The Russellville Democrat., 1889-06-06
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
A. Discourse On Mans Need Of
Spiritual Cleansing.
Words Applicable to Ttose who Seek to
Excuse Their Own shortcomings
by Pointing to those of
Their NeighborS.

| Attif NelShDOres
The following goFmon was delivered by
! ! ss.rv y. Dewitt TalIsage at the Brooklyn
| Tabernacle on the subject of "0ur Need
of Spiritual Cleansing" His text was:
III wash myself with snow water, and should
cleanse my hands m alkali, yet shalt Thot
plunge me in the ditch, and mine own clotse!
shall abhor me.-Job TX. 30-31.
Albert Darles--honored be his name OF
earth and in Heaven--went straight bach
to the original writing of my text, ant
translated it as have now quoted it, Civ
Ing substantial reasons for so doing. AL.
though we know better, the ancients had
an idea that in snow water there was 6
special power to cleanse, and that gar.
ment washed and rinsed in it would be as
clean as clean could be; but if the plair
snowwater failed to do its work, ther
they would take lye or alkah and mix il
with oil, and under that preparation they
felt that the last impurity would rtainly
be gone. Job, in my text, in most force.
ful figure, sets forth the idea that all his
attempts 10 make himself pure before God
were a dead failure, and that unless we
are abluted by something better than
earthly liquids and chemical prepara-
ions, we are loatbsome and in the ditch.
''If | 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 abhor me-" You
are now sitting for your picture. turn
the camera obscura of Gods word full
upon you, and l pray that the sunshine
falling through the skylight may enable
me to take You just as you are. Shall il
be a fiattering picture or shall it be q
true one? You say: "Let it be true
one" The first profile that was ever
taken was taken three hundred and thirty
years before Christ of Antigonus. He
had blind eye, and he compelled the art
ist to take his profile so as to hide the de-
feet In his vision. But since that inven-
tion, three hundred and thirty years be-
fore Christ, there have been great many
profiles.
Shall I to-day give you a one-sided
view of yourselves, profile, or shall 1t
be a full-length portrait, showing you
Just what you are? II God will help me
by His almighty grace, shall give VOC
that last kind of picture. When first
entered the ministry used to write my
sermons out and road them, and run my
band along the line lest 1 should lose my
place. have hundreds of those manu-
scripts. Shall ever preach thems
Eever; for in those days was somehow
over-mastered with the idea l heard
talked all around about Of the dignity of
human nature, and 1 adopted the idea,
and evolved it, and l illustrated 1t, and
| argued it; but coming on In life, and
having seen more OF the world and studied
hnt 7 that hot Ity
teaching was faulty, and that there Is no
dignity i'll human nature until it is recon
structed by tue grace of God. Talk about
vessels going to pieces on the Skerries,
off Ireland! There never was such a
shipwreck as in the Ghion and tho Hid
dekel, rivers of Eden, where our first par
ents fouudered. Talk of steamer CO.
ing down with five hundred passengers
on board! What is that to the shipwreck
of ono billion four numbered million
souls? We are by nature q mass of un-
cleanness and puterfaction, from which
It takes all the omnipotence and infihi-
tude Of Gods grace to extricate us. "If
I wash myself with snow water, and
should cleanse my hands in alkali, yet
shalt Thou plunge me in the ditch, and my
own clothes shall abhor me-"
remark, in the first place, that some
people try TO cleanse their soul of SIN in
the snow water OF fine apologies. Here
Is one man who says: ~ am sinner;
confess that; but l inherited this. My
father was sinner, my grandfather, my
great great grandfather, and all the way
back to Adam, and | couldn't help my
self" My brother, have you not, every
day in your life, added something to the
pripf fna Al 70 Of ed hot
to your Are you not brave enough to con-
Tess that you have sometimes surren-
dered to sin, which you ought to have con-
quered? l ask you whether it is fair
play TO put upon our ancestry
things for which we ourselves are
personally responsible? II your nature
was askew when you got it, have you not
sometimes given it an additional twist?
viii all the tombstones of those who
have preceded us make a barricade high
enough for eternal defenses? l know a
devout man who had blasphemous parent
age. / know an honest man whose father
was thief. l know a pure man whose
father was waif of the street. The
hereditary tide may be very strong, but
there is such thing as stemming. The
fact that / have a corrupt nature is no
stains of our soul can never be washed
out by the snow water of such insufficient
apology.
Still further, says some one: "1f / have
gone into sin it has been through my COM
panions, my 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
.t,I. Il L.. 1.oIs
God gave to no ono the power to destroy
you or me. II a man is destroyed no
Is self destroyed, and that is always so.
Why did you not break away from theml
II they had tried to steel your 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 immortal soul
you placidly submitted to it. Those bad
fellows have a cup of fire to drink; do not
pour your cup into 1t. 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 oonsort with them. You can not get
off by blaming them. Though you gather
up all these apologies; though there
we're great flood OF them; though they
SuOulu COfilb uOWn Win Tue ADICb OL tNc
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: 1--WE are q
great deal better than some people. You
see people all around about us that are a
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,
my brotherf II | failed through reck-
lossness and wicked imprudenoe for TIM
dollars, is the matter alleyiated
OF all by the fact that somebody else has
failed for one hundred thousand dollars,
and somebody else for two hundred
dollars? Oh, no. II have the
shall / refuse medical attend
ance because my neighbor has virulent
typhoid fevert The fact that his disease
Is worse than mine--does not cure miner
If /, through my foolhardiness, leap off
into ,.afn dnau a. hraatf fha falI 4n Lnau,