The Russellville Democrat. [volume] (Russellville, Ark.) 1875-1898, 1889-05-16
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
An Interesting Discourse on "Other
Days Lived Over"
Looking Back Over tho Past--The Trials
and Bies1ings That Have Dotted
Our Lives-Looxing for
the Last Hour.

Rev. 7. Dewitt Talmage took for the
subject of a recent sermon in the Brook
lyn Tabernacle: "Other Days Lived
Over" His text was:
Thou shalt remember all the way which the
Lord thy God led thee.-Deut. viii. q
Before entering on my subject wish to
say that some newspaper correspondents,
referring to recent sermon in which l
welcomed foreign nationalities to this
country, have said that advocated as
desirable thing the intermarriage of the
| white and black races. l never said so;
never thought so, and any one who so
misrepresents that sermon is either viii
lain or fool, perhaps both.
But to open this mornings subject
have to say God in the text advises the
people to look back upon their past his
tory. 1t will do us good to re-
member the scenes between this May
morning and our cradle, whether it
was rocked in country or town. a few
days ago, with my sister and brother, l
visited the place of my boyhood. 1t was
one of the most emotional and absorbing
days of my life. There stands the
old house. and as l went through the
rooms | said: 81 could find my way here
with my eyes shut. although l have not
been here in forty years" There was the
sitting room, where large family group
every evening gathered, the most Of them
now in better world. There was the old
barn where we hunted for Easter eggs,
and the place where the horses stood.
There is where the orchard was, only
three or four trees now left of all the
grove that once bore apples, anG such ap-
fNIac fon Sc tbo 1,.on xpb fcl,
we rode to the watering of the horses
bareback and with rope halter. We
also visited the cemetery where many of
our kindred are waiting for the resur-
rection, the old people side by
side, after o journey together of
sixty years, only about three years be-
tween the time of their going. There
also sleep the dear old neighbors who used
to tie their horses under the shed of the
country meeting house and sit at the end
of the. pew singing: Duke Street, and
"Balerma" and antioch" Oh they were
glorious race OF men and women who
did their work well, raised splendid lot
of boys and girls, and are now as to their
bodies in silent neighborhood on earth,
but as to their souls in iubilant neighbor-
hood before the throne of God. / feel
that my journey and visit last week did
me good and it would do you all good, IL
not in person then in thought, to revisit
the scenes of boyhood or girlhood. Thou
shalt remember all the way which the
Lord thy God led thee"
Youth is apt too much to spend all its
time in looking forward. Old age is apt
too much to spend all its time in looking
backward. People in mid-life and on the
apex look both ways. 1t would be well
for us, think, however, to spend more
time in "reminiscences. By the constitution
of our nature we spend most of the time
looking forward, and the vast majority of
this audience live not so much in the
present as in the future. / find that you
mean to make reputation, you mean to
establish yourself, and the advantages
that you expect to achieve absorb great
deal of your time. But see no harm in
this, if it does not make you discontented
with the present or disqualify you for ex-
isting duties.
1t is useful thing sometimes to look
back and see the dangers we have es-
capped, and to see the sorrows we have
suffered, and the trials and wanderings of
our earthly pilgrimage, and to sum up
our enjoyments. l mean this morning so
far as God may help me, to stir up your
memory of the past, so that in the review
you may be encouraged, and humbled,
and urged to pray. There is a chapel in
Florence with fresco by Guido. 1t was
covered with two inches of stucco until
our American and European artists went
there, and after long toll removed the
covering and retraced the fresco. And l
am aware that the memory of the past
with many of you, is all covered up with
ten thousand deliberations, and l pro-
pose this morning, so far as the Lord may
help me, to take away the covering, that
the old picture may shine out again. /
want to bind in one sheaf all your past
advantages, and want to bind in another
sheaf all your past adversities II is
precious harvest, and must be cautious
how swing the scythe.
Among the greatest advantages of your
past life was an early home and its sur
roundings. The bad men of the day, for
the most part, dip their heated passions
out of the boiling spring of an unhappy
home. We are not surprised to find that
Byron's heart was a concentration of sin
when we hear his mother was abandoned,
and that she made sport of his infirmity,
and often called him tho "lame brat"
He who has vicious parents has TO fight
every inch OF his way IL he would main
tain his integrity, and at last reach the
home of the good in Heaven. Perhaps
your early home was in the city. 1t may
have been in the days when Canal street
New York, was far uptown, and the site
OF this present church was an excursion
into the country. The old house in the
city may have been demolished or
changed into stores, and IL seemed like
sacrilege to you, for there was more
meaning in that plain house, in that small
house, than there is in granite mansion
or a turreted cathedral.
Looking back this morning you see it
as though il were yesterday-the sitting
room, where the loved ones sat by the
plain lamp. light, the mother at the even
ing stand, the brothers and sisters, per-
haps long ago gathered into the skies,
then plotting mischief on the floor or un-
der the table, your father with firm
voice commanding silence that lasted
half minute. Oh, those were good days.
If you had your foot hurt your mother al
ways had a soothing salve to heal Il. If
you we're wronged in the street, your
father was always ready to protect you.
The year was one round of frolie and
mirth. Your greatest trouble was like an
April shower, more sunshine than shower.
The heart had not been ransacked by
troubles, nor had sickness broken it, and
no lamb had warmer sheepfold than
the home in which your childhood nestled.
Perhaps you were brought up in the
country. You stand now to-day ia men,
ory under the old tree. You dubbed il
for fruit that was not quite ripe because
you couldn't wait any longer. You hear
the brook runlbling along over the peb-
bles. You step again into the furrow
where your father in his shirt sleeves
shouted 10 the lazy oxen. You frighten
the swallows from the rafters of the barn
and take just one egg, and silence your
conscience by saying they won't miss it.
You take a drink again out OF the very
bucket that the old we'll fetched up. You
az, E.e the cq1uu ~ and Hnd than