Richmond planet. [volume] (Richmond, Va.) 1883-1938, 1889-11-16
DIR. TALMAGE IN ROME.
EULOGY ON THE WORK AND PREACH
ING OF ST. PAUL.

Ahrhtng Interest OF Many Sights I'm Rome
The Scene OF Greatness and viIeness. OF
tho Mghtiest and Me@o~-t Intellect
Confirming ono's Faith.
ROME, Nov. l0.-The Rev. I. De Witt Tai
mage, ID. d., Mrs. Tamage and Miss Tai
mage, with Mr.. and Mrs. Louis Klopsch, ar
rived in this city last evening. Today the
great Brooklyn divine preached to n large
congregation from the text, Acts xix, 2l: Il
must also see Rome" full report of tho
sermon follows:
Here is Paul's itinerary He was travel
Ing or circuit preacher He had been mobbed
and inSulted, and the more good he did the
worse the world treated him. But he went
right on. Now he proposes to go Co Jerusa-
lem and says; After that must also see
Rome" Why did he want to visit this won
derful city in which L am today permitted to
standf ITO preach the Gospel" you answer.
No doubt OF it, but there were other reasons
why he wanted to see Rome A man of Paul's
intelligence and classic taste had fifty other
reasons for wanting TO see it Your Colos-
scum was at that time in process of erection,
and he wanted to see it. The Forum was
even then an old structure, and the eloquent
apostle wanted TO see that building, in which
eloquence had 50 often Numbered and wept
Over the Appian Way the triumphal process
years, and he wanted to see that The temple
of Saturn was already an antiquity, aud he
wanted TO see that. The ard Fttecture OF the
world renowned city, he walked to see that.
The places associated with the triumphs the
cruelties the disasters, the wars, the military
genius, the poetic and the historical fame OF
this great city, he wanted TO see them.
man like Paul, so many sided, 50 sympathetic,
so emotional, so full of analogy. could not
have been Indifferent to the antiquities aud
the splendors which move every rightly
organized human being. And with what
thrill of interest he walked these streets those
only, who for the first time like ourselves
enter Rome, can imagine II the inhabitants
of all Christendom were gathered into one
plain, and it were put to them which two
cities they would above all others wish to see.
the vast majority of them would vote Jeru-
salem and Rome. So we can understand
something of the record of my text and it's
surroundings when it says, Paul purposed in
the spirit when he had passed through Mace
donia and Achaia to go to Jerusalem, saying:
AFTER that must also see Rome.n As some
of you are aware, with my family, and only
for the purpose of what we can learn and the
good we can get, am on the way to Pales-
tine. Since leaving Brooklyn, New York this
Is the first place we have stopped. Intermedi-
ate cities are attractive, but we have visited
them in other years, and we FASTENED on, for
l said before starting that while was going to
Jerusalem I must also see Rome Why do I
want to see it'll Because want, by visiting
regions associated with the great Apostle to
the Gentiles, 10 have my faith in Christianity
confirmed There are those who will go
through large expenditure TO have their faith
weakened. In my native land have known
persons Of very limited means to paw fifty
cents or dollar to hear lecturer prove that
our Christian religion is a myth. dream, a
cheat, a lie. On the contrary, / will give all
the thousands OF dollars that this journey of
my family will cost, to have additional evil
dence that our Christian religion is an au-
thenticated grandeur, solemn, a Joyous a
rapturous, stupendous, a magnificent fact
So want to SEQ Rome. / want you 20 show
me the places connected with apostolic min
istry. have heard that in your city and
amid its surroundings, apostles suffered and
died for ChriSt's sake. My common sense
tells me that people do not die for the sake of
a falsehood- They may practice a deception
for purposes of gain, but put the sword To-
their heart, or arrange the halter aroaSid
their neck, or kindle the fire around their
feet, and they would say my life is worth
more than anything can gain by losing it.
hear you have in this city Paul's dungeon
Show it to me. must see Rome also. While
i am Interested in this city because of her
rulers or her citizens who are mighty in his
tory for virtue or vice or Notwithstanding,
and Caligula, and Cincinnatus, aud
Vespasian, and Coriolanus, and Bru-
tus, and hundred others whose
names are bright with an exceeding bright
ness, or black with the deepest dye-most OF
ali am / Interested in this city because che
preacher of Mars Hill, and the defer Of
Agrippa and the hero Of the shipwrecked
vessel in the breakers of Melita and the man
who held higher than any one that the world
ever saw the torch of Resurrection, lived.
and preached, and was massacred here. Show
me every place connected with his memory.
/ must also see Rome.
CURIOSITY OF THE CHRISTIAN
But my text suggests that in Paul there
was the inquisitive and curious spirit. Had
my text only meant that he wanted TO preach
here he would have said So Indeed, in ael-
other place, he declared: II am ready to
preach the Gospel to you who are at Roene
also" But my text suggests sight seeing
This man who had been under Dr. Gamahei
had no lack of phraseology, and was used to
saying exactly what he meant, and he said:
II must also see Rome" There is such
thing Christian curiosity. Paul had It,
and some Of us have it. About other peoples
business have no curiosity. About all that
hgion and the worlds salvation and the souls
future happiness, l am full of all absorb
ing, all compelling curiosity. Paul had
a great curiosity about the next world, and
so have we l hope some day, by the grace
of God, to go over and see for myself;
but not now. No well man, no prospered
man, / think, wants to go now. But the
time will come, think, when 1 shall go over.
want to see what they do there. and / wart
to see how they do it. do net want to 20
looking through the gates ajar forever. l
want them to swing wide open. There are
ten thousand things want explained-aboIt
you, about myself, about the government Mf
the world, about God, abont everything w
start in plain path of what we know, a
in n minute come up against high wall o.
what we do not know. | wonder how il
looks over there. Somebody tells me it is
like paved city-paved with gold; and an
other man tells me it is like fountain, and
it is like tree, and it is like triumphal PR.
cession; and the next man meet tells me it
is all figurative 1 really want to know after
the body is resurrected what they wear and