The Atlanta constitution. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1885-19??, 1888-08-07
TALMAGE'S TEXT.
ISIS Orthodoxy Stale and Unrea-
sonable."
The Eloquent Divine Answers This
Question in n Sermon at the
New York Chautauqua.


BROOKLYN. is present for tine twelfth time at
the national meeting OF religious educators
and students held yearly in this place. His
sermon today, which was delivered 10 an audi
ehce imposing in numbers and intelligence,
was from the following text in the book of
Jeremiah, ci vi, Y. is: ASK for the old
paths, where is the good way, and walk there
in and so shall find rest for your SOUL" and
answered lie question: "Is Orthodoxy Stale
and Unreasonable" Following IS verbatim
report OF IL:
A great London fog has come down upon
some Of the ministers and some OF the churches
IN the shape Of what is called advanced
thought in Biblical Interpretation All Of
them, ana without any exception, deny the
full inspiration of the Bible. Genesis is an
alegory, md there arc many myths in the
Bible and they phiosophize and guess and
reason and evolute until they land in a great
continent Of mud. from which, / fear, for all
eternity they will not be able TO extricate
themselves.
The Bille is not only dyinely inspired, but
st is diviuely protected in its present shape.
You could "a easily without detection, take
from the writings of Shakespeare Hamlet,
and institute III place thereof Alexander
Smiths drama, as at any time during the last
fifteen hundred years man could have
uistUG AllF iifi pol thit Ie IA ttit i'iDAS N4Ah-
out immediate detection. if there had been
an element OF weakness or Of deception, or Of
disntegrason, the book would long ago have
fallen to pieces. If there had been one loose
brick or cracked easement in this castellated
truth surely the bombardment of eight cen
turtles would have discovered and broken
through that impnfection. The fact that the
Bible stands intact, Notwithstanding all the
furious assaults on all sides upon it.. is proof
to me that IL is a miracle, and every miracle is
of God
But " eaya some one, "while we admit tho
Biole Is OF God. il has not been understood I'M
iii our time" My answer is. that If the Bible
he a letter from God, our Father. TO man, His
child, is il not strange that that letter should
have been written in such way that it should
allow seventy generations to pass away and be
buried before the letter could be understood?
That would be a very bright father who should
write a letter for the guidance and intelligence
of his children, not understandable until
thousand years aftor they were buried and for
gottoni While as the years rol! on other
beauties aud excelencies will unfold from the
scriptures, that the Bible is such dead fail
.ure that all the Christian scholars for eighteen
hundred years were deceived in regard to vast
reaches OF its meaning, Is a demand upon my
credulty great that if | found myself at all
disposed 10 yield 10 il / should tomorrow
morning apply AT some insane asylum as unfit
10 go alone. essssE
Who make up this precious group OF adyanc-
ed thinkers to whom God has made especial
revelation in our time of that which He tried
TO make known thousands of years ago and
failed TO make Ineligible? Are they so dis
tinguished for unwurldliness, piety and schol-
arship that it is to be expected that they would
have been chosen to fix TIP the defective work
of Moses and Isaiah and Paul and Christ? Is
il at all possibleY wonder on what mountain
these modern exegetes were TRANSPORTED? /
wonder what star pointed down to their birth
place? Was it the North star, or the Evening
Star. or the Dipper? AS they came through
and descended to our world did Mars blush or
Saturn lose one Of its rings? When find
these modern Wisoacres attempting to improve
upon the work of the Almighty and to ntor-
lard il with their wisdom and TO suggest
prophetic and apostolic errata, am filled with
disgust insufferable. Advanced thought.
which proposes TO tell the Lord what lie ought
to have said thousands of years ago. and would
have sNd il lie had been MS wise as His nine
teenih century critics. All this comes of liy-
ing away back in the eternities instead of 1883.
have two wonders In regard TO these men.
The first one IS how the Lord got along with
out them before they were born the second
wonder is how the Lord will get along without
them after they are dead,
''But." say some, edo you really think the
scriptures are inspired throughout?" Yes;
either rs history or MS guidance. Gibbon and
Josephus and Prescott record in their histories
n great many things they did not approve Of
When George Bancroft puts upon his brilliant
historical page the account of an Indian mas
saCre, does he approve ofthatmassacro? There
are scores of things in the Bible which neither
God nor inspired men sanctioned.
Either as history or as guidance the entire
Bible was inspired Of God.
"But." says some one, 'don't you think that
the copylsts have made mistakes in transfer
ring the divine words from one manuscript 20
another Nes, no doubt there were such
mistakes; but they no more affect the mean
ing of the scriptures than by misspeihng of a
word or the ungrammatical structure of a sont-
once IN a last Will and testament affect the
validity or tho meaning OF that will. All tho
mistakes made by the copysts in the script
res DO not amount TO any more importance
than the difference between your smelling in n
document the word forty, forty or fourty. This
book Is the last will and testament of God TO
our lost world, and IL bogueaths everything in
the right way, although human hands may have
damaged the grammar or made uujusti6able
Interpretation.
1hse men who pride themselves in our day
on being advanced thinkers in Biblical inter-
probation viii all of them end in atheism, il
they live long enough. and declare here 10.
day they are doing more in the different de-
nominations OF Christians, and throughout the
world, FOR damaging Christianity and hinder
ing the cause of the worlds hetterment than
FIVE thousand Robert Ingersolls could do
That man who stands inside castle is far
more dangerous il he be an enemy than five
thousand enemies outside the castle. Robert
G, lngersol assails the castle from the out
thinkers ia all the denominations are fighting
the truth from the inside, and trying 20 shove
back the bolts and swing open the gates.
Now, am IN favor of the greatest freedom
of religious thought and discussion would
have rs much liberty for hetcrodONy as for or
thodoXy II should change my theories of
religion / should preach them out and out, but
no, IN tho building whore ! am accustomed 10
preach, for that was erected by people who be-
leye in an entire Bible aud it would be dis
honest for me 10 promulgate sentiments differ
eut nom those for which that building was
put up. When we enter any denomination as
ministers ot religion, we take solemn vow
that we will preach the sentiments of that de-
nomination. II we change our theories. as
We have right 20 change thom, then there is
a world several thousand miles In circumfer-
cnce. and there art. hundreds OF halls and hum
dredS Of academies OF music where we can
Ventilatc our sentiments.
remember that in all our cities. in time of
political agitation there are the republican
headquarters and the democratic headquarters
sup ose should 70 into one Of these head
quarters pretending 20 DE in sympathy with
Their Worh, ~ the same time clectoneering
Tor the opposite party. l would soon find