The united opinion. [volume] (Bradford, Vt.) 1881-1970, 1888-10-05
THE CLOUDS HIS CHARIOT.
LAST SUNDAYS DIVINE SERVICES IN
THE BROOKLYN TABERNACLE.

DR.. Talmage Says That Man Was Made :,
Look Upward-God Does Not Beiittl'
Himself When He Takes q Chariot ~ I
Conference.-The Storm Cloud.
BROOKLYN, Sept 80. The hymn suns
at the opening of the services in the
Brooklyn Tabernacle this morning was:
Welcome, sweet day Of rest,
That saw the Lord arise.
After expounding appropriate passages
Of Scripture, the Rev. T. De Witt Tai
mage, d. D., took the text; Psalm, civ,
8: "Who maketh the clouds his
chariot" DR.. Talmage said:
Brutes are constructed so as to look
down. Those earthly creatures that have
wings when they rise from the earth still
look down, and the eagle searches for
mice in the grass and the raven for car
cases in the field. Man alone is made
to look up To induce him to look up
God makes the sky picture gallery, a
Dusseldorf, Louvre, Luxembourg, a
Vatican that eclipses all that German or
French or Italian art ever accomplished.
But God has failed so far to attract the
attention of most of us by the scenery Of
the sky. We go into raptures over
flowers in the soil, but have little or no
appreciation of the morning glories"
that bloom on the wall of the sky at SUM-
rise or the dahlias in the clouds at sunset.
We are in ecstasies over gobelin tapes
try OF bridal veil of rare fabric, or a
snowbank Of exquisite curve, but see not
at all, or see without emotion, the bridal
wells Of mist that cover the face Of the
Catskills, or the swaying upholstery
around the couch of the dying day, or
the snowbank Of vapor piled up in the
heavens.
My text bids us lift our chin three or
four inches and open the two telescopes
which under the forehead are put on
swivel easily turned upward, and see that
the clouds are not merely uninteresting
signs of wet or dry weather, but that
they are embroidered canopies of shade,
that they are the Conservatives of the
sky, that they are thrones Of pomp, that
they are crystalline bars, that they are
paintings in water color, that they are
the angels of the mist, that they are great
cathedrals of light with broad aisles for
angelic feet to walk through and bow at al
tars of amber and alabaster, that they are
the mothers of the dew, that they are lad
ders for ascending and descending glories,
Cotopaxis of belching flame, Niagaras of
color, that they are the masterpieces of
the Lord God Almighty. The clouds are
favorite Bible smile and the sacred
writers have made much use of them.
After the deluge God hung on cloud in
concentric bands the colors Of the spec
trum, saying: 81 do set my bow in the
cloud" AS a mountain is sometimes en-
tirely hidden by the vapors SO, says God:
II have blotted out as a thick cloud
thy transgressions." David measures
the divine goodness and found it so high
he apostrophized: ''Thy faithfulness
reacheth unto the Clouds AS some
times there are thousands of feeces of
vapor scurrying across the heavens, SO,
says Isaiah, will be the converts in the
millennium ''as clouds and as doves"
As in the wet season no sooner does the
sky clear than there comes another OBJ
scuration, so, says Solomon, one ache or
ailment of old folks has no more than
gone than another pain comes las clouds
return in the rain." A column Of il
lumined cloud led the Israelites across
the wilderness. In the book of Job Elihu,
watching the clouds, could not under
stand why they did not fall or why they
did not roll together, the laws of evapor-
alton and condensation then not being
understood, and he cries out, "Dost thou
know the balancing Of the cloudsS"
When I read my text it suggests to me
that the clouds are the Creators equi-
page, and their whirling masses are the
wheels, and the tongue of the cloud is
the pole of the celestial vehicle, and the
winds are the harnessed steeds, and God
is the royal occupant and driver ''who
maketh the clouds his chariot"
To understand the psalmist's meaning
in the text you must know that the
chariot of old was sometimes sculptured
brilliancy made out OF ivory, sometimes
of solid silver, and rolled on two wheels
which were fastened to the axle by stout
pins, and the awful defeat of Oenomaus
by Pelops was caused by the fact that
traitorous charioteer had inserted Inch
pin of wax instead of Inch pin of iron.
All Of the six hundred chariots of Pha-
raoh lost their Inch pins in the Red sea,
for the Bible says, 'The Lord took off
their Wheels Look at the long flash
of Solomon's fourteen hundred cha
riots, and the thirty thousand chart
OTIS of the Philistines. If you have
ever visited the buildings where king
or queen keeps the coaches of state, as I
have, you know that kings and queens
have great varieties of turnout. The
keeper tells you: "This is the state car
riage and used only on great occa-
sions." ''This is the coronation car
rage, and in it the king rode on the day
he took the throne" ''In this the queen
went to open parliament" "This is the
coach in which the car and the sultan
rode on the occasion of their visit" All
costly and tessellated and enriched and
emblazoned are they, and when the
driver takes the reins of the ten white
horses in his hands, and .amid mounted
troops and bands in full force sound
ing the national air, the splendor
starts and rolls on under arches entwined
with banners, and amid the huzza of hun
dreds of thousands of spectators the scene
is memorable. But my text puts all such
occasions into insignifcance, as it repre-
sents the King of the Universe coming to