The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1889-10-09
AMERICA FOR GOD.
DR.. Talmage Discourses on the
immensely Of Our Country.
4 Graphic Description Of the Wonderful
Scenery Of the Great West and Its
n 'Boundless Resources How
the Continent II to be
.---1 Gospelized

ul6 SuUlCCU, TUul OCCdu w OCOull, VI A0y
Transcontinental Journey" Text: Psalms
lxxii. s: He shall have dominion from sea
to sea-" The eloquent divine spoke as fol-
lows:
What two seas are referred tot Some
might say that the text meant that Christ
was to reign over all the land between the
Arabian Sea and Caspian Sea, or between
the Red Sea and the Mediterranean Sea, or
between the Black Sea and the North Sea-
No; In such cases my text would havenamed
them. 1t meant from any large body OF
water on the earth clear across to any other
large body of water. And SO have right
to read it: He shall have dominion from the
Atlantic Sea to the Pacific Sea. My theme
8: America for God!
First, consider the immensely Of this pos
session. If it were only small tract OF
land capable of nothing better than sage
brush and with. ability only to support
prairie dogs, should not have much en-
thusiasm in wanting Christ to have 1t added
to His dominion. But its immensely and af-
fuence no one can imagine unless in immi-
grant wagon or stage coach or in rail train
of the Union Pacific or the Northern Pacific
or the Canadian Pacific or the Southern Pa
citic, he has traversed it, Having been
privileged six times to cross this continent,
and twice this summer, have come to some
appreciation of its magnitude. California,
which supposed in bOyhood from its size
on the map, was few yards across, a ridge
of land on which one must walk cautiously
lest he hit his head against the Sierra Neva-
do on the one side or slip of into the Pa
ciHc waters on the other; California, the
thin slice Of land as supposed it to be in
my boyhood, have found to be larger
than all the States of New England and all
New York State and all Pennsylvania
added together; and if you add them to-
gether their square miles fall far short of
California. North and South Dakota, Mon
tana, end Washington Territory, to be
launched next winter into statehood, will
be giants at their birth. Let the Congress
of the United States strain point and soon
admit also Idaho and Wyoming and New
Mexico. What is the use keeping them out
in the cold any longer2 Let us nave the
whole continent divided into States with
Senatorial and Congressional representa-
tves and we will all be happy together. If
some Of them have not quite the requisite
number of people, fix up the Constitution to
suit these cases. Even Utah will by dropping
polygamy soon be ready to enter Monoga-
my has triumphed in parts of Utah and will
probably triumph at, this fall election in
Salt Lake City. Turn all the Territories
into States and if some of the sisters are
smaller than the elder sisters, give them
time and they will soon be as large as any
of them. Because some of the daughters
of family may be five feet in stature and
the others only four feet, do not let the
daughters five feet high shut the door in
the faces of those who are only four feet
high. Among the dying utterances Of oul
good friend, the wise statesman and great
author, the brilliant orator and magnificent
soul, s. s. Cox, was the expressed deter
mination to move next winter in Congress
for the transference Of other Territories
into States.
"But," says some one, sin calculating thu
immensely of our continental acreage YOU
must remember that vast reaches of oul
public domain are uncultivated heaps o.
dry sand, and the bad lands Of Montana
and the great American desert" am glat
you mentioned that. Within twenty five
y
tic and Pacific coasts a hundred miles o.
land not reclaimed either by farmers pillow
or miners crowbar. By irrigation, th(
waters Of the rivers and the showers @
heaven in what are called the rainy season
will be gathered into great reservoirs ant
through aQueducts let down where ant
when the people want them. Utah is an OBJ
ject lesson. Some parts of that Territor,
which were 50 barren that spear of gras
could not have been raised there in hun
dred years are now rich as Lancaster Count,
farms of Pennsylvania, or Westcheste
farms of New York, or Somerset Count,
farms of New Jersey.
Experiments have proved that ten acres o
ground irrigated from waters gathered il
| great NEUROLOGICAL basins will produce a
much as fifty acres from the downpour o
rain as seen in our regions. We have on
freshets and our drOughts, but in thos
lands which are to be- scientifically irrigate
there will be neither frCshets nor droughts
As you take pitcher and get it full @
water and then set it on table and take
drink out Of it when you are thirsty, an
never think of drinking a pitcherful all q
once, so Montana and Wyoming and Idah
will catch the rains of their rainy seaso
and take up all the waters of their rivers
great pitchers of reservoirs and drink on
VI them whenever they will, and refres
their land whenever they will
The work has already been grandly begu
by the United States Government. Owe
four hundred lakes have already been of
cially taken poss ession Of by the nation fc
the great enterprise of irrigation. River
that have been rolling idly through theser
gions, doing nothing on theirway to the SCI
will be lassoed and corralled and penned u
until such time as the farmers need then
Under the same processes the Ohio, the Mi
sissippi and all the other rivers will |
taught to behave themselves better, an
great basins will be made to catch the su
plus of watersin times of frcshet and ket
them for times of, drought. The irrigatir
process by which all the arid lands betwee
the Atlantic and Pacific oceans are to be 70
tilted is no new experiment 1t has bee
going on successfully hundreds of years
Spain, in China, in India, in Russia,
Egypt.
About eight hundred million of people
the earth today are kept alive by foC
raised on irrigated land. Aud here we Ia,
allowed to lie waste, given up to rattlesnal
and bat and prairie dog, lands enough
support WINE nations of Industrious pop
lation. Thewo begun will be consur
mated. Here and there exceptional lam
may be stubborn and refuse to yield al
wheat or corn from their hard fists, but
the hoe fail to make an impression, Il
miners pick-axe will discover. the reas'
for it and bring up from beneath these u
productive surfaces coal and iron, aud lie;
and copper and silver and gold. God spe
the biologists and the surveyors, the ems
neers and the Senatorial commissions, al
the capitalists and the new settlers. and 4
husbandm-n who put their brain and hal