Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1889-11-25
TALMAGE IN ATHENS.
BrOoklyn's Divine breaches on the
Revelation Paul Wrote Of.
MARS HILL AND CORINTH AGLOW
With Reminders Of What Paul Saw When
He Drew Comparisons,
TELLING OF THE GLORIES YET TO BE
ESPECIAL TO THE D1sPAroH.,

ATHENS, November A.-Ihe Rev. L.
De Witt Talmage, D. D., of Brooklyn,
preached in this city this morning to a
group of friends, baslng his discourse on
the following two passages from the Pauline
epistles: l. Corinthians, H., 9: 'Eye hath
not seen, nor ear heard, and 1. Corinthians,
xiii, 2: ''For now we see through glass,
darkly." The sermon was as follows:
Both these sentences were written by the
most inustrious merely human being the
world ever saw, one who walked these
streets and preached from yonder pile ofrocks,
Mars Hill. Though more classic associa-
tions are connected with this city than with
any other citv under the sun, because here
Socrates, and Plato, and Aristotle, and
Demosthenes, and Perieles, and Herodotus,
and Pythagoras, and Xenophon, and
Praxiteles wrote or chiseled, or taught or
thundered or sung, yet in my mind all
those men and their teachings were
eclipsed by Paul and the gospel he preached
in this city and in your nearby city Of
Corinth.
Yesterday. standing on the old fortress at
Corinth, the Acro-Corinthus, out from the
ruins at its base arose in my imagination
the old city, just as Paul saw it. 1 have been
told that for splendor the world beholds no
such wonder to-day as that ancient Corinth
standing on an isthmus washed BY two seas,
the one sea bringing the commerce of Eu-
rope, the other sea bringing the commerce of
ASIA. From her wharves, in the construc-
ton of which whole Kingdoms had been alb
sorbed war gallevs with three banks of oars
pushed out and confounded the navy yards
of all the world. Huge-handed machinery,
such as modern invention cannot equal,
lifted ships from the sea on one side and
transported them on trucks across the 18TH
mus and set them down in the sea on the
other side.
THEY BELIEVED IN THE TARIFF.
The revenue officers of the city went down
through the olive groves that lined the
beach to collect a tariff from all nations.
The mirth of all people sported in her
Isthmian games, and the beauty of all lands
sat in her theaters, walked her porticos
and threw itself on the altar of her stupend-
Gus dissipations. Column and statue and
temple bewildered the beholder. There were
white marble fountains into which, from
apertures at the side, there rushed waters
everywhere known for health-giving quail
ties. Around these basins, twisted into
wreaths of stone, there were all the beauties
of sculpture and architecture, while stand
ing, as if to guard the costly display. was a
statue Of Hercules of FURNISHED Corinthian
brass Vases of terra Gotta adorned the
cemeteries of the dead-vases so costly that
Julius Caesar was not satisfied until he had
captured them for Rome. Armed officials,
the corinsharii, paced up and down to see
that no statue was defaced, no pedestal over
thrown, no bas-relief touched.
From Ihe edge of the city the hill held its
magnificent burdens of columns and towers
and temples G ZOO slaves waiting at one
shrine), and a citadel so impregnable that
Gibraltar is a heap of sand compared
with it.
Amidsall that strength and magnifcence
Corinth stood and defed the world. OH it
was not to rustics who had never seen any
thing grand that Paul uttered one of nv
texts. They had heard the best music that
had come from the best instruments in all
the world; they had heard songs floating
from morning porticos and melting in even
ing groves; they had passed their whole
lives among pictures and sculpture and
architecture and Corinthian brass, which
had been nodded and shaped until there was
no chariot wheel in which it had not sped.
and no tower in which it had not gliItered,
and no gateway that it had not adorned.
PAUL WAS VERY BRAVE.
All, it was bold thing for Paul to stand
there amid all that and say: "All this is
nothing. These sounds that come from the
temple of Neptune are not music compared
with the harmonies of which I speak. |
These waters rushing in the basin of Pyrene |
are not pure These statues of Bacchus and |
Mercury are not exquisite. Your citadel Of |
Acro-Corinthus is not strong compared with |
that which 1 offer to the poorest slave that |
puts down his burden at that brazen gate.
You Corinthians think this is a splendid |
city; you think you have heard all sweet /
sounds and seen all beautiful sights; but 1 |
tell you eye hath not seen nor ear heard, |
neither have entered into the heart of man.
the things which God hath prepared for /
them that love Him. Indeed. both NV
texts, the one spoken by Paul and the one
written by Paul, show us that we have very
imperfect eyesight, and that our day of |
vision is YET to come: For now we see
through a glass darkly, but then face to
face.
So Paul takes the responsibility of saying
that the Bible is an indlstinct mirror, and
that its mission shall be finally SUSPENDED.
/ think there may be one Bible in heaven
fastened to the throne Just as now, in a
museum, we have a lamp exhumed from
Herculaneum or Nineveh, and we look at it
with great interest and say: "How poor a
light it must have given, compared with our
modern lamps" So / think that this Bible.
which was lamp to our feet in this world,
NAV lie near the throne OF God, exciting our
interest to all eternity by the contrast be-
tween its comparatively feeble light and the
illumination of heaven.
WHAT IT CONCENTRATES.
The Bible, now, is the scaffoldiug to the
rising temple, but when the building is
done there will be no use for the scaffoldinp.
The idea 1 shall develop to-day IS
that in this world our knowledge is
comparatively dim and unsatisfactory.
but nevertheless is Introductory to
grander and more complete vision, This is
eminently true in regard to our view of
God. We hear so much about God that we
understand Him. He is represented as
having the tenderness of a father, the firm
ness Of a judge, the pomp of king and the
love of mother. We hear about him, talk
about him, write about him. We lisp his
name in infancy, and il trembies on the
tongue of the dying octogenarian. We
think that we know very much about him.
Take the attribute of mercy. Do we under
stand it? The Bible blossoms all over with
that Word-Merey. 1t speaks again and
again of the tender mercies of God; of the
sure mercies; of the great mercies; Of the
mercy that endureth forever; of the multi
tude Of his mercies.
And yet know. that the views we have of
this great being are most indefinite, one
sided and incomplete. When, at death, the
gates shall fly open, and we shall look
directly upon Him, how new and surprising!
We see upon canvas picture of the morn
ing. We study the cloud in the sky, the
dew upon the grass, and the husbandman on
the way to the field. Beautiful picture of