The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1888-03-09
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
Eighth Sermon o. the Series 10
the Women Of America.


|
| On MeusshesA-0osa aud ned
Isaasncss ~ Early Ts.la.
| ing On Ohilarea.
Rev. I. Dewitt Talma4e, in the eighth
discourse OF his series to the women Of
America took for his subject 1.-THE Grand
mother and Her Grandchildren" Hia
text was:
The unfeigued faith that 10 IN thee, which
dwelt nrst In thy grandmother Lois.
The eloquent preacher said:
In this love letter which Paul, the old
minister, 10 writing to Timothy, the
young minister. the family record Is
brought out. Paul practically says:
"Timothy, what . good grandmother you
had. You ought to b better than most
folks, because not only was your mother
good. but your grandmother. Two pre-
ceding generations Of piety ought to give
you a mighty push in the right direc-
tion." The fact was that Timothy needed
encouragement. He was in poor health,
having q weak stomach, and was dys.
peptic, and Paul prescribed for him a
tonic. "a little wine for thy stomach's
sake"-not much wine, but q little wine,
and only as a r,edicine. And il the wine
then had been as much adulterated with
logwood and strychnine a. our modern
wines, he would not have prescribed any.
But Timothy, not strong physically, is
encouraged spiritually by the recital of
grandmotherly excellence, Paul limiting to
him, as I hint this day to you, that God
sometimes gathers mp as in q reservoir
away back OF the active generations of
to-day q godly influence, and then in re-
Spouse to prayer lets down the power up
on children and grandchildren and great.
grandchildren. The world is woefully in
want of a table of statistics in regard to
what is the prCtractedness and immensely
Of influence of one good woman in the
church and wcrld. We have accounts of
how much evil has been wrought by Mar.
earet, the mother of criminals. who
lived near one hundred years ago,
and of how many hundreds
of criminals her descendants fur.
nished for the penitent iaries and the
gallows, and how many hundreds OF
thousands of dollars they cost this coun .
try in their arraignment and prison sup
port, as we'll as in the property they burg.
)arized or destroyed. But will not some
enc come ont with brain comprehensive
enough and heart warm enough and pen
keen enough to give us the facts in regard
TO some good woman of one hundred
years ago, and let us know how many
Christian men and women and reformers
and useful people have been found among
her descendants. and how many asylums
and colleges and churches they built, and
how many millions of dollars thew con.
tributed for humanitarian and Christian
purposes?
The good women whose tombstones
were planted in the eighteenth century
are more alive for good in the nineteenth
century than they were before, as the
good women of this nineteenth century
will be more alive for good in the TWEEN.
tieth century than now. Mark you,
have no idea that the grandmothers were
any better than their granddaughter.
You can not get very old people to talk
much about how things were when they
were boys and girls. They have q reti.
cence and . non-committalism that
makes me think they feel themselves to
be the custodians Of the regulations Of
their early comrades. While our dear
old folks are rehearsing the follies OF the
present, il you put them en- the witness
stand and cross.examine them as to how
things were seventy years ago, the silencs
becomes oppressive.
A celebrated Frenchman by the name
Of Nolney visited this country in 1916,
and he says Of woman's diet in those
times: "lf a premium was offered for .
regimen most destructive to health, mono
could be devised moro efficacious for these
ends than that in use among these PEG.
ple." That eclipses our lobster salad at
midnight Everybody talks about the
dissipation Of modern society and how
wOmanly health goes down under il. but
it was worse hundred years ago, for the
Chaplain Of q French regiment in our
Revolutionary War wrote in 1882, in his
book Of American women, saving: "They
are tall and we'll proportioned, their
features are generally regular,
their compilations are general.
ly fair and without color. At
twenty years Of age the women have
no longer the freshness Of youth. At
thirty or forty they are decrepit" In 1879
a foreign consul wrote book entitled "a
Sketch of the United States Mt the Com.
mencement Of the Present Century," and
the age Of thirty all their charms have
uiSoPPcoAcus Ou0 ktouCo Tue pOIs
traits Of the women hundred years ago,
and their style Of dress makes us wonder
how they ever got their breath. All this
makes me think that the express rail
train is no more an improvement on the
old canal boat, or the telegraph no more
an improvement on the old.time saddle.
bags than the women of our day are an
Improvement on the women of the last
century.
But still, notwithstanding that those
times were so much worse than ours,
there was glorious race Of godly wom-
en-, seventy and q hundred years ago, who
held the world back from sin and lifted IL
toward virtue, and without their exalted
and sanctifisd influence before this the
last good influence would have persisted
from the earth. Indeed all over this land
there are seated to-day-not 80 much in
churches, for many of them are too feeble
to come great many aged grandmoth.
ers. They sometimes feel that the world
has gone past them. and they have an
idea that they arc of little account. Their
head sometimes gets aching from the
racket Of the grandchildren down.stairs
or in the next room. They steady them.
selves by the banisters As they go up and
down. When they get . cold it hangs on
to them longer than 1t used to. They can
not bear to have the grandchildren pun.
ished even when they deserve II, and
have 80 relaxed their ideas Of
family discipline that they would
spoil all the youngste Of tho household
by too great leniency. These old folks
arc the resort when troubles come, and
there is . calming and . soothing power
in the touch Of an aged hand that 10 IL.
most supernat ural. They feel they are
almoat fhrou1h with fhA iournax Of lifa