The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1889-04-17
A WONDERFUL AGE.
Sermon by Rev. T. Dewitt Tai
mage, D. D.
The Nineteenth Century One of Wonderful
Disasters and Wonderful Blessings
The Christian Religion March
ing Onward-An Eloquent
Discourse.

heavens and in the earth''-Joel IL, 80. The
eloqu, divine spoke as follows:
DR.. Cumming-great and good man
would have told US the exact time Of the
fulhnment Of this prophecy. As stepped
into his study in London on my arrival from
Paris just after the French had surrendered
at Sedan. the good doctor said to me: ''Tt
IS just as told you about France; people
laughed aG me because talked about the
seven horns and the viais, but foresaw all
this from tho Book of Daniel and the Book
Of Revelation" Not taking any such re
sponsibility in the Interpretation Of the pas
sage, simply assert that there is in it sug-
Gest;ons Of many things in our time.
Our eyes dilate and heart Quickens its
pulsaticns as we read of events in the third
century, the sixth century, the eighth cea-
tury, the fourteenth century, but there are
more far reaching events crowded into the
nineteenth century than into any other,
and the last quarter bids fair to eclipse the
preceding three-quarters. We read in the
daily newspapers OF events announced in
one paragraph and without any special en-
phasis-of events which Herodotus,
Jcsephus, Xeuophon, 8 Gibbon would
have taken whole chapters or whole vol
Umes to elaborate. Looking out upon our
time, we must cry out in the words of our
text: ''Wonders in the heavens and in the
earth.'
Ipropose to show you that the time IN
which we live is wonderful for disaster and
wonderful for blessing, for there must be
lights and shades in this picture as IN all
others. Need argue this day that our time
is wonderful for disaster! Our world has
had rough time since by the hand OF God
it was bowled out into space. 1t is an
epileptic earth; convulsion after convulsion;
frosts pounding 1t with sledge hammer OF
iceberg, and fires melting it with furnaces
seven hundred times heated. 1t is wonder
to me it has lasted so long. Meteors shoot
ing by on this side and grazing it, and me
teors shooting by on the other side and
grazing it, none Of them slowing up for
safety Whole fleets Of navies and argosies
and flotilias Of worlds sweering all about
US. Our earth like fishing smack of
the banks of Newfoundland, while the
Etruria and Gernanic and the Arizona
and the City of New York rush by.
Besides that, our world has by sin been
damaged in it's internal machinery, and
ever and anon the furnaces have burst,
and the walking beams of the noun
tain have broken, and the Islands have
shipped sea, and the great hulk Of the
world has been Jared with accidents that
ever and anon threatened immediate 6emol!-
tion. But it seems to US as If our century
were especially characterized by disaster
volcanic, cyclonic, oceanic. epidemic. l say
volcanic, because an earthquake is only
volcano huShed up. When Stromboh and
Cotopaxi and Vesuvius stop breathing, let
the foundations Of the earth beware. Seven
Thousand earthquakes in two centuries re-
corded in the catalogue Of the British as
sociatiou. Trajap, the Emperor, goes to
ancient Antioch, and amid the splendors OF
his reception is met by an earthquake that
nearly destroys the emperor's life. Lisbon,
fair and beautiful at one O'Clock on the lst
Of November, 1855, in six minutes GC.OO
have perished, and Voltaire writes OF them:
..For that region it was the last judgment,
nothing wanted but trumpet" Europe
and America feeling the throb; 1900 chin
neys in Boston partly or fully destroyed.
But the disasters Of othe centuries have
had their counterpart in our own. In 1872
Caracas was caught in the grip ofthe earth
quake; in 1922, in Chilli, 100000 square miles
of land by volcanic force uph eaved to four
and seven feet Of permanent elevation; in
1854 Japan felt the geological agony; Naples
shaken in 1857; Mexico in 1858; Medosa. the
capital of the Argentine Republic, in 1851;
Manila terrorizei in 1858; the hawaiian
Islands by such force uplifted and let down
in 1871: Nevada shaken in 1871; Antioch in
1872; California in 1872: San Salvador in
1878; while in 1898 what subterrauean eX-
citement! lschia, an island of the Medi-
terranean, beautiful Italian watering
place, vineyard clad, surrounded by ali
natural charm and historical reminis-
cence; yonder Capri the summer resort of
the Roman emperors; yonGer Naples, the
paradise of art-this beautiful island sud-
denly toppled into the trough of the earth,
5000 merry makers perish, and some
of them so far down beneath the reach Of
human obseeuies that it may be said OF
many one of them as it was said OF Moses,
s.The Lord buried him." Italy weeping. all
Europe weeping, all Christendom weeping
where there were hearts to sympathiZe and
Christians to pray. But while the nations
were measuring that magnitude Of disaster.
measuring it not with golden rod like that
with which the angel measured heaven. but
with the black rule of death, Java, Of the
Indian archipelago, the most fertile island
Of all the earth. is caught in the grip of the
earthquake, and mountain after mountain
goes down, and city after city, until that
island. which produces the healthiest bever-
age Of all the world, has produced the ghast-
lest accident Of the century. One hundred
thousand people dying, dying, dead, dead.
But look at the disasters cyclonic. At
the mouth Of the Ganges are three islands =
the Hattiah, the Sundeep and the Dakin
Shabazpore In the midnight Of October,
1877, on all these three islands the cry was:
.sThe waters, the watersr' A cyclone arose
and rolled the sea over those three islands,
and of population Of $4,000, 2l5,OOO were
drowned. Only those saved who had
climbed to the top of the highest trees.
Did you ever see a cyclone? No! Then
pray God you may never see one. saw one
on the ocean, and it swept US eight hundred
miles back from our course, and for thirty
six hours during the cyclone and after 1t
we expected every moment to go to the bot
tom. They told US before we retired at nine
O'Clock that the barometer had fallen but at
eleven O'Clock at night we were awakened
with the shock of the waves. All the lights
outl Crash went all the life-bcats. Waters
rushing through the skylights down
into the cabin and down on the
furnaces until they hissed and smoked
in the deluge. Seven hundred people
praying, Disappearing, shrieking. Our
great ship poised moment on the top Of a
mountain of phosphorescent fire, and then
plunged down, down, down, until it seemed
as il she never would again be righted All!
vou never want to see a cyclone at sea-
Rnt I was in Minnesota, where there was
one Of these cyclones on land that swept
from fO11nNafl0llS