The Bolivar bulletin. [volume] (Bolivar, Hardeman County, Tenn.) 1865-1888, 1886-08-20

saved" might talk Of a great many
other things, but that is the message, and
so I declare it. Jesus never fattered those
TO whom he preached. He said to those
who did wrong and who were offensive in
his sight: eye generation Of vipers? We
whited sepulchersI How can ye escape
the damnation Of hell?" Paul the Apostle
preached before man who was not ready
TO hear him preach. What subject did he
take? Did he say: sob, you are good
man, very fine man. a very noble man?''
No; he preached of righteousness to a
man who was unrighteous; Of temperance
to man who was the victim
of bad aPpetites; of the judg-
ment to come to a man who was unfit for
il. So we must always declare the mes
sage that happens to come to us. Daniel
must read it as it is. A minister preached
before James I. of England, who was
James VI of Scotland. What subject did
he take? The King was noted all over
the world for being unsettled and waver-
ing in his ideas. What did the minister
preach about to his man who was James l.
of England and James VI of Scotland?
He took for his text:
He that wa vereth is like q wave of the sea
driven with the wind and tossed-James,
IL, 6.
Hugh Latimer offended the King by
sermon he preached, and the King said:
"Hugh Latimer, come and apologize"
al WILL" said Hugh Latimer.
So the day was appointed, and the
Kings chapel was full of lords and dukes,
and the mighty men and women of the
country, for Hugh Latimer was to apollo
gize. He began his sermon by saying:
"Hugh Latimer, bethink thee! Thou art
in the presence of thine earthly King, who
can destroy the bodyl But bethink thee,
Hugh Latimer that thou art in the pres
ence of the King of Heaven and earth,
who can destroy both body and soul in
| hell fire. o, King, cursed be thy crimes!"
2. Another lesson that comes to us:
/ There is great difference between the
| opening of the banquet of sin and its close.
Young man, If you had looked in upon tho
banquet in the first few hours you would
have wished you had been invited there
and could sit at the feast go, the grand
eur of Belshazzar's feast" you would have
said; but you look in at the close of the
| banquet and your blood curdles with hor-
ror. The King of Terrors has there a
| ghaBtlier banquet; human blood is the
wins and dying groans are the music. Sin
has made itself king in the earth. Ithas
D
| 1t invites all the world to come to it. 1t
has hung in its banqueting hall the spoils
/ OF ell kingdoms and the banners Of all ma
| tons. 1t has gathered from all music. It
| has strewn from its wealth the table and
/ doors and arches. And yet how often is
| that banquet broken up, and how horrible
| 10 Its end! Ever and anon there is hand
writing on the wall. A king falls. A
1 great culprit is arrested. The knees of
! wickedness knocked together. Gods judg-
meut, like an armed host, breaks i'm upon
/ the banquet, and that night is BeIshazz ar,
| the King of the Chaldeans. slain.
Here is a young man who says: "I can
not see why they make such a fuss about
| the intoxicating cup. Why, it is exhil-
/ arating. 1t makes me feel we'll. 1 can
talk better, think better, feel better. can
not see why people have such prejudice
/ against it." A few years pass on and he
wakes up and finds himself IN the clutches
of an evil habit which he tries to break.
but he can not; and ne cries out: son,
| Lord God, help me!' 1t seems as though
| God would not hear his prayer, and in an
agony of body and soul he cries out:
It biteth like a serpent and stingeth like an
adder.
How bright it was at the startI how
| black it was at the lastI
! Here is a man who begins to read
French novels. "They are so charming"
he says; 81 will go out and see for myself
| whether all these things are So" He
| opens the gate of a sinful life. He goes
| in. sinful sprite meets him with her
wand. She waves her wand and it is
all enchantment. Why it seems as if the
! angels of God had poured out pitfalls of
/ perfume in the atmosphere. AS he walks
on he finds the hills becoming MOI radiant
with the falling water. o, what charm
| ing landscape he seesI But that sinful
sprite with her wand meets him again
but now she reverses the wand, and all the
enchanment is gone. The cup is full of poi
son. The fruit turns to ashes. All the
leaves of the bower are forked tongues of
kissing serpents. The flowing fountains
fall back in a dead pool, stem chfuI with
corruption. The Turing songs become
curses and screams of demoniac laughter.
| Lost spirits gather about him, and feel for
his heart, and beckon him on with; "Hail
brotherl Hail, blasted spirit HailW He
| tries to get out. He comes to the from
| door, where he entered, and tries to push
it back, but the door turns against him
and in the jar of that shutting door he
hears these words:
This night is Belshazzar, the King OF the
| ChRldeans, slain.
Sin may open bright as the morning; it
| closes dark as the night.
3. I learn further from this subject that
! death sometimes breaks in upon a ban
quet. Why did he not 60 down to the
prisons in Babylon? There were people
there that would like to have died sup
pose there were men and women in tor
ture in that city who would have well
coined death. But he comes to the palace,
| and just at the time when the mirth is
dashing to the tip top pitch death breaks
in at the banquet. We have often seen
the same thing illustrated. Here is q
young man just come from college. He
is kind. He is loving. He is enthusiastic.
He is eloquent. By one spring he may
| bound to heights toward which many
men have been struggling for years. A
| profession opens before him. He is es-
| tablished in the law. His friends cheer
him. Eminent men encourage him. At
ter awhile you may see him standing in
/ the American Senate, or moving a popu-
lar assemblage by his eloquence as trees
are moved in a whirlwind. Some night
he retires early. A fever is on him.
Delirium, like a reckless charioteer,
seizes the reins of his in
teAAsCI Father ana mother stand by and
see the tides of life going out to the great
ocean. The banquet is coming to an end.
The lights of thought and mirth and elo-
quence are being extinguished. The gar
lands are snatched from the brow The
vision is gone. Death at the banquatl
We saw the same thing on p larger scale
illustrated at the last war in This country.
Our whole Nation had been Aittiug AT a
National banou st-North, South. East and
West. What grain was there but we grew
it on our hillsg What invention was there
but our rivers must turn the new wheel