The Atlanta constitution. [volume] (Atlanta, Ga.) 1885-19??, 1888-08-14

"HSi0 WIS clty lS butled. Ihey ma street
IN that city six miles long, where once flashed
imperial pomp, and which echoed with the
laughter OF llght-hearted mirth on its way to the
theater. On temples, fashioned out of colored
stohes-some OF which have blushed into the
crimson of the rose, and some of which have
darkened into the blue of the sky, and some of
which have paled into the Wilderness of the
lly-ay, on column, and pediment and entab-
lature, and statuary, God writes the truth of
mat Bible. The Bible says that Sodom and
Gomorrah We're destroyed by fire and brim-
stone. Absurd" Iufdels, year after wear,
said: ut is positively absurd that they could
have been destroyed by birthstone. There is
nothlng IN the elements to cause such shower
OF death as that" Lieutenant LYNCH think
he was the first man who went out on the dis
coVery, but he has been followed by many
otherS-IIeutenant Lynch went out in explora-
ton, and came to the Dead Sea, which, by
a CONFUSION of nature, has overfown tho
place where the cities once stood. He sank
his fathoming line, and brought IN from
theI0ottom of the Dead sea great masses of sui
phur, remnants of that very tempest that
swept Sodom and Gomorrah to ruin. Who
was right-the Bible that announced the de-
struction of those cities, or the sceptics who
for ages scoffnd at it?
The Bible says there was city called
Nlneveh, and that it was three days journey
around and that it should be DESTROYED bv FIRE
and water. Absurd" cried out hundreds of
voices for many years; mo such a city was
ever built that it would take three days. Jour
ney to go around Beside it could not be de-
stroyed by fire and water; they are antagonis-
tic clements" But Layard, Botta, Bononli,
and Keith go out, and by their explorations
they find that city of Nineveh, and they tell us
that by their own experiment it is three DAYS
journey around according to the old estimate
of days journey, and that it was literally
destroyed by fire and by water-two antagonis-
tic eements~-a part of the city having been inun-
dated by the river Tigris (the brick material
IN those times being dried clay instead of
burned while i'll other parts they find the
remains of the fire in heaps of charcoal that
have been excavated, and in the calcined
slabs of gypsum. Who was right, the Bible
or infdelity?
Moses intimated that they had vineyards in
Egypt. Absurd cried hundreds of voices,
you. can't raise grapes in Egypt; or, if you
can, it is very great exception that you can
raise them" But the traveller goes down,
and in the underground vaults OF Eilithya he
finds painted on the wall all the process of
tending the vines and treading out the grapes.
1t is all there, familiarly sketched by people
who evidently knew all about it, and saw it all
about them every day and in those under
ground vaults there are vases still incrusted
with the settings of the wine. You see the
vine did grow in Egypt, whether it grows
there now or not
Thus you see while God wrote the Bible, at
the same time, He wrote this commentary
that 'the statutes of the Lord are right" on
leaves of rock and shell, bound in clasps of
the jeweled vase Of the sea. In authenticity
and in genuineness the statutes OF the Lord are
right.
Again; The Bible is right in style Iznow
there are great many people who think it is
merely collection of genealogical tables and
dry facts. That is because they do not know
how to read the Book. You take up
the most interesting novel that was
ever written, and if you commence
at the four hundrcdth page today, and tolnor-
# l1- nd fI,A, a
at the first page, how much sense or interest
would you gather from it2 Yet that is the
very process to which the Bible is subjected
every day. An angel from heaven, reading
the Bible in that way, could NOT understand it.
The Bible, like all other palaces, has a door by
which to enter and door by which to go out.
These Epistles of Paul the Apostle are merely
letters written, folded up, and sent by postmen
to the different churches. Do you read other
letters the way you read FauPs letters? Sup
pose you get business letter, and you know
that in it there are important financial PROPOSE
tions, do you read the last page first, and
then one line of the third page, and another of
the second, and another of the first? No. You
begin with Dear Sir and end with ''Yours
truly" Now here is a letter written from the
throne of God to our lost world; it is full of
magnificent hopes and propositions. and we
dip in here and there and we know nothing
about 1t. Beside that, people read the Bible
when they cannot do anything else. 1t is a
dark day, and they do not feel well, and they
do not go to business, and after longing about
awhile they pick up the Bible-their mind re-
fuses TO enjoy the truth. Or they come home
weary from the store or shop, and they feel, if
they do not say it is dull book. While the
Bible is to be read on stormy days. and while
your head aches, it is also to be read in the sun
shine, and when your nerves, like harp-strings,
thrum the song of health While your vision
is clear walk in this Paradise of truth; and
while your mental appetite is good pluck these
clusters of grace.
am fascinated with the conciseness of this
book. Every word is packed full of truth.
Every sentence is doube-bauelled. Every
paragraph is like old banyan tree, with a
hundred roots and a hundred branches. 1t is
a great arch pull out one stone and it all comes
down. There has never been a pearl-diyer
who could gather up one half of the treasures
in any verse. John Halsebach, of Vienna, for
tWenty-one years, every Sabbath eXpounded to
his congregation the first chapter of the book
of Isaiah, and yet did not get through with it.
Nine-tenths of all the good literature of this
age is merely the Bible diluted.
This book is
THE HIVE OF ALL SWEETNESS.
It is the armory Of all well-tempered weapons;
it is the tower containing the crown jewels Of
the universe; it is the lamp that kindles all
other lights it is the home Of all maiesties
and splendors; it is the marriage-ring that
unites the celestial and the terrestrial, while
all the clustering white-robed denizens of the
sky lowering around rejoice at the nuptials.
1ulS DOCK, IL IS inc wreath INTO winch are
twisted all garlands; it is the song into which
are struck all harmonies ii is the river into
which are poured all the great tides Of hallelu-
jah it is the armament in which suns, and
moons, and stars, and constella-
tions, and galaxies, and immensi-
ties, and universes, and extremities,
wheel, and blaze, and triumph. Where is the
young mans soul with any music in it, that is
not stirred with Jacobs lament, or Nahum's
dirge, or Habakl1uk's dithyrambic, or PauPs
march of the resurrection, or Johns anthem,
where the elders, with doxoogy on their faces,
respond to the trumpet blast Of the archangel
as he stands with one foot on the sea and the
other foot Oh land, swearing by Him that
liYeth forever and ever that time shall DO no
longer.
Goethe, the admired of all sceptics, had the
walls Of his house at Weimar covered with re-
ligious maps and pictures Miton's "Fara-
disc Lost" is part of the Bible in blank verse.
Tassos "Jerusalem Delivered" is borrowed
from the Bible. Sponsors writings are imita-
tons Of the parallels. John Bunyan saw in a
dream only what st. John had before seen in
Apocalyptic vision. Macaulay crowns his
most gigantic sentences with scripture quota
tons. Through Addison's Spectator" there
glances in and out the stream that broke from
beneath the throne of God, clear as crystal.
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