The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1888-07-13
SOUR EXPERIENCES.
REV. r. De WITT TALMAoE
breaches IN CHICAGO.

IN SOuo s>tVes tuc seccuwrtuo Sce"s "
Predominate-A Gravel In Almost Every
Shoe - The Omnipotent sympathy Of
Jesus Christ.
CHICAGO. July s.-The Rev. I. De
Witt Talmage, D. d.. of Brooklyn,
preached in this city this evening. He
is here on his way home from tour OF
the Chautauquas in Missouri, Kansas and
Minnesota. The doctor had an enormous
auditory. His subject was "Sour Expe-
riences," and his text: "When Jesus
therefore had received the vinegar"
John xix, 80. The sermon was as fol-
lows:
The brigands of Jerusalem had done
their work. 1t was almost shutdown,
and Jesus was dying. Persons in cruel
fixion often fingered on from day to day
crying. begging. cursing; but Christ
had been exhausted by years of maltreat-
ment Pillowless, poorly fed, logged
as bent over and tied to low post, his
bare back was inflamed with the scourges
intensified with pieces of lead and bone
and now for whole hours, the weight OF
his body hung on delicate tendons. and,
according to custom, violent stroke un-
der the armpits had been given by the
executioner. Dizzy, swooning nau-
seated, feverish-a world of agony is
compressed in the two words: II thirst"
Oh skies of Judea, let drop of rain
strike on his burning tongue. Oh world,
with rolling rivers, and sparkling lakes,
and spraying fountains, give Jesus some
thing to drink. If there be any pity in
earth, or heaven, or hell, let it now be
demonstrated in behalf of this royal SUI
ferer. The wealthy women of Jerusa-
lem used to have fund Of money with
which they provided wine for those peo-
pie who died in crucifixion-a power
full opiate to deaden the pain;
but Christ would not take it. He
wanted to die sober, and so he refused
the wine. But afterward they 60 to a
cup of vinegar and soak a sponge in it,
and put it on stick of hyssop, and then
press it against the hot lips of Christ.
You say the wine was an anasthetic, and
intended to relieve or deaden the pain.
But the vinegar was an insult. I am
disposed to adopt the theory Of the old
English commentators, who believed that
instead of its being an opiate to soothe,
it was vinegar to insult Malaga and
Burgundy for grand dukes and duchesses,
and costly wines from royal watts for
bloated imperials; but singing acids for
a dying Christ. He took the vinegar.
In some lives the saccharine seems to
predominant. Life is sunshine on a bank
Of flowers. A thousand hands to clap
approval. In December or in January,
looking across their table, they see all
their family present. Health rubicund.
Skies famboyant Days resilient. But
in great many cases there are not SO
many sugars as acids. The annoyances,
and the vexations, and the disappoint-
ments Of. life overppwer the successes.
There is gravel in almost every shoe.
An Arabian legend says that there was
worm in Solomon's staff, gnawing its
strength away; and there is weak spot
in every earthly support that man leans
on. King George, of England, forgot
all the grandeurs Of his throne because,
one day in an interview, Beau Brummell
called him by his first name, and adj
dressed him as a servant, crying:
George, ring the bell!'' Miss Langdon,
honored all the world over for
her poetic genius, is SO worried over
the evil reports set afoat re-
garding her that she is found dead,
with an empty bottle of prussic acid
in her hand. Goldsmith said that his
life was wretched being, and that all
that want and contempt could bring to
it had been brought, and cries out:
"What, then, is there formidable in
jail?" Correggio's fine painting is hung
up for tavern sign. Hogarth cannot
sell his best paintings except through
rattle. Andrew Delsart makes the great
fresco in the Church of the Annunciata,
at Florence, and gets for pay sack of
corn; and there are annoyances and vex-
atoms in high places as well as in low
places, showing that in great many
lives the sours are greater than the
sweets. "When Jesus, therefore, had
received the vinegar"
1t is absurd to suppose that man who
has always been well can sympathize
with those who are sick; or that one who
has always been honored can appreciate
the sorrow of those who are despised;
or that one who has been born to great
fortune can understand the distress and
the straits of those who are destitute.
The fact that Christ himself took the
vinegar makes him able to sympathize
today and forever with all those whose
cup is filled with sharp acids of this life.
He took the vinegarl
In the first place, there is the sourness
of betrayal. The treachery Of Judas
hurt .Christ's feelings more than all the
friendship of his disciples did him good.
You have had many friends, but there
was one friend upon whom you put espe-
cial stress. You Toasted him. You
loaned him money. You befriended him
in the dark passes of life, when he espe-
cially needed friend. Afterward he
turned upon you, and he took advantage
of your former intimacies. He wrote
against you. He talked against you. He
microscopized your faults. He flung con-
tempt at you when you ought to have
received nothing but gratitude. At first
you could not sleep at nights. Then you
went about with a sense of having been
stung. That difficulty will never be
healed, for though mutual friends may
arbitrate in the matter until you shake