The intelligencer. [volume] (Lexington, Mo.) 1887-1891, 1889-06-01
HUMAN U~NCLEANNESS.
Dr.. Talmage Discourses on Original
Sin in Man.
Natural Foulness of the world-No Good
Apologies For is No Pardon
Without Repentance-ChrIst Ready
to Cleanse All.

In a late sermon at Brooklyn Rev. I.
De Witt Talmage took for his text: IF 1
wash myself with snow water and should
1 cleanse my hands in alkali, yet shalt
thou plunge me in the ditch, and mine
W clothes shall abhor me."-Job tx.
2O-3l. The preacher said:
Albert Ba~rnes-honored be his name on
earth and in Heaven-went straight Jack
TO the original writing of my text, and
translated 1t as l 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 a
special power to cleanse and tina a gar
ment washed and rinsed in it would be as
clean as clean could be; but if the plain
snow water failed to do its work, then
they would take I've or alkali and mix 1t
with oil, and under that preparation they
felt that the last impurity would certain
~ be gone. Job, in my text, in most
1orceful figures sets forth the idea that all
his attempts to max himself pure before
sod were a dead failure, and that, unless
we are abluted by something better han
earthly liquids and chemical preparations,
we are loathsome and in the ditch" "If 1
wash myself with snow water, and should 1
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. l
turn the camera obscura of Gods word
full upon you, and / pray that the sum
shine falling through the skylight may
enable me to take you just as you are.
Shall 1t be a f1attering picture or shall it
De a true one? You say: Let it be q true
one" The first profile that was ever
taken was taken, 800 years before Christ,
OF Ambiguous. He had a blind eye, and
he compelled the artist to take his profile
so as to hide the defect in his vision. But
sinee that invention, $50 years before
Christ, there has been a great many pro-
hlss. Shall l to-day give you a one-sided
view of yourselves, n profile, or shall it
be . full length portrait, showing you Just
what you are? If God will help me by
His almighty grace, l shall give you that
last kind of a picture.
When first entered the ministry 1 used
to write my ermou all out and read them,
and run my hand along the line lest 1
should lose my place. 1 have hundreds
OF those manuscripts. Shall l ever preach
them? Never; for in those DAYS I was
somewhat overmastered with the idea 1
heard talked all around about, of the dig.
nifty OF human nature, and | adopted the
Idea, and l evolved 1t, and l illustrated it,
and / argued 1t; but coming on in life,
and having seen more of the world, and
studied better my Bible, I find that that
early teaching was faulty, and that there
10 no dignity in human nature Until il Is
reconstructed by the grace of God. Talk
about vessels going to pieces on the Sker-
ries, of Irelandi There never was such
shipwreck as in the Gihon and the Hidde-
kel, rivers of Eden, where our first par
ents foundered. Talk of a steamer going
down with five hundred passengers on
boardl is that to the shipwreck of
fourteen hundred million souls? We are
by nature a mass of uncleanness and
putrefaction, from which it takes all the
omnipotence and infinitude of Gods grace
to extricate us. III | wash myself with
snow water, and should l cleanse nv
hands in alkili, yet shalt thou plunge me
In the ditch, and my own clothes shall
Rbhor me-"
Iremark, 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: 81 am a sinner; l con-
fess that; but 1 inherited this. Ny father
was a sinner. my grandfather, my great
great-grandfather, and all the way back
to Adam, and / couldn't help myself.D
MY brother, have you not, every day in
your life, added something to the original
estate OF sin that was bequeathed to youP
Are you not brave enough to confess that
you have sometimes surrendered to sin
which you ought to have conuueredP I
ask you whether tits fair play to put upon
our ancestry things for which we our
selves are personally responsible? If YOUR
nature was askew when you got it, have
you not sometimes given it an additional
twistY Will all the tombstones of those
who have preceded us make a barricade
high enough for eternal defenses? know
a devout man who had blasphemous par
entage. L Know All honest man whose
father was a thief l know a pure man
whose mother was a waif of the street.
The hereditary tide may be very strong.
but there is such a thing as -stemming il.
The fact that l have a corrupt nature il
no reason why / should yield to it. The
deep stains of our soul can never be
washed out by the now water of such in.
sufficient apology.
Still further. says some one: "If Ihave
gone into 4sin,it has been through INV
companions, 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. Thew
ruined my SOUL" / do not believe it. |
God gave to no one the power to destroy /
you or me. If a man is DESTROYED he is |
self destroyed, and that is always SO. |
Why did you not break away from them?
IL they had tried to steal your purse you
would have Knocked them down; if they |
had tried to p%urloin your gold watch you
would have riddled them with shot; but
when they tried TO steal your immortal
you placidly submitted 10 it. Those
bad fellows rave a cup of fire to drink; |
do not pour your cup into it. In this mat |
OF the soul. every man for himself.
That those persons are not fully RESPONSE
BILE for your sin, l prove by the fact that
you still consort with them. You can not
get of by blaming them. Though you
gather up all these apologies; though
there were a great flood of them; though ,
should come-downswith the force of
Ehe melting snows from Lebanon, they
could not wash out n stain of your i'm |
mortal soul.
Still further, some persons apologize for
heir sins by saying: 1--WE are a great
deal better than some people. You see
people all around about aus that are q
great deal worse than we are.D You
stand up columnar In your integrity, and
look down upon those who are pro- tie
their habits and crimes. What of that,
ny brother? II l failed through reckless
leSs and wicked imprudence for $40, 900, is
he matter alleviated at all by the fact
hat somebody else has failed for 500. 600,
Ind somebody else for 5000, 900? o, no. if
rave the neuralgia, shall 1 refuse med
attendance because my neighbor has
typhoid feverr The fact that his
disease is worse than m~ine-does that
,ure mine? If ]. through my foolhardi-
less, leap oil into ruin, does IL break the
all to know that others leap Off a higher
'lif into deeper darkness! When the
Hudson rail train went through the bridge
It Spuyten Duyvil, did it alleviate the
natter at all that instead of two or three
being hurt there were s~eventy-ive
nangled and crushed2 Because others
re d~epraved, is that any excuse for my
Am l better than they? Per-
laps they had worse temptations than I
had. Perhaps their surroundings
n life were more overpowering. Per-
o man, If you had been under the
anne stress of temptation, instead of be-
ng here to-day you would have been
through the bars of a penitentiary.
Perhaps, y woman, il you had bsen under
he same power of temptation, instead of
itting here to-day you would be tramp
ng the street, the laughing stock Of men
the grief of the angels of God. dun-
eoned, body, mind and soul, in the black
ess of despair.
Some winter morning you go out and see
snow bank in graceful drifts, as though
y some heavenly compass it had been
urved; and as the sun glints it the luster
; almost insufferable, and it seems as il
TOD had wrapped the earth in a shroud
Nth white plaits woven in looms celestial.
You sav: .tWns thnrnnunn L..