The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1889-06-19
ABOUT PURIFICATION.
Sermon by Rev. T. Dewitt Tai
mage, D. D.
How Different People Try to Cleanse Their
Souls from Sin-But Little Good in
Humanity Until 1t is Recon-
structed by Gods Grace.

DR.. TalmaGe'S recent sermon at the Brook
lyn Tabernacle was upon the subject of
Publication, and his text JOB ix, 3O-3l: 'sIf
I wash myself with snow water, and should
L cleanse my hands in alkali. yet shalt thou
plunge me in the ditch and mine own clothes
shall abhor me- The eloquent divine spoke
rs follows:
Albert Barnes-honored be his name on
earth and il heaven-went straight back to
the original writing of my text, and trans
lated it IS have now quoted it, giving sub
Stantial reasons for so doing Although we
know better, the ancients had an idea that
IL snow water there was 4 special power to
cleanse, and that u garment washed and
rinsed in it would be as clean as clean could
be; but if the plain snow water failed to do
its work, then they would take lye or alkali
and mix it with oil, and under that prepara-
ton they felt that the last inlpurity would
certainly be gone. Job, in my text, in most
forceful figure sets forth the idea that all
his attempts to make himself pure before
God were dead failure. and that, unless
we are abluted by something better than
earthly liquids and chemical preparations,
we are loathsome and in the ditch. '1lf
wash myself with snow water, and should
cleanse my hands in alkali. yet shalt thou
plunge me in the ditch, and mine own clothes
shall abhpr me-
You are now sitting for Your picture I
turn the camera obscura Of Gods word full
upon you, and I pray that the sunshine fall
ing through the Skylight may enable me TO
take you just as you are. Shall it be flat
tering picture, or shallitbea true one! You
say. Let it be true one" The first pro-
file that was ever taken was taken three
hundred and thirty years before Christ, OF
AutieonuS He had blind eye. and hecom-
PEELED the artist to take his profile so as to
hide the defect IN hiSvision. But since that
invention. three hundred and thirty years
before Christ. there have been a great many
prohles. Shall I today give YOU one-sIded
view Of yourselves, 4 profile, or shall 1t bea
full length portrait, showing you just what
You are? If God will help me by His al
mighty grace shall give you that last kind
Of a picture.
When I first entered the ministry I used
to write my sermons ali out and read them,
run my hand along the line lest l should
lose my place. l have hundreds Of those
manuscripts. Shall ever preach them!
Never: for II those days l was somehow
overnaStered with the idea heard talked
all around about, ef the dignity of human
nature and adopted the idea, and evolved
it, and illustrated it, and argued it; but
coming on in life, and having seen more OF
the world. and studied better my Bible,
find that that early teaching was faulty, and
that there is no dignity in human nature un-
til it is reconstructed by the grace Of Cod
Talk about vessels going to pieces on the
Skerries off Ireland There never was such
shipTreck as in Gihon and the HidSseIl:-;ta7--
rivers Of Eden. whAcU our first parents
LSTooered. Talk of steamer going down
with FIVE hundred passengers on board!
What is that to the shipwreck OF fourteen
hundred million souls? We are by naturea
mass Of uncleanness and pUtrefaction, from
which it takes all the omnipotence and in
fnitude of Gods grace to eXtricate US. ''lf
wash myself with snow water, and should
a cleanse my hands in alkali, yet shalt thou
plunge me in the ditch, and my own clothes
shall abhor me-" N
rssssSssrz' m the fiTst place that sopspeo
Try to cleanse their soul OF sin in the
snow water Of fine apologies. Here is one
man who says: 81 am sinner; confess
that; but inherited this. Ny father was
grandfather, and all the way back TO Adam,
eauO I SS44f oAOSiiSA.
have you not, every day in your life, added
something to the original state Of sin that
was beaueathed to you2 Are you not brave
enough to confess that you have sometimes
surrendered to sin, which you ought to have
conquered! ask you whether 1t IS fail
play to put upon our ancestry things for
which we ourselves are personally respon
sible2 If your nature was askew when you
a
additional twist? VIII all the tombstenes
of those who have preceded Us make bar.
ricade high enough for eternal 6efenses? ]
know a devout man who had blasphemous
parentage. / knew an honest man whose
father was thief. know a pure mar
whose mother was waif of the street. The
hereditary tide may be very strong, but
there is such 4 thing as stemming 1t. The
fact that have corrupt nature is no rea
sonwhy should yield to it The deep stains
of our soul can never be washed out by
the snow water of such insufficient apology.
Still further, says some one: ''If have
gone into sin it has been through my com
panions, nv comrades and associates; they
ruined me. They taught me to drink. They
took me to the gambling hell. They plunged
me into the house of sin. They ruined my
soul" do not believe it. God gave to nc
M2e the power to destroy you or me- If
a destroyed he is self-destroyed, and
5<alwavs So Why did you not break
az from them? If they had tried to steal
4rour purse, you would have knocked them
down; if they had tried to purloin your gold
watch, you would have riddled them with
shot, but when they tried to steal your i'm
mortal soul, YOU placidly listened to 1t.
Those bad fellows have cup of fire to
drink; do not pour your cup into it. In this
matter of the soul, every man for himself.
That those persons are not fully responsible
for your sin, prove by the fact that you
still consort with them. Youcan not getof
by blaming them. Though you gather up
all these apologies; though there were
great food of them; though they should
come down with the force of melting SHOWS
from Lebanon, they could not wash out one
stain of your immortal soul.
Still further. some persons apologize for
their sins by saying: ''We are great deal
better than some people You see people all
around about US that are great deal worse
than We" You stand up columnar in your
integrity. and look down upon those who are
PROSTATE in their habits and crimes. What
of that, nv brother: If failed through
recklessness and wicked imprudence for ten
thousand dollars. is the matter allevlated at
all by the fact that somebody else has failed
5or one hundred thousand dollars, and some
body else for two hundred thousand dollars!
o. no. If l have the neuralgia, shall re-
fuse medical attendance because my neigh
Dor has virulent typhoid fevers The faci
that his disease IS worse than mine-does
that cure mine! If l, through my foolhard-
mess, leap off into ruin, does it break the
fall to know that others leap of higher
cliff into deeper darkness? When the Hud-
son River rail train went through the bridge
at Spuyten puyvil, did it alleviate the mat
ter at all that instead Of two or three peo-
ple being hurt there We're seventy-hve man
s-,ed and crushed? Because others are
deuraved, is that anE excuse Tor my
deprayity. Anil better than they: fer
hans they had worse temptations than have
had. Perhaps their surroundings IN hTe