Connecticut western news., 1889-09-11
TABERNACLE PULPIT.
ssTHOU ART WEIGHED INTHE BAIL ANCES, AND ART FOUND
 WANTING."
Dr. Talmage's Discourse Sunday, Sep
 tember l.

Rev. T. De Witt Talmage, D. D., preach ed to an immense congregation at Omaha, Neb., Sunday, September 1st. His text was: ssThou art weighed in the balances, and art found wanting. ."-Daniel V, 27. The preacher said:
 Babylon was the paradise of architecture, and driven out from thence the grandest buildings of modern times are only the evi- dence of her fall. The site having been selected for the city, two million men were employed in the rearing of her walls and the building of her works. It was city sixty miles in circumference. There was trench for the building of the city had been digged.
 There were twenty-five gates on each side of the city; between every two gates tower of defence springing into the skies; from each gate on the one side, street running straight through the corresponding street on the other side, so that there were fifty streets fifteen miles long. Through the city ran branch of the river Euphrates. This river sometimes overflowed it's banks, and to keep 1t from the ruin Of the city lake was con- structed into which the surplus water of the river would run during the time or the fresh cts, and the water was kept in this artificial lake until time of drought, and then this water would stream down over the city. At either end of the bridge spanning this Eu- pirates there was palace-the one palace
 
 seven and half miles around.
 The wife of NebuchadnezZar had been born and brought up in the country, and in . mountainous region, and she could not bear this fiat district of Babylon; and so, to please his wife, NebuchadneZZar built in the midst of the city 8 mountain four hundred feet high. This mountain was built out into terraces supported on arches. On the top of these arches layer of hat stones, on the top of that layer of reeds and bitumen, on the fnr nf hat tVxy0 lovo nf Eo PQ- mented3 on he top of that heavy sheet of lead, and on the top of that the soil placed the soil 30 deep that Lebanon cedar had room to anchor it's roots. There were pumps worked by mighty machinery fetching up the water from the Euphrates to this hang ing garden as it was called, so that there were fountains spouting into the sky.
 Standing below and looking up 1t must have seemed as if the clouds were in blossom, or as though the sky leaned on the shoulder please his wife. Well, she ought to have been pleased. suppose she was pleased. If that would not please her nothing would. There was in that city also the temple of Belus, with towers-one tower the eighth of 8 mile high, in which there was an observa- tory where astronomers talked to the stars. There was in that temple an image, just one image, which would cost what would be our fifty-two million dollars.
 O what cityl The earth never saw any thing like it, neve.' will see anything like 1t. And yet have to tell you that it is going to be destroyed. The king and his princes are at feast. They are all intoxicated. Pour out the rich wine into the chalices. Drink to the health of the king. Drink to the glory of Babylon. Drink to great future.
 A thousand lords reeled intoxicated. The king, seated upon 8 chair. with vacant look, as intoxicated men will-with vacant look stared at the wall. But soon that vacant look takes on intensity, and it is an affrighted look; and all the princes begin to look and wonder what is the matter, and they look at the same point on the wall. And then there drops a darkness into the room and puts out the blaze of the golden plate, and out of the sleeve of the darkness there comes finger a finger of fiery terror circling around and circling around as though it would write :; and then it comes up and with sharp tip of flame it inscribes on the plastering of the wall the doom of the king: "Weighed in the balances, and found wanting" The bang of heavy fists against the gates of the palace are followed by the breaking in of the doors. A thousand gleaming knives strike into q thousand quivering hearts. Now Death Is king, and he is seated on a throne of corpses. In that hall there is a balance lifted. God swung it. On one side of the balance are side of the balance are put Belshazzar's sins. The sins come down. His opportunities go up. Weighed in the balances-found want ing
 There has been great deal of cheating in our country with false weights and measures and balances, and the government, to change that state of things, appointed commissioners whose business it was to stamp weights and measures and balances and a great deal of the wrong has been corrected. But still, after all, there is no such thing as a perfect balance on earth. The chain may break, or some of the metal may be clipped, or in some way the equipoise may be little disturbed. You cannot always depend upon earthly | balances. A pound is not always pound, and you may pay for one thing and get pended to the throne of God, pound is a pound, and right is right, and wrong is wrong, and soul is a soul, and eternity is l eternity. God has perfect bushel and a merchants weigh their goods in the wrong way, then the Lord weighs the goods again. If from the imperfect measure the merchant pours out what pretends to be gallon of oil 1 and there is less than gallon, God knows it, and he calls upon his recording angel to of oil.' The farmer comes in from the country. He has apples to sell. He has an imperfect measure. He pours out the apples from this imperfect measure. God recog- l nizes 1t. He says to the recording angel s'Mark down so many apples too few-an l imperfect measure" We may cheat our | selves and we may cheat the world, but we cannot cheat God, and in the great day of | judgment it will be found out that what we learned in boyhood at school is correct; that twenty hundred weight make ton, and one hundred and twenty solid feet make cord | of wood. No more, no less, and religion which does not take hold of this life as well as the life to come is no religion at all. But, my friends, that is not the style of balances 1 am to speak of today, that is not the kind of weights and measures.
 am to speak of that kind of balances which can weigh principles, weigh churches, weigh men, weigh nations and weigh that %atla our word is so be Megbed I 0S Yes. Why, you would think if God put on one | side the balances suspended from the throne the Alps, and the Pyrenees, and the Hima- layas, and Mount Washington, and all the no. The time will come when God will sit down on the white throne to see the world weighed, and on one side will be the worlds opportunities, and on the other side the worlds sins. Down will go the sins and away will go the opportunities, and God will | say to the messengers with the torch: ''Burn that world weighed and found wantingw
 So God will weigh churches. He takes q great church. That great church, according to the worldly estimate, must be weighed. He puts it on one side the balances, and the minister and the choir and the building tf.at cost its hundreds of thousands of dollars. He puts them on one side the balances. On the other side of the scale he puts what tn. church ought to be, what it's consecration ought to be, what its sympathy for the poor oug ght to be, what it's devotion to all good ought to be. That is on one side. That side comes down, and the church, not being able to stand the test, rises in the balances. It does not make any difference about your magnificent machinery. A church is built for one thng-to save souls. If it saves a few souls when it might says multitude .o1 souls, God will speW It out of his mouth
 Weighed and found wanting! So God es. inmates nations.
 How many times he has put the Spanish monarchy into the scales, and found it insuf tcient and condemned it! The French en- pire was placed on one side the scales, and | God weighed the French empire, and Napo.