The McCook tribune. (McCook, Neb.) 1886-1936, 1888-08-31
TALMAGB IN THE QUEENS DOMINION
The Great Divine Discourses to
Thousands.

ieAt dreat rSeSults May Depend on Small
EVENTS His Beautiful Illustration OF
PauA's Dethronement at the Glistenine
Gates OF Damascus-How His Optics Were
Q eansed, and His Advocation of Gods
Word Thereafter is Something Beyond
Parallel.
GRIMsBY, CANADA, August 26.-The Rev r.
Dewitt Talmage, ID. D.,of Brooklyn, preach
ed on the camp ground this place. to day.
All Canada Is represented in the immense
fhrongs assembled. DR.. Talmage has
preached at Grimsby many ummers This
closes bis summer absence. He has preached,
iectured and visited in thirteen states Of the
Union this summer his audiences numbering
ten and fifteen thousand prople. The sub
.1ect OF his sermon here to-day was Great
Results May Depend on Small Events" DIR
Talmage took for his text: Through a win
dow. in a basket, was l let down by the
Wall."-H Cor. Oh. 2, v. SO. BE said:
Damascus Is a city of white and gIistening
architecture sometimes called ''the eye of the
East" sometimes called "a pearl surround
ed By erperalds," OF one time distinguishe ed
Tor swords Of the best material called Da-
mascus blades, and upholstery of richest
fabric called damasks. A horseman by the
name of Paul, riding toward this city, had
been thrown from the saddle. The horse
had dropped under a flash from the sky, which
at the same time was so bright 1t blinded the
rider for many days, and, | think so perma-
nently injured his eyesight that this defect
Of vision became the thorn in the flesh he
afterwards speaks OF. He started for Da-
maseus TO butcher Christians, but after that
lard fall from his horse he was a changed
man and preached Christ in Damascus
III the city was shaken to its foundation.
The mayor gives authority for his arrest, and
the popular cry is, xiii him! Kill him I"
The city is surrounded by a high wall, and
lhe gates are watched by the police lest the
CHician preacher escape, Many of the
houses are built on the wall, and their balco-
0ies projected clear over and lowered above
che gardens outside. 1t was customary to
hang baskets out of these balconies and pull
up fruits and flowers from the gardens. To
this day visitors at the monastery of Monnt
Sinai are lifted and let down in baskets.
Detectives prowled around from house to
house looking for Paul, but his friends hid
him now IN one place, now in another. He
is no coward, as fifty incidents in his life
demonstrate. But he feels his work is not
lone yet, and so he eYades assassination. as
that preacher here?" the fosming mob shout
at one house door. is that fanatic here?'
che police shout at another house door.
Sometimes on the street incOgnito he passed
through a crowd Of cienched fists and some
times he secretes himself on the house-top.
AT last the infur,ate p~Opulace get on sure
track OF him. They have positive evidence
that he Is in the house of one of the Chris
tlaus, the balcony OF whose home reaches
over the wall. Here he isl Here he isl'
The VociIeration and blasphemv and bowling
81 the pursuers are at the front door. They
break in. Fetch out that Gospelizer, and
tet Us hang has head on The city gate. Where
Is beg" The emergency was terrible. Provi-
hentialiy there was a good stout basket in
the house. PauFs friends fastened a rope to
the basket Paul steps into it. The basket
is lifted to the edge of the balcony on the
wall, and then while Paul holds on 10 tue
rope with both hands his friends lower away,
carefully and cautiously, slowly but
until the baskets strikes the earth
and the apostle steps out, and afoot and
alone starts on that famous missionary tour,
the story of which has astonished earth and
heaven. Approximate entry in Paurs diary of
travels: Through a window, in a basket,
was llet down by the wall"
Observe, first on what a slender tenure
great results hang. The ropemaker who
twisted that cord fastened to that lowering
basket never knew how much would depend
Oh the strength of it. How If it had been
broken and the apostles life had been dashed
out. what would have become of the Christ
Jan Church.! All that magnificent missionary
work in Pamphlia, Cappadocia. GaIatia,
Macedonia would never have been accom-
p.ished. All his writings that make up SO
indispensable ana enchanting Il part of the
New Testament you'll never have been
written. The story of resurrection would
never have been so gloriously told as he told
it That example Of heroic and triumphant
endurance at Philippi, in the Mediterranean
eurOclydOn, under 1agellation aud at his be-
heading would rot have kindled the courage
Of ten thousand martyrdoms. But that rope
holding that basket, how much depended on
1t! SO again and again great results have
hung on what seemed slender circumstances.
Did ever ship OF many thousand tons cross
ing the sea have such important passenger as
had once a beat of leaves, from taffrail to
stern only three or four feet, the vessel made
waterproof 10y a coat of bitumen and floating
on the Nile with the infant laWgiyer of the
Jews on board! What if some of the cattle
wading in for 4 drink should sink it2 Vessels
OF war sometimes carry forty guns looking
through the portfolios, ready to open battle.
But that tiny craft on the Nile seems to be
armed with all the guns of thunder that
bombarded Sinai at the law-giving. On how
fragile craft sailed how much of historical
importance
The parsonage at Epworth, Englsnd, is on
Gre in the night, and the father rushed
through the hallway for the rescue of his
children. Seven children are out aud safe on
the ground, but one remains in the consum-
ing building. That one wakes. and, finding
his bed on fire and the building crumbling,
comes to the window, and two peasants make
q ladder of their bodies, one peasant standing
on the shoulder of the other, and low the
human ladder the boy descends-John Yves
Jey. II you would know how much depended
on that ladder of peasants ask the millions of
Meihodists or both sides of the sea. Ask
their mission stations all around the world.
Ask their hundreds of thousands already as
cended to Join their founder, vino would have
persisted but for tie living stairs of peasants
shoulders.
An English ship stopped at Pitcairn Island,
and right in the midst OF surrounding canni-
balism and sQualor, the passengers discovered
a Christ an colony OF churches and schools
and beautiful homes and highest style of re-
ligion and civilization. For fifty wears no
missionary and no Christian influence had
landed there. Why this oasis of light amid
a desert OF heathendOm? SixtY years before
a snip had met disaster, and on. of The sail
ors, unable to save ANYTHING else, went to his
trunk and took out a Bible which his mother
had placed there, and swan ashore. the Bible
held ia his teeth. The Book WAS read on all
sides until the rough and vicious population
were evangelical, and a church was
started, and an enlightened common
wealth established, aud the worlds his
tory has no more brilliant page than
that which tells of this transformation
of a nation BIZ one book. 1t did not
seem of much importance whether the sailor
continued TO hold the book in his teeth or let
ii fall into the breakers, but upon what small
circumstance depended what mighty results!
Practical inference There are no insignif-
canoes in our lives. The minutest thing is
part of a magnitude. ~lninity is made up of
infnitesimals. Great things All ag-
gregation of small things. Bethle-
en- manager pulling on a star
the eastern sky. One book in a drenched
liior's mouth the evangeliziiiou of a multi
igte. One boat of tapyrus on the Nile freight
ed with events for all ages. The fate of
Chrisleudom in a basket let down from a win
dew on the wall. What you do, do well. If
you make a rope make it strong and true, for
you know not how much may depend on your
Workmanship Ii you fashion a boat let it he
waterproof, for you know not who may sail
in il. IL you put a B bic in the trunk OF your
10y &C he roaS from hona let /. ha hoard in