St. Landry democrat. (Opelousas, La.) 1878-1894, 1886-02-06
TALMAGES SERMON.
Third Discourse Of the Series on
"The Marriage Ring"
CIandestine Marriages, Elopements and
other Matrimonial Escapades Con"
sidered BY the Light of Script
ure and Common Sense.

nacle, the interest in the series having be-
come quite marked. In presenting the
division of his subject under the heading
of "ClandestiEe Marriages and Es-
capades," Mr.. Talmage took the following
text:
Stolen waters are sweet, and bread taken
in secret is pleasant But he knoweth not
shat the dead are there.-Proverbs tx, T-1s
The preacher said:
The garden of Eden was great orchard
of fruit bearing trees, bushels and bushels
of round, ripe, glorious fruit, but the horti-
culturist and his wife having it in charge,
hankered for one special tree, simply be-
cause it was forbidden, starting bad
streak in human nature, so that children
will now sometimes do something simply
because they are forbidden to do it. This
kink in the human race is not easily un-
snarled. Tell company that they may
look into any twenty rooms of a large house
except one, and their chief desire is to see
that one, though all the others were pict-
ure galleries and that a garrett. If there
were in a region of mineral springs twenty
fountains, but the proprietor had fenced ia
one well against the public, the one fenced
in would be the chief temptation to the
visitors, and they would rather taste of
that than of the other nineteen. Solomon
recognized this principle in the text, and
also the disaster that follows forbidden
conduct, when he said: "Stolen waters
are sweet, and bread eaten in secret is
pleasant. But he knoweth not that the
dead are there"
In this course of sermons on ''The Mar
| - Il, i,nk
blank shot at "Clandestine Marriages and
Escapades." Yonder comes up through
the narrows of New York harbor a ship
having all the evidence of tempestuous
passage: Salt water mark reaching to the
top of the smoke-stack. Mainmast, fore
mast, mizzenmast twisted off. Bulwarks
knocked in. Lifeboats off the davits. Jib-
! sheets and lee bowlines missing. Captains
bridge demolished. Mainshaft broken. All
the pumps working to keep from sinking
before they can get to wharfage. That ship
is the institution of Christian marriage,
launched by the Lord grandly from the
bank of the Euphrates and floating out on
the seas for the admiration and happiness
of all nations. But free -loveism struck it
from one side, and Mormonism struck it
from another side, and hurricanes of lib
ertinism have struck it from all sides, until
the old ship needs repairs in every plank,
| and BEAM and sail, and bolt, and clamp,
and transom, and stanchion.
In other words, the notions of modern
society must be reconstructed on the sub
ject of the marriage institution. And when
we have got it back somewhere near what
it was when God built it in Paradise, the
| r,&h ry,Sn ha co. yorI
ton of Paradisaical conditions. Do
you ask what is the need of
course of sermons on this subject: The
man or woman who asks this question is
either ignorant or guilty. In New En-
gland. which has been considered by many
the most moral part of the United States,
there are 1900 divorces per year. And in
Massachusetts,, the headquarters of steady
habits, there is one divorce to every four
teen marriages. The State of Maine, con-
sidered by many almost frigid in proprie-
ties, has in one year 47S divorces. In Ver-
mont swapping wives is not rare trans.
action. In Connecticut there are women
who boast that they have four or five
times been divorced. Moreover, our boast
ed Professionalism is, on this subject, more
lax than Roman Catholicism. Roman
Catholicism admits of no divorce except
the reason that Christ admitted as law
full reason. But Professionalism is admit
Ting anything and everything, and the
larger the proportion of Protestants in any
part Of the country, the larger the ratio of
divorce. Do you not then think that
Professionalism needs some toning up on
this subject?"
During our civil war marriage was
about to be celebrated in Charleston, 8. c.,
between Lieutenant de Rochelle and Miss
Anna, the daughter of Ex-Governor Pick
ems. AS the ceremony was about to be
solemnized, shell broke through the roof
and wounded nine of the guests, and the
bride fell dying, and, wrapped in her
white wedding robe, her betrothed kneel-
ing at her side, in two hours she expired.
And there has been many as bright
union of hearts as that proposed, that the
bomb shell of outrageous parental indig-
nation has wounded and scattered and
slain.
If the hand offered in marriage be
blotched of intemperance, if the life of the
marital candidate has been debauched, il
he has no visible means of support, and
| pOPcEty huu duhuuOuIneut SooH1 o1Ay O
little way ahead; if the twain seem en-
tirely unmatched in disposition, protest
and forbid and re-enforce your opinion by
that of others, and put all lawful OBJ
stacles in the way; but do not join that
company Of parents who have ruined their
children by plutocracy of domestic
crankiness which has caused more than
one elopement. I know of few cases
where marriage has been under the red
hot anathema of parents and all the neigh
bors, but God approved, and the homes