The Indiana State sentinel. [volume] (Indianapolis) 1868-1895, 1889-10-09

nacle last sunday morning the Rev. L. DE
Witt Talmage, ID. D., gave out the hymn:
$50 let our lips and lives express
The holy gospel we profess;
50 let works and virtues shine
To prove the doctrine all divine"
The subject of DIR. Talmages sermon was:
1.-The Shorn Locks of Samson" He took
for his text Judges, xvi, 3; ''Entice him,
and see wherein his great strength lieth,
and by what means we may prevail
against him, that we may bind him to af-
flict him; and we will give thee every one
of US 100 hundred pieces of silver" The
sermon was as follows:
One thousand pounds, or about s., 900 in
our money, were thus offered for the cap
ture of giant. 1t would take a skillful
Photographic to picture Sampson as he
really was The most facile words are not
supple enough to describe him. He was
a giant and a child; the conqueror and
the-defeated; able to snap a lions jaw,
and yet captured by the sigh of maiden.
He was ruler and slave; commingling of
virtue and vice, the sublime and the ride
ulous; sharp enough to be caught in the
most superficial strategem; honest enough
to settle his debt, and yet outrageously
robbing somebody else to get the material
to pay it; miracle and a soothing; a
browning glory and a burning shame.
There he stands, looming up above other
men, a mountain of flesh; his arms
punched with muscle that can lift the gate
of city; taking an attitude defiant of
armed men and wild beasts. His hair had
never been cut, and it rolled down in
seven great plaits over his shoulders, add
ing to his fierceness and terror. The Phil
istines want to conquer him, and therefore
they must find out where the secret of his
strength lies.
There is woman livingin the valley of
Sorek by the name of Delilah. They ap-
point her the agent in the case. The
Philistines are secreted in the same build
ing, and then Delilah goes to work and
coaxes Samson TO tell what is the secret of
his strength. WELL" he saws, eff you
should take seven green withes, such as
they fasten wild beasts with, and put
them around me / should be perfectly
powerless." So she binds him with the
seven green withes. Then she claps her
hands and saws, ''They come-the Philis-
tines" and he walks out as though there
were no impediment. She coaxes him
again and says. "Now tell me the secret of
your great strength" and he replies, eff
you should take some ropes that have
never been used and tie me with them |
should be just like other men," She tied
him with the ropes, claps her hands, and
shouts, They come-the Philistinesp
He walks out as easy as be did before
not single obstruction. She coaxes him
again, and he says: Now, if you should
take these seven long plaits of hair, and
by this EOuse-loom weave them into a
web, l could not get away" So the house
loom is rolled up and the shuttle flies
backward and forward, and the long plaits
of hair are woven into web. Then she
claps her hands and says: ''They come
the PhilistinesW.
He walks out as easily as he did before,
dragging a part OF the loom with him.
But after awhile she persuades him to tell
the truth. He says: eff you should take
razor or shears and cut off this long hair,
/ should be powerless and in the hands of
my enemies" Samson sleeps, and, that
she may not wake him upduring the proc
ess of shearing, help is called in. You
know that the BARRIERS of the East have
such a skillful way OF manipulating the
head, TO this very day they will put man,
wide awake, sound asleep. 1 hear the
blades OF the shears grinding against each
other, and | see the long locks falling of.
The shears or razor accomplishes what
green withes and new ropes and house
loom could not do. Suddenly she claps
her hands and saws: '"Ihe Philistines be
upon thee, Samsonl'' He rouses up with
struggle, but his strength is all gone
He is in the hands of his enemies! / hear
the groan of the giant as they take his
eyes out, and then l see him staggering on
in his blindness, feeling his way as he goes
on toward GAIA The prison door is
opened and the giant is thrust in. He sits
down and puts his hands on the mill
crank, which, with eXhausting horizontal
motion, goes day after day, week after
week, month after month-work, work,
work! The CONSERVATION of the world in
captivity, his locks shorn, his eyes pune
tured, grinding corn in Gazal Though
strong as a giant, lookout for Delilah's
scissors. Samson, the strongest man who
ever lived, was overcome by coaxing.
Again, this narrative teaches us the
power of an ill-disposed woman. In the
portrait gallery OF bible queens we find
Abigail, and Ruth, and Miriam, and
Nashti and Deborah, but in the rogues'
gallery OF a police station you find the pic
lures of women as we'll as men. Delilah's
picture belongs to the rogues' gallery but
she had more power than all Philistia
armed with sword and spear. She could
carry off the iron gates of Samson's reso-
luton as easily as ne shouldered the gates
OF GAIA. The force that had killed the
lion which one day plunged out fierce
from the thicket utterly succumbs to the
silken net which Delilsh weaves for the
giant. He who had driven an army in
riotous retreat with the bleached jaw
bone, shifting them hip and thigh with
great slaughter, now falls captive at the
feet of an unworthy woman. Delilah in
the bible stands in the memorable COM
pany of Adah, and Zillah, and Bathsheba,
and Jezebel, and Athaliah, and Herodias.
How deplorable the influence of such in
contrast with Rebecca, and Phoebe, and
Huldah, and Tryphona, and Jeptha's
! daughter, and Mary, the mother of Jesus.
While the latter glitter in the armament
of Gods word like consultations with
steady, cheerful, holy light, the former
shoot like baleful meteOrs across the terri
fed heavens ominous of war, disaster,
and death. If there is a divine power in
the good mother, her face bright with pur-
ity, an unseltish love beaming from her
eye, a gentleness that by pangs, and suf-
ferings, and holy anxieiies has been mel
lowing and softening for many year. ut
tering itself in every syllable, a dignity
that cannot be dethroned, united with the
playfuness that will not be checked, her
hand the charm that will instantly take
pain out of the child's worst wound her
presence a perpetual benediction, her