of
ruin.
This is the season for parties, and if they
are of the right kind, our social nature is
improved and our spirits are cheered up.
But many of them are not of the right
kind, and our young people night after
night are keptin the whirl of unhealthy ex-
element, until their strength fails, and
their spirits are broken down, and their
taste for ordinary life corrupted; and by
the time the spring weather comes they are
in the doctors hands or sleeping in the
cemetery. The certificate of their death is
made out, and the physician, out of regard
for the family, calls til edisease by some
Latin name, when the truth is that they
died OF too many parties.
Away with these wine-drinking convivi-
alitles. How dare you, the father of a
III "iUu 'Cuc dppCtlGcS u Our
young people: Perhaps out of regard for
the minister or some other weak temper
ance man, you have the decanter in a side
ROOM Where, after refreshments, only a
select lew are invited; and you come back
with a glare in your eye and a stencil in
your breath that show that you have been
out serving the devil.
Inc excuse which Christian men often
give lor this is that it is necessary, after
sueh late eating, by some sort of stimulant
70 nelp digestion. My plain opinion is
.naV l a man have no more control over
MS appetite than to stuff himself until his
digestive organs refuse to do their Office,
ne ought not to cali himself a man, but
rather to class himself among the beasts
.n"' perish. | take the words of the Lord
Almighty, and cry: sWoe to him that
pu.'cen the bottle to his neighbours lips!'
aouhs men, take it as the counsel of a
iiieia when bid you be cautious where
souspehd Your winter evenings. Thank
oou 'hat you have lived to see the glad
winter days in which your childhood was
" cheerful by the faces OF fathers and
Aotnefs brothers and sisters, some of
~non' alas! will never again wish you a
Happy New Year" or ".Merry Christ
LET no one tempt you out of your So
mle's' l nave seen respectable young
Men OF the best families drunk on
ave" Years Day. The excuse they
s'se ior the inebriation was that the
h" "!e insisted on their taking it. There
h, y oeen instances where the delicate
"". OF woman hath kindled a young
m "i ) taste for strong drink, who, after
bIii years, when the attractions of that
~ I"'ay scene We're all forgotten, crouched
rags and her desolation and her
= under the uplifted hand of the drunk
monster who, on that Christmas morn
ho ~ long ago., took the glass from her
na And so the woman stands on the
Ia'nent of the bridge on the moonlit
,sn' wondering if down under the water
h,na. ~ NOT some quiet place for a broken
nr"n, She takes one wild leap-and all is
on' mlngle not with the harmless bever-
q OF your festive scene this poison Of
mm" Mix not with the sugar of the
~ tne snow of this awful leprosy! Mar
so". .'se CHATTER of cutlery at the holiday
WIN The clink Of a madman's chain!
" AMI l@~l.