The Russellville Democrat., 1889-10-03
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
A Transeontinental Journey Taken
 as a Theme.
The Immensity of This Fair Possession or Ours and the Wonders It Contains Particularly In the West
 America for God.

Psalms lxxii., S.
 What two seas are referred tog Some might say that the text meant that Christ was to reign over all the land between the Arabian sea and Caspian sea, or be- tween the Red sea aud the Mediterranean sea, or between the Black sea and the North sea. No; in such case my text would have named them. It meant from any large body of water on the earth clear across to any other large body of water. And so l have right to read it: He shall have dominion from the Atlantic sea to the Pacific sea. My theme is, America for God
 First consider the immensity of this possession. If it were only small tract of land capable of nothing better than sage brush and with ability only to sup port prairie dogs, should not have much enthusiasm in wanting Christ to have 1t added to His dominion. But it's immensity and affiuence no one can imagine unless, in immigrant wagon or stage coach or in rail train of the Union Pacific, or the Northern Pacific, or the Canadian Pacific, or the Southern Pacific, he has traversed if. Having been privileged six times to cross this continent and twice this summer 1 have come to some NDDTeCl1IlOu California, which 1 supposed in boy hood, from it's size on the map, was few yards across, Iidge of land on which one must walk cautiously lest he hit his head against the Sierra Nevada on one side or slip off into the Pacific waters on the other California, the thin slice of land as 1 supposed it to be in boyhood, l 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 added them to- gether their square miles fall far short of California. North and South Dakota, Montana and Washington Territory, to be launched next winter into Statehood, will be giants at their birth. Let the Congress of the United States strain a point and soon admit also Idaho, and Wyoming, and New Mexico.
 What is the use keeping them out in the cold any longer? Let us have the whole continent divided into States, with Senatorial and Congressional represent . atives, 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. Monogamy 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 sis ters, give them time and they will soon be as large as any of them. Because some of the daughters of a 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 our good friend, the wise statesman and great author. the brilliant orator and magnificent soul, s. s. Cox, was inc expressed determination to move next winter in Congress for the transferenoe of other Territories into States.
 But" says some one, ''in calculating the immensity of our continental acre. age you must remember that vast reaches of our public domain are uucultivated heaps of dry sand, and the bad lands of Montana and the great American desert" l am glad you mentioned that. Within twenty five years there will. not be be- tween the Atlantic and Pacific coasts hundred miles of land not reclaimed either by farmers blow or miners crow bar. By irrigation the waters of the rivers and the showers of Heaven in what are called the rainy season will be gath cred into great reservoirs and through aqueduct let down where and when the people want them. Utah is an object les son. Some parts of that Territory which were so barren that spear of grass could not have been raised there in hundred years are now rich as Laucas- tor County farms of Pennsylvania, or Westchester farms of New York or Somerset County farms of New Jersey.
 Experiments have proved that ten acres of ground irrigated from waters gathered in great physiological basins will produce as much as fifty acres from the downpour of rain as seen in our re- gions. We have our freshets and our droughts, but in those lands which are 10 be scientifically irrigated there will be neither freshets nor droughts. As you take @ pitcher and get 1t full of water and then set it on table and take drink out of it when you are thirsty, and never think of drinking a pitcherful all at once, so Montana and Wyoming and Idaho will catch the rains of their rainy season and take up all the waters of their rivers in great pitchers of reservoirs and drink ont of them whenever they will and refresh their land whenever they will.
 The work has already been grandly begun by the United States Government mt. Over four hundred lakes have already been officially taken possession of by the Nation for the great enterprise of irriga- ton, Rivers that have been rolling idly through these regions, doing nothing on their way to the sea, will be lassoed, and corraled and penned up until such time as the farmers need them. Under the same processes the Ohio, the Mississippi and all the other rivers will be taught 10 behave themselves better, and great basins will be made 10 catch the surplus of waters in times of freshet and keep them for times of drought The irrigat- ing process by which all the arid lands between the Atlantic and Pacific oceans are to be fertilized is no new experiment.. IL has been going on successfully hun dreds of years in Spain, in China, in In- dia, in Russia, in Egypt.
 About eight hundred million of people of the earth to-day are kept alive by food raised on irrigated land. And here we have allowed to lie waste, given up to rattlesnake and bat and prairie dog lands enough to support whole nations of industrious population. The work be- gun will be eonsummated. Here and there exceptional lands may be stubborn and refuse to yield any wheat or corn from their hard fists, but if the hoe fails to make an impression the miners pick axe will discover the reason for rand bring up from beneath those unproduct- i've surfaces coal and iron and lead and copper and silver and gold. God speed the geologists and the surveyors, the engineers and the Senatorial commis- sions and the capitalists and the new settlers and the husbandmen who put their brain and hand and heart to this transfguraton of the American conti. nent!
 But while l speak of the immensity of the continent I must remark 1t is not an immensity of monotone or tameness.