The Russellville Democrat., 1888-06-07
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
The Disabled Hunters Bring Down
the Most Game.
The Grand Achievements of Men Laborine
Under Disadvantages-TheB Blind. the
Lame. the Halt, Working far
the Glorx of God.

Lame. the Halt. working far
the 0lorx of God.
The subject OF recent sermon by Rev.
7. Dewitt Talmage at the Brooklyn Taber-
nacle was 'Disabled Hunters Bringing
Down the Most Game.n His text was:
The lame take the prey Isaiah, xxxiii, %.
The utter demolition of the Assyrian
| host was here predicted. Not only ro-
bust men should go forth and gather the
! spoils Of conquest, but even men crippled
Of arm and crippled of foot should go out
and capture much that was valuable.
! Their physical disadvantages should not
| hinder their great enrichment So it has
1 been Ia the past, so it is now, and so 1t
| will be in the future. So 1t is in all de-
| partments Men labor under seemingly
| great disadvantages, and amid the most
| unfavorable circumstances, yet making
grand achievements, getting great bless
| ing for themselves, great blessing for the
world, great blessing for the church, and
| so the ELAINE take the prey"
| Do you know that the three great poets
| of the world were totally blind? Homer,
| Ossian, John Milton. Do you know that
| Mr.. Prescott, who wrote that enchanting
book, "The Conquest of Mexico" never
| saw Mexico, could not even see the paper
on which he was writing? A framework
across the sheet, between which, up and
down, went the pen immortal. Do You
know that Gambassio, the sculptor, could
| not see the marble before him, or the
chisel with which he cut it into shapes
bewitching? Do you know that Alexan-
der Pope, whose poems will laGt as long
as the English language, was so much of
an invalid that he had to be sewed up
| every morning in rough canvas in order
! TO stand on his feet at all?
| Do you know that Stuart, the celebrated
| painter, did much of his wonderful work
under the shadow of the dungeon, where
| he had been uniustly imprisoned for debtf
! Do you know that Demosthenes, by al
most superhuman exertion, first had to
conquer the lisp of his own speech before
| he conquered assemblages with his elo-
| quence? Do you know that Bacon strug-
| gled all through innumerable sicknesses,
and that Lord Byron and Sir Walter
| Scott went limping on clubfoot through
all their life, and that many of the great
| poets and painters and orators and his
/ torians and heroes of the world had some
thing to keep them back, and pull them
| down, and impede their way, and cripple
their physical or their intellectual move
ment, and yet that they pushed on and
| pushed up until they reached the spoils of
worldly success, and amid the huzza of
nations and centuries "the lame took the
prey?"
You know that q vast multitude of these
men started under the disadvantage of
obscure parentage. Columbus, the son
of the weaver. Ferguson, the astrono-
mer, the son of the shepherd. America
| the prey of the one; worlds on worlds the
prey of the other. But what is true in
secular directions is more true in spir-
itual and religious directions, and pro-
| coed to prove it.
There are in all communities many in
valids. They never know a we'll day.
They adhere to their occupations, but
they go painting along the streets with
exhaustions, and at eventime they lie
down ON the lounge with achings beyond
all medicament. They have tried all
prescriptions; they have gone through all
the cures which were proclaimed in
| fallible, and they have come now to sur
render to perpetual ailments. They con-
slider they are among many disadvan-
tages, and when they see those who are
buoyant in health pass by they almost
envy their robust frames and easy respi-
ration.
But have noticed among that invalid
class those who have the greatest knowl
edge of the Bible, who are in nearest in
timacy with Jesus Christ, who have the
most glowing experiences of the truth,
who have had the most remarkable
answers to prayer, and who have the most
exhilarant anticipations of Heaven. The
| temptations which weary us who are in
robust health they have conquered. They
have divided among them the spoils Of
the conquest. Many who are alert and
athletic and swarthy loiter In the way.
| These are the lame that take the prey.
Robert Hall an invalid, Edward Payson
an invalid, Richard Baxter an invalid,
Samuel Rutherford an invalid. This
morning when you want to call to mind
those who are most Christ-like, you think
of some darkened room in your fathers
house from which there went forth an in
| fuence potent for eternity.
| A step further: Through raised letters
the art of printing has been brought to
the attention Of the blind.
You take up the Bible for the blind and
you close your eyes and you run your fin
ger over the raised letters, and you say:
why, never could get any information
In this way. What slow, Humorous way
of reading! God help the blind"
And yet find among that class of per-
sons, among the blind, the deaf and the
| dumb, the most thorough acquaintance
with Gods word. Shut out from all other
sources of information, no sooner does
their hand touch the raised letter than
they gather a prayer. Without syes, they
look off upon the kingdoms Of Gods love.
Without hearing, they catch the min
strelsy of the skies. Dumb, yet with PEN
Gil or with frradiated countenance they
declare the glory of God.
A large audience assembled in New
York at the anniversary of the Deaf and
Dumb Asylum, and one of the visitors
with chalk on the blackboard wrote this
question to the pupils:
''Do you not find it very hard to be deaf
and dumb?" And one of the pupils took
the chalk and wrote on the blackboard
this sublime sentence in answer:
when the song of the angels shall
burst upon our enraptured ear, we will
scarce regret that our ears were never
marred with earthly sounds"
y oh, the brightest eyes in Heaven will be
those that never saw on earth. The ears
most alert in Heaven will be those that in
this world heard neither voice of friend,
nor thrum of harp, nor carol of bird, nor
doxology of congregations.
A lad who had been blind from infancy
was cured. The oculist operated upon the
lad, and then put very heavy bandage
over the eyes, and after few weeks had
gone by the bandage was removed, and
the mother said to her child:
willie, can you seer" He said:
"Ohl mamma, is this Heavenfv
The contrast between the darkness be-
fore and the brightness afterward was
hal ptipn An fal ,xIo
of Heaven will be thousand-fold bright
er for those who never saw any thing on
earth. While many with good vision
closed their eyes in night, and many who
had good, artistic and cultured ear
went down into discord, these afflicted
ones cried unto the Lord in their trouble,
and He made their sorrows their advan-
tage, and so "the lame took the prey"
In the seventh century there was