The Nicodemus cyclone. [volume] (Nicodemus, Graham County, Kan.) 1887-1888, 1888-03-02
|. UNFEIGNED FAITH.
TALMAGE's SERMON TO WOMEN.

Ialmage, d. D., preached IN the Brooklyn
Tabernacle to-day the eighth of his series of
Sermons to the Women of America with I'm
portant Hints to Men," His subject wasi
1.-THE Grandmother and Her Grandchildren
vast congregation was present. The open
ing hymn begins:
Give to the wind thy fears
Hope and be uhdisn'ayedi
God hears thy sghs and counts thy tears
God shall lift up thy head
Dr, TRlmage's text was from II Timothy j.
8: "The unfeigned faith that is in thee,
which dwelt first in thy grandmother Lois''
The eloquent preacher saidf
In this love letter which Paul, the old min
ister is writing to Timothy, the young minis
ter, the family record is brought out. Paul
practically says: "TimOthy, what a good
/ grandmother you had. You ought to be bet
ter than most folks, because not only was YOUR
mother good but your grandmother. Two
preceding generations of piety ought to give
! you mighty push in the right direction"
The fact was that Timothy needed encour4
| agement He was in poor health. having a
weak stomach and was dyspeptic, and Paul
prescribed for him tonic "a little wine for
| thy stomach's sake'-not much wine but a
little wine, and only as a medicine. And if
the wine then had been as much adulterated
with logwocd and strychnine as our modern
wines. he would not have prescribed any.
But Timothy, not strong physically, is
encouraged by the recital of grand
motherly excellence, Paul limiting to
him as hint this day to
you, that God sometimes gathers up as in a
reservoir away back Of the active generations
nd IV- SnH,I
spouse to prayer let's down the power upon
children and grandchildren and great grand
children. The world is woefully in want of a
table of statistics in regard to what is
the prOtractedness and immensely of intlu.
ence OF one good woman in the church and
world. We have accounts of how much evil
has been wrought by Margaret, the mother of
criminals, who lived near hundred years ago,
and OF how many hundreds of criminals her
descendants furnished for the penitentary
ana the galloWs, and now many hundreds of
thousands of dollars they cost this country in
their arralgnment and prison support as well
as In the property they burglarized or de-
str0yed. But will not some one come out
with brain comprehensive enough and heart
warm enough and pen keen enough to give us
the facts IN regard to some good woman Of
hundred years ago, and let us know how
many Christian men and women and reform
ers and useful people have been found among
her descendants and how many asylums and
colleges and churches they built, and how
many hundreds of dollars they contributed
for humanitarian and Christian purposesa
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 twentieth century than they are
now. Mark you, l have no idea that the
grandmOthers were any better than their
No old
people to talk much about how things were
when they were boys and girls. They
nave reticence and. a nOn-cOmmit-
talism which makes me think they feel
themselves to be the custodians of the
reputation of their early comrades. While
our dear old folks are rehearsing the folIies
OF the present, if you put them on the witness
stand and crOss-examine them as to how
things were seventy years ago the silence be-
comes oppressive.
celebrated Frenchman by the name of
Volney visited this country in 1896, and he
says OF wOman's diet in those times: IF
premium was offered for regimen most de-
structive to health, none could be devised
more et1icacOus for these ends than that in
use among these people," That eclipses our
lobster salad at midnight. Everybody talks
about the designations of modern society and
how womanly health goes down under it. but
it was worse hundred years ago, for the
chaplain of French regiment in our Revolu-
tlonary war wrote in 1882, in his book of
American women. saying: 'They are tall
and well proportional, their features are
generally regular, their compilations are
generally 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 1912 foreign consul wrote
a book entitled "A Sketch of the United
States at the Commencement of the Present
Century," and he says of the women of those
times: "At the age Of thirty all their charms
have disappeared. One glance at the portraits
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 i'm
provement on the Old-time saddlebags, 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 a
glorious race of cody women, seventy
and a hundred years ago, who held the
world back from sin and lifted it toward
virtue, and without their exalted and sancti-
fed influence before this the last good int1u-
ence would have persisted from the earth In
deed all over this land there are seated to-
day-not so much in churches, for many of
them are too feeble to come-a great MANY
aged erandmothers. They sometimes feel
that the world has gone past them, and they |
have an idea they are of little account Their |
mead sometimes gets aching from the racket
next room. They steady themselves bv the |
banlsters as they GO up and down. When they |
get cold 1t hangs on TO them longer than it |
used to. They cannot bear to have the grand |
children punished even when they deserve il.
and have so relaxed their ideas of family dis
eipline that they would spoil all the Young
steers of the household by too great leniencv.
These old folks are the resort when great
troubles come and there is a calming and
soothing power in the touch Of an aged hand |
that Is almost supernatural They feel they
are almost through with the journey of life !
and read the old book more than they used to.
hardly Knowing which most they eniOv the |
Old Testament or the New, and often stop !
and dwell tearfully over the family record |
halt wav between. We hail them to-day !
whether in the House of God or at the home
stead. Blessed is that household that has in
1t grandmother Lois. Where she is angels
are lowering round and good IS in the room.
May her last days be like those lovely au-
tumnal DAYS that we call Indian Summer
never knew the JOY of having a grand
mother; that is the disadvantage of being
The youngest child of the family The elder
members only have that benediction. But
though she went up out of this life before |
began it, | have heard of her faith
In God, that brought all her children into the
kingdom and two Of them into the ministry
and then brought all heI grandchildren into
the kingdom, myself the last and least worthy.
Is IL not time that a