The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1889-09-16
STREETS OF A BIG CITY.
TALMAGa TEACHES A LESSON
FROM EVERYDAY LIFE.

Great Harvests to be Reaped from the
Paved Thoroughfares Over Which
Men Rushs Without Heed - Life a
Scene of Toll and StrugGle-An
Classes and Conditions OF Society
Must Commingle.
BROOKLYN, Sept. 15.-The Rev. T. De
Witt Talmage, d. D., preached at the
Tabernacle to-day to a vast congregation
on 1.-THE City Streets" His text was:
"Wisdom crieth without; she uttereth her
voice in the Streets Prov i, 20. He said:
We are ell ready to listen to the voices of
nature-the voices of the mountain, the
voices of the sea, the voices of the storm,
the voices of the star. AS in some of the
cathedrals in Europe there is an organ at
either end of the building, and the one in
strument responds musically to the other,
20 in the great cathedral of nature
day responds to day and night Co
night, and flower to flower, and star to star,
in the great harmonies of the universe. The
spring time is an evangelist in blossoms
preaching of Gods love; and the winter is
prophet-white bearded-denouucing woe
against our sins. We are all ready to listen
to the voices of nature; but how few of lis
learn anything from the voices of the noisy
and dusty street. You go to your mer-
chandise, and your mechanism, and to your
work, and you come back again-aud often
with an indifferent heart you pass through
the streets. Are there no things for us to
learn from these pavements over which we
pass! Are there no tufts of truth growing
up between these cobblestoncs, beaten with
the feet of toll and pain, and pleasure. the
slow tread of old age, and the quick step of
childhooda Aye, there are great harvests
TO be reaped; and now thrust in the sickle
because the harvest is ripe. "Wisdom
crieth without; she uttereth her voice in the
streets"
In the first place the street impresses me
with the fact that this life is a scene of toil
and struggle By 10 o'clock every 1av the
city is iarring with wheels, aud shufIinp
with feet, and humming with voices, and
covered with the breath of smokestacks and
a-rush with traffickers Once in a while
you find man going along with folded
arms and with lelsurely step, as though he
had nothing to do; but for the most pert. as
you find men going down these streets. on
the way to business, there is
anxiety in their faces, as
though they had some errand
which must be executed at the first possi-
Die moment. ou are Jostled by those who
have bargains to make and notes to sell.
UP this ladder with hood of bricks, out of
| this bank with q roll of bills on this draw
with load of goods, digging a cellar, or
smuggling a roof, or shoeing borse or
building wall, or mending watch or
binding book. Industry, with her thou
| sand arms, and thousand ewes. and thopsand
teet, goes on singing hacssong of work
WORK! WORK! wnde the mills drum 1t, and
the steam whistles fife 1t. All this is not be-
| cause men love toll Some one remarked ::
Every man is as lazy as he can afford to
be-" But it Is because necessity, with stern
brow and with uplifted whip, stands over
them ready whenever they relax their toll
| to make their shoulders sting with the lash.
Can 1t he that, passing up and down these
streets on your way to work and business
you do not learn anything of the worlds
toll ard anxiety, and struggle? Oh how
many dropping hearts, how many ewes on
The watch. how many miles Travelled how
many burdens carried, Low many losses
suffered, how many battles fought. how
many victories gained, how many defeats
suffered, how many exasperatlous en-
dured-what losses, what hunger. what
wretchedness, what pallor, what dis
ease. what agony, what despairl Some
times l have stopped az the corner of the
street as the multitude weat hither and
mime, and as l looked upon it nv heart
broke. This great tide OF human life that
goes down the street is q rapid, tossed and
turned aside, and dashing ahead and driven
back-bsautiful in its confusion and con-
fused in its beauty. In the carpeted aisles
of the forest, in the woods from which the
eternal shadow is never lifted, on the shore
or the sea over whose iron coast tosses the
tangled foam, sprinkling the cracked cliffs
with baptism of wnirlwind and tenn
pest, is the best place to study God; but ia
the rushing, swarming, raving street is the
best place to study man. Going down TO
your place of business and coming home
again, charge you look about-see these
signs OF poverty, of wretchedness, of hunger.
OF SIN. OF bereavement-andy you go through
the streets, and come back through the
streets, gather up in the arms Of your
prayer, ali the sorrow, all the losses, all the
suffering, all the bereavements of those
whom you pass. and present them In PRAYER
before an ali sympathetic God, Then in
the great day Of eternity there will be
thousands of persons vita whom you in
this world never exchanged one word who
viii rise up and call you blessed: and there
will be thousand fingers pointed at you in
heaven, saying: That is the man, that is
the woman, fIho helped me wnen / was
nngry, and sick, and wandering, and lost.
and heart broken. That is the man. that is
the woman" and the blessing will come
down upon you as Christ shall say: 81 was
hungry and ye fed me, l was naked and We
clothed me, was sick and ia prison and We
visited me; inasmuch as ye did it to these
poor waits Of the streets, We did it 10 tne.n
Again. the street impresses me with the
fact that all classes and conditions of soci-
ETY. must commingle. We sometimes cul-
ture a wicked exclusiveness. Intellect
despises ignorance. Refinement will have
nothing to do with boorishness Gloves
hate the sunburned hand, and the high
forehead despises the fiat head; aud the trim
hedgerow will have nothing TO do with the
wild copsewood, and Athens hates Nazareth.
This ought not to be so. The astronomer
must come down from his starry revelry and
help US in our navigation. The surgeon must
come away from his study Of the human
organism and set our broken bones. The
chemist must come away from his labora-
tory, where he has been studying analysts
and synthesis, and help us to understand
the nature Of the soils. 1 bless God that all
classes Of people are compelled to meet on
the street. The glittering coach wheel
clashes against the scavenger's cart Fine
robes run against the psddlers pack Robust
health meets wan sickness. Honesty CON
fronts fraud. Every class Of people meets
every other class Independence and
modesty, PRIDE and humility, purity and
beastliness, frankness and hypocrisy, meet
ing on the same block, in the same street. in
the same city. OH that is what Solomon