The Londonderry sifter. (South Londonderry, Vt.) 1883-19??, 1889-01-31
TALMAGE'S SERMON,
The Weekly DISCOURSE Of tho Great
Brooklyn Preacher
subject "a Bright sunday
Versus a. DOlcf1l sunday"


There is an element OF gloom striking
through all false religions. Paganism is
brood of horrors The god OF Confuciu,
frowned upon its victims with blind fate
Mohammedansm promises nothing to thos,
exhausted with sin in this world but ar
eternity OF the same passional indulgences
But God intended that our religion should
have the grand characteristic of cheerfulness
st Paul struck the keynote when he said
REJOICE evermore, and again say, re
loice" This religion has no spikes for the
feet; 1t has no hooks for the shoulder; it has
no long pilgrimages to take; il has no funer.
elpyres upon which to leap; il has no jug
gernauts before which to fall Its good cheei
is symbolized in the Bible by the brightness:
OF waters, and the redolence OF lilies, and the
sweetness OF music, and the hilarities Of a
banquet choir of seraphim chanted at il.
induction and pealing trumpet, and waving
palm, and Tapping wing of archangel are to
celebrate It's triumphs 1t began it's chief
mission with the shout: "Glory to God in
the highest" and it will close its earthly
mission with the Inscription; "Hallelujah, for
the Lord God omnipotent reignethln
But men have said that our religion is not
cheerful. because we have such doeful Sab
bath. They say: "You can have your re-.
ligious assemblages, and your long faces, and
your smiling cant, and your psalm books,
and your Bibles. Give us the Sunday excur-
sion, AMI the horse-race, and the convivial
laughter. We have so much Joy that we
want to spread it all over the seven days Of
the week, and YOU shall not have one of our
days OF worldly satisfaction for religious
uolefulness." want to show these men-if
there are any such in the house this morning
that they are under great delusion, and
that God intended the fifty-two Sundays Of
the year to be hung up like bells in tower,
peatlng perpetual chime of Joy, and glory,
and salvation, and heaven; for want you to
carry out the idea of the text. land call tho
Sabbath delight"
remark, in the first place, we are to find
In this day the joy of healthy repose lhi
this democratic country we all have to
work-some with hand, some with brain,
some with foot. If there is in all this house
q hand that has not, during the past year,
been stretched forth to some kind of toll, let
1t be lifted. Not one not one You sell the
goods, You teach the school, You doctor
IN the sick room. You practice at the bar.
You edit a newspaper. You tan the hides.
You preach the Gospel You mend the shoes.
You sit at the shuttle. You carry the hod
OF bricks up the ladder on the wall. And
the one occupation is as honorable as the
other, provided God calls you to it. | care
not what youd do, if you only do it well. But
when Saturday night comes you are faded
and worn. The hand cannot so
skillfully manufacture; the eye cannot
ceo 40 NcH, tle Dram is nOU so clear,
the Judgment Is not so well balanced. A
prominent manufacturer told me that he
could see difference between the goods
which went out of his establishment on Sat-
urday from the goods that went out on Mon
day. He said: They were very different
indeed. Those that were made in the former
part of the week, because of the rest that
mad been previously given, were better than
those that were made in the latter part of the
week, when the men were tired OUT The
Sabbath comes, and it battles the soreness
from the limbs, quiets the agitated brain,
and puts out the fires of anxiety that have
been burning all the week. Our bodies are
seven day clocks, and unless on the seventh
DAY they are wound up, they run down into
savings bank; into it we are to gather the re-
sources upon which we are to draw all the
week That man who breaks the Sabbath
robs his own nerve, his own muscle his own
brain, his own bones. He dips up the wine
of his own life and throws it away. He
VINO oie;s~~ ea-s l.cTra day gives mortgage
to disease and death upon his entire physical
estate, and at the most unexpected moment
that mortgage will be foreclosed, and the
soul ejected from the premises. Every gland,
and pore, and cell, and finger nail demands
the seventh day for repose The respiration
OF the lungs the throb of the pulse in the
wrist. the motion of the bone in its socket
uoeio,o. ReMeniper Gns oaoDaIn gay 10
keep 1t holy" There are thousands of men
who have had their lives dashed out against
the golden gates of the Sabbath A promi-
pent London merchant testifes that thirty
years ago he went to London. He says: II
have during that time watched infinitely,
and | have noticed that the men who
went to their business on the Lords
have, without single exception
come to failure" A prominent Christian
merchant in Boston says: II find it don't pay
to work on Sunday. When | was a boy. I
noticed out on Long Island there were mer.
chants who loaded their vessels on the Sab.
bath day, keeping their men busy from
morning until night, and it is my observa-
tlon that they themselves came to nothing
these merchants-and their children came to
on the Sabbath"
appeal to your observation. Where are
the men who twenty years ago were Sab
bath breakers, ana who have been Sabbath
breakers ever since? Without a single ex-
ception, you will tell me, they have come
either to financial or to moral beggary.
DEFY you to point out single exception and
you can take the whole world for your
!eld. 1t has either ceen Il financial or moral
deialcation in every instance. Six hundred
and forty physicians in London petition Par
lament, saying: "We must have the Sab
bath obeyed. We can not have health
In this city, and in this nation un-
less the Sabbath is observed" Those
IN our own country have given evi.
dence or The same side. The man who takes
down the shutters of his store on the Sabbath
takes down the curse of Almighty God.
That farmer who cultures his ground on the
Sabbath day raises crop of neuralgia, and
OF consumption, and of death A farmer
said: II defy your Christian Sabbath. /
will raise a Sunday crop" So he went to
work and plowed the ground OH Sunday. and
narrowed it on Sunday, and he planted corn
on sunday, and he reaped the corn on Sunday,
and he gathered it into the barn on Sunday.
Ihere," he says, II have proved to you that
all this idea about fatality accompanying
Sabbath work is a perfect sham. My corn
is garnered and all is we'll" But before
many weeks passed the Lord God struck that
barn with his lightnings, and away went the
Sunday crop.
So great is the moral depression coming
upon those who toll upon the Sabbath day,
that you may have noticed df you have not,
call your attention to the fact that in
cases where the public interest demands
Sabbath toll the moral depression is so great
that there are but very few who can stand
it. For instance, the police servics without
which not one of our houses would be safe
there are very few who can stand the pres
sure and temptation of it. In Loudop, where
there are five thousand policemen, the sta
tistic is given that in one year nine hundred
and twenty one If that five thousand were
dismissed, five hundred and twenty three
were suspended, and two thousand. four
hundred and ninety-two were fined. Now,f
tbe moral depression is so great in occupa-
lions that are positively necessary for the
peace and prosperity of society, l ask you
what must be the moral depression in those
bases where there is no necessity for Sabbath
work, and where a man chooses worldly bust
hess on the Lords day just because he likes
1t, or wants to add to his emoluments! Dur
ing the last war it was found out that these
public works which paused on the seventh
day turned out more war material than those
which worked all the seven days. Mr. Bag
nall, a prominent iron merchant. gives this
81 find we have fewer accidents
in our estab ishment and fewer interruptions,
now we observe the Lords day; and at the
cnse of the wear now that we keep the Sab
bath, l find that we turn out more iron and
have larger profits than any year when we
worked all the seven days" The fact is, Sab
ropes will break. and Sabbath
made shoes will leak, and Sabbath-made
coats will rip and Sabbath-made muskets
will miss fire, and Sabbath occupations will
be blasted A gentleman said: 81 invented
a shuttle on the Lords day. / was
very busy, 50 I made the model
Of that new shuttle On the Lords day. So
very busy was during the week that had
10 occupy many Sabbaths 1t was a great