The national leader., 1889-01-26
DR.. TALMAGE'S SERMON:
Sundays, Bright or Doleful.

"And call the Sabbath @ delight. ."-lsa. 5S'l2
THERE is an element Of gloom strik-
ing through all false religions. Pagan
| ism is brood Of horrors with blind
fate. Mohammedanism promises moth
ing to those exhausted with sin in this
| world but an eternity of the same
passional indulgeuces. But God in
tended that our religion should have
| the grand characteristic OF cheerfulneSs.
st. Paul struck the keynote when he
said: "Rejoice evermore, and again I
say, rejoice" This religion has no
spikes for the feet; it has no hooks for
the shoulder; it has no long pilgrimages
| to take; it has no funeral-pyres upon
which to leap; it has no Juggernauts
before which to fall
ITS GOOD CHEER
| is symbollZed in the Bible by the
| brightness of waters, and the redOlence
| of lilies, and the sweetness of music,
| and the hilarities of banquet. A
! choir of seraphim chanted at its induc-
tion, and pealing trumpet, and waving
palm, and Tapping wing of archangel
are TO celebrate its triumphs. Itbegan
its chief missi1n with the shout: 'Glory
to God in the highest!" and it will
close its earthly mission with the as
cription: ''HalleluJah. for the Lord
God omnipotent reigneth!''
But men have said that our religion
| is not cheerful, because we have such
| doleful Sabbath. They say: "You can
| have your religious assemblages, and
| your long faces, and your shifting cant.
and your psalm-books, and your Bibles:
give us the Sunday excursion, and the
horse-race, and the convivial laughter.
We have SO much joy that we want to
| spread it all over the seven days OF the
week, and you shall not have one Of
our days of worldly satisfaction for re-
| ligiouS dolefulneSS." " | want to show
these men-if there are any SUCH in the
| house this morning-that they are un-
der great deluson, and that God in
tended the tifty-two Sundays of the
year to be hung up like bells IN a tower
| beating perpetual chime of joy and
glory and salvation and heaven; for |
want you to carry out the idea of the
text, land call the Sabbath delight" +"
| remark, in the first place, we are to
| find in this day the JOY Of
HEALTHY REPOSE.
In this democratic country we all have
| to work-some with hand, some with
brain, some with foot. If there is in
all this house hand that has not, dur
ing the past year, been stretched forth
to some kind of toll, let it be lifted.
| Not one, not one. You sell the goods.
| You teach the school. You doctor in
the sick-room. You practice at the
bar. You edit newspaper. You tan
the hides. You preach the gospel.
You mend the shoes. You sit at the
shuttle. You carry the hod of bricks
up the ladder on the wall. And the
one occupation is as honorable as the
other, provided God calls you to it, |
care not what you do, if you only do it
well. But when Saturday night comes,
you are jaded and worn. The hand
cannot SO skillfully manufacture: the
eye cannot see as we'll; the brain is not
so clear; the judgment is not so well
balanced.
a prominent manufacturer told me
| that he could see a difference between
the goods which went out of his estab-
lishment on Saturday from the goods
that went out on Monday. He said:
''They were very different indeed.
| Those that were made in the former
part of the week, because of the rest
that had been previously given, were
| better than those that were made in
the latter part of the week, when the
men were tired out" The Sabbath
comes, and it bathes the soreness from
the limbs, quiets the agltated brain,
and puts out the fires of anxiety that
have been burning all the week. Our
bodies are Seven-day clocks, and unless
on the seventh day they are wound up,
they run down into the grave. The
Sabbath was
| INTENDED AS A SAVINGS-BANK:
into it we are to gather the resources
upon which we are to draw all the
week. That man who breaks the Sab
bath robes his own nerve, his own
muscle, his own brain, his own bones.
He dips up the wine of his own life,
and throws it away. He who breaks
the Lords day gives q mortgage to
disease and death upon his entire physl-
cal estate, and at the most unexpected
moment that mortgage will be fore
closed, and the soul elected from the
premises. Every gland and pore and
cell and fnger-nall demands the seventh
day for repose. The respiration of the
lungs, the throb of the pulse in the
wrist, the motion, of the bone in its
socket declare: Remember the Sab
bath day, to keep it holy"
| There are thousands of men who
have had their lives dashed out against
the golden gate of the Sabbath. A
prominent London merchant teStifeS
that thirty years ago he went to Lon
don. He says: 81 have during that
time watched minutely, and have no.
ticed that the men who went to buSi-
ness on the Lords day. or opened their
counting-houses,h have, without a single
exception, come to failure" 4 prom
inent Christian merchant in Boston
says: 81 find it doesn't pay to work
| on Sunday. When was a boy no.
ticed, out on Long Wharf. there were
merchants who loaded their vessels on
the Sabbath day, keeping their men
busy from morning till night; and it is
my observation that they themselves
came to nothing-these emerchants-and
their children came to nothing. 1t
doesn't pay" he says, ito work on the
Sabbath"
1 appeal to your observation. Where