The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1888-02-29
REV. DR.. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIV1NE'S sun
DAY SERMON.
Subject: "Wifely Ambition, Good
and Bad"


Of Naboth. Kings, xxi, Z.
One day King Ahab, looking out of the
window Of his palace at Jezreel, said to his
wife Jezebel: 1--WE ought to have these royal
gardens enlarged If we could only get that
fellow Naboth, who owns that vineyard out
there, to trade or sell we could make it a
kitchen garden for our palace.
"Fetch in Naboth," said the king to one OF
his servants.
The plain gardener. wondering why he
should be called into the presence of His
Majesty, comes in, little downcast in his
modesty and with very obsequious manner
bows to the King.
The King says: 'Naboth, want to trade
vineyards with you. 1 want your vineyard
for a Kitchen garden, and will give great
deal better vineyard in place of it, or, If you
prefer money orit, will give you cash." =,
"Oh, no." says Naboth, II cannot trade off
my little place, nor can sell it, 1t is the old
homestead. I got it of my father and he OF
his father, and I cannot let the old place 60
out Of my hands"
In great state Of petulancy King Ahab
went into the house and flung himself on the
bed, and turned his face to the wall in great
pout.
His wife Jezebel comes in and she says:
"What is the matter with you: Are you
sick"
"Oh,n he says, &c feel very blue. I have
and Naboth will neither trade nor sell, and to
be defeated by a common gardener is more
than can stand"
''Oh, pshaw," says Jezebel, ''don't go on
that way. Get up and eat your dinner and
stop, moPing. I will get for you that kitchen
garden
Then Jezebel borrowed her husbands signet
ring or seal, for then, as now, in those lands
kings never signed their names, but had
ring with the royal name engraved on 1T
and that impressed on royal letter or docu-
ment was the signature. She stamped her
husbands name on proclamation which
resulted in getting Naboth tried for treason
against the king, and two perjured witnesses
swore their souls away with the life OF
Naboth, and he was stoned to DEATH and his
property came to the crown, and so Jezebel
got for her husband and herself the kitchen
garden.
But while the wild street dogs were rend-
ing the dead body Of poor Naboth, Elijah,
the prophet, tells them of other CANNES that
ing: "Where dogs lick the blood OF Naboth
shall dogs lick thy blood, even thine"
And, sure enough, three years after, Ahab,
wounded in battle, his chariot dripping with
the carnage, dog sstood under it tapping his
LIES blood. AND little afterward his wife,
Jezebel, who had been his chief adviser in
crime, stands at her palace window and sees
JoUu, Uuc dpplOdCuluS W pOSScS-
sion Of the palace And to make herself look
as attractive as possible and queenly to the
very last, she decorated her person and, ac-
cording to Oriental custom, closed her eyes
aud ran brush dipped in the black powder
along the long eyelashes, and then from the
window she gared her indignation upon
Jehu. As he rode to the gates in his chariot
he shouted to the slaves in her room:
'Throw her down." But no doubt the
slaves halted moment from such work of
assassination, yet knowing Queen Jezebel
could be no more to them and the conqueror
Jehu would be everything, as he shouted
again: "Throw her down" they seized her
and bore her struggling and cursing to the
window easement and hurled her forth till
she came tumbling to the earth, striking it
Just in time to let Jehu's horses trample her
and the chariot wheels roll over her. While
Jehu is inside at the table refreshing himself
after the excitement he orders his servants to
go out and bury the dead queen. But the
wild street dogs had for the third time ap-
peared on the scene, and they removed all her
body except those parts which in all ages
dogs are by strange instinct or brutal su-
psrstition kept from touching after death
the palms Of the hands and the soles Of the
feet.
All this appalling scene of ancient history
was the result of wife's bad advice to hus-
band, of wife's struggle to advance her
. husbands interests by unlawful means.
Ahab and Jezebel got the kitchen garden Of
Naboth, but the dogs got them The trouble
all began when the mistaken wife aroused
her husband out Of his melancholy by the
words Of the text: "Arise, and eat bread,
and let thine heart be merry; I will give thee
the vineyard of Naboth."
The influence suggested by this subject is
an influence you never before heard dis
coursed on and may never hear again, but
I'D,
and decides the course Of individuals fami-
lies, nations, centuries and eternities I
speak Of wifely ambition, good and bad.
How important that every wife have her
ambition, an elevated, righteous and divinely
approved ambition.
And here let me say, that what am most
anxious for is that woman, not waiting for
the rights denied her or postponed, promptly
and decisively employ the rights she already
has in possession. Some says she will be in a
fair way to get all rights when she gets the
right to the ballot box. I wish that the ex-
pertinent might be tried and settled. I
would like to see all women vote,
and then watch the result. I do
not know that it would change
anything for the better. Most wives and
daughters and sisters would vote as their
husbands and fathers and brothers voted.
Nearly all the families that know are SOL
tion. Those families all voting would make
more votes, but no difference in the result.
Besides that, as now at the poles men are
bought up by the thousands, women would
be bought up by the thousands. The more
voters the more opportunity for political
corruption. We have several million more
voters now than are for public good.
We are told that female suffrage would
correct two evils-the rum business and the
insufflciency of womans wages. About the
rum business have to say that multtudes
of women drink, and it is no unusual thing
to see them in the restaurants so overpow-
cred with wine and beer that they can
hardly sit up, while there are many so
called respectable restaurants where they can
90 and take their champagne and hot toddy
all alone. Mighty temperance voters those
women would make Besides that, the
wives of the rum sellers would have to : ote
In the interests Of their husbands business, o.
have time the inverse of felicitious., Be-
sides that, millions Of respectable and r.
fined women in American would not
vote at all, because they did not care to
20 to the polls, and, on the other hand,
womanly roughs would all 60 to the polls,
and that might make more woman vote on
the wrong side. There is not, in my mind,
much prospect of the expulsion OF drunken
ness by female suffrage.
As to woman's wages to be corrected by
woman's vote, have not much faith in that.
Women are harder on women than men are.
Masculine employers are mean enough In
treatment of women, but if you want to hear
beating down of prices and wages IN perfec-
ton. listen how some women treat washer
women and dreSsmakers and female servants
Mrs. Shylock is more mercileSs than Mr.
Shylock Women, l fear, will never get
righteous wages through woman's vote, and
as to unfortunate womanhood, woman are
far more cruel and unforgiving than men
are. After a woman has made shipwreoE or