St. Paul daily globe., 1886-06-21
THE BATTLEFOR BREAD
DR.. Talmage breaches His Brooklyn Con-
gregation Sermon on the Struggle
for Lifs's Necessaries,
Promising His Remarks With Denial of
the Report That His Health is Not
Now Good
How White Providence Often Brings
Ruin and Black Providence
Eternal Salvation.
We Have Right to Argue From Pre-
cedent That the Lord Will Take
Care of Us.
DR.. Taimage,s Sermon.

Care of Us.
DR.. Taimage's Sermon.
Special to the Globe.
BROOKLYN, n. Y, June 2O.-As re-
port had been published in many papers
that the Rev. Dr.. Il. Dewitt Talmage was
in poor health. he told his congregation in
the Brooklyn Tabernacle to-day that he had
in the thirty years of his ministry missed
but one Sabbath through i'll health, and
that Sabbath twenty-fOur years ago. He
said that he had never been in as robust
health as at present. DR.. Talmadge has
been in Brooklyn seventeen years. The
ordinary state of things at the Brooklyn
Tabernacle on Sunday mornings is, that
5000 people assemble inside and multitudes
are not able to get in. At a recent meet
ing of the session, thirty-eight new MEM
bers were received, making the communi-
cant membership of this church about 8, 400.
The subject of the sermon to-day was
1.-The Battle for Bread" and the text was
taken from 1. Kings, xviii, 6: ''And the
ravens brought him bread and flesh in the
morning, and bread and flesh in the even
ing" DR.. Talmadge said: The orni-
thology of the Bible is a very interesting
study. The stork which knoweth her ap-
pointed time The common sparrows
teaching the lesson of Gods providence
The ostriches of the desert, by careless in
cubation, illustrating the recklessness of
parents who do not take enough pains with
their children. The eagle symbolizing
riches which take wings and fly away The
pelican embemizing solitude. The bat,
flake of the darkness.
THE NIGHT HAWK,
the ossifrage. the cuckoo, the lapwing, the
osprey, by the command of God in Levitt
Gus, flung out of the worlds bill of fare. I
would like to have been with Audubon as
he went through the woods with gun and
pencil bringing down and sketching the
fowls of heaven, his .unfolded portfolio
thrilling all Christendom. What wonder
full creatures of God the birds are Some
of them, this morning, like the songs of
heaven let loose, bursting through the
gates of heaven. Consider their feathers,
which are clothing and conveyance at the
same time; the nine vertebrae of the neck,
the three eyelids to each eye, the third eye
lid and extra curtain for graduating the
light of the sun. Some of these birds
scavengers and some of them orchestra.
Thank God for quai's whistle and lark's
carol and the twittering of the wren, called
by the ancients the king of birds. because
when the fowls of heaven went into a con-
test as to who could fly the highest, and
the eagle swung nearest the sun, wren ON
the back Of the eagle, after the eagle was
exhausted, sprang up much higher and so
was called by the ancients the king of birds.
Consider those of them that have golden
crowns and crests, showing them to be
feathered imperials. And listen to the
humming birds serenade in the ear of the
honeysuckle. God is infinite in resource.
When the city of Rochelle was beseiged
and the inhabitants were
DYING OF THE FAMINE,
the tides washed up on the beach as never
before, and as never since. enough shell
fish to feed the whole city. God Is good
There is no mistake about that. History
tells us that in 1856 in England there was a
general drought. The crops failed, but in
Essex, on, on the rocks, ill a place where
they had neither sown nor cultured, a great
crop of peas grew until they filed a hun
dred measures; and there were blossOming
vines enough promising as much more. But
why go so far? 1 can give you family
incident Some generations back there
was great drought in Connecticut, New
England. The water disappeared from the
hills and the farmers living on the hills
drove their cattle down toward the valleys
and had them supplied at the wells and
fountains of the neighbors. But these
after while, began to fail, and the neigh
bors said to Mr.. Birdseye, of whom [ shall
speak: "You must not send your flocks
and herds down here any more; our wells
are giving out" Mr.. Birdseye, the old
Christian man, gathered his family at the
altar, and with his family he gathered the
slaves of the household-for bondage was
then in vogue in Connecticut-and on their
knees before God they cried for water; and
the family story is that there was weeping
and great sobbing at that altar that the
family might not perish for lack of water,
and that the herds and focks might not
perish. The family rose from the altar
Mr.. Birdseye, the old man, took his staff
and walked out
OVER THE HILLS
and in place where he haG been scores of
times without noticing anything particular,
he saw the ground was very dark, and he
took his staff and turned up the ground,
and water started and he beckoned to his
servants, and they came and brought pals
and buckets until all the family and all the
flocks and the herds were cared for. and
then they made troughs reaching from that
place down to the house and barn, and the
water flowed and it is a living fountain to-
day. Now, I call that old grandfather,
Elijah, and [ call that brook that began to
roll then, and is rolling still. the brook
Cherith; and the lesson to me and to all
who hear it is, vixen you are in great stress
of circumstances pray and dig, dig and
pray, and pray and dig. How does that
passage go? The mountains shall depart
and the hills be removed. but my loving
L.. H. I ro.l
ise. if your mechanism, if your husbandry
fail, look out for ravens. 1t you have in
your despondency put God OH trial and con-
demned Him as guilty of cruelty, move
this morning for new trial. If the biog-
raphy of your life is ever written. will tell
you what the first chapter and the middle
chapter and the last chapter will be about,
if it written accurately. The first chapter
about mercy, the middle chapter about
mercy, the last chapter about mercy. The
mercy that hOvered over your cradle. The
mercy that will hover over your grave. The
mercy that will cover all between. Again.
this
STORY OF THE TEXT
impressed me that relief came to this
prophet with the most unexpected and
with seemingly impossible conveyance If
it had been a robin-redbreaSt or a musical
meadow lark. or a. meek turtle dove or
sublime albatross that had brought the
food to Elijah. it would not have been so
surprising. But no; it was bird so
fierce and inauspicate that we have fash
ioned one of our most fOrceful and repu-
slve words out of it-ravenous. That bird
has passion for picking out the eyes of
men and of animals 1t loves to maui the
sick and the dying. 1t swallows with vul-
turous guzzle everything it can put its
beak on; and yet all the food Elijah gets
for six months or year is from ravens.
So your supply is going to come from an
unexpected source. You think some great