The Iola register., 1890-10-24
ON CALvARY'S BROW.
D.. Talmage's Marvellous Dis
course on the Sacred Spot

D.. Talmage's Marvellous Dis
course on the Sacred Spot
fhe Holy sepuicher-where jeremiah
Wrote His Lamentations The Beaatlful
! Associations aud the Great Events
Of Sacred History. Iu
The following discourse was delivered
by Rev. 7. Dewitt Talmage at Brook
lyn, N. Y, on Sunday, October IL Hi
text was: 'If forget thee, o Jerusalem,
let my right hand forget her cunning.
Psalm cxxxvii 5. He said: 20
Paralysis Of his best hand, the with.
ering of its muscles and nerves. is here
invoked IL the author allows to pass
out Of mind the grandeurs Of the Holy
City where once he dwelt jeremiah,
seated by the river Euphrates, wrote
this psalm and not David. Afraid am
of every thing that approaches impre-
cation, and yet l can understand how
any one who has ever been at Jerusalem
should, in enthusiasm Of soul, cry out
whether he be sitting by the Euphrates,
the Hudson or the Thames IF for
get thee, o Jerusalem, may my right
hand forget her cunningl" You see, II
is a city unlike all others for topography,
for history, for significance, for style OF
! population, for waterworks, for ruins,
for towers, for domes, for ramparts, for
literature. for tragedies, for memorable
birthplaces, for sepulchers, for confla-
grations and famines, for victories and
defeats. Hs
/ am here at last in this very Jerusa-
lem and on a housetop just after the
dawn of the morning Of Decemb Der 3,
with an old inhabitant to point out the
salientfeatures of the scenery. ''Now,"
! said, where is Mount Zion?" '.Here
at your right" where is Mount Oil
vet?'' "In front Of where you stand"
Where is the garden of Gethsemane?"
'tIn yonder valley" where is Mount
Calvary?" Before he answered saw It
No unprejudiced mind can have a mo-
ment's doubt as to where it is. Yonder
] see hill in the shape of q human
skull and the Bible says that Calvary
was the ''place of human skull" Not
only is it skull shaped, but just beneath
the forehead of the hill is cavern that
looks like eyeless sockets, Within
the grotto under it is the shape of the
inside Of the skull Then the Bible
says that Christ was crucified outside
the gate, and this is outside the gate,
while the site formerly selected was in
side the gate. Beside that this skull
hill was for ages the place where male
factors were put to death, and Christ
was slain as malefactor. ..rs
The Saviour's assassination took
place beside thoroughfare along which
people went ''wagging their heads and
there is the ancient thoroughfare. I
saw at Cairo. Egypt clay mold Of
that skull hill, made by the late Gem
eral Gordon, the arbiter of nations.
While Empress Helena, eighty years of
age and imposed upon. by having three
crosses exhumed before her dim eyes,
as though they were the three crosses
Of Bible story, selected another site as
Calvary, all recent travellers agree that
the one l point out to you was, without
doubt the scene Of the most terrific and
overwhelming tragedy this planet ever
witnessed.
There were a thousand things we
wanted to see that third Of December.
and our dragoman proposed this and
that and the other journey, but said:
First Of all show us Calvary. Some
thing might happen If we went else
where, and sickness or accident might
hinder our seeing the sacred mount If
we see nothing else we must see that,
and see it this morning" Some of us
in carriage and some of US on mule back,
we were soon on the way to the most
sacred spot that the world has ever seen
or ever will see. Coming to the base OF
the hill we. went inside the skull of
rocks. 1t is called Jeremiah's grotto,
for there the prophet wrote his book Of
lamentations The grotto is thirty-five
feet high, and its top and sides are NAL
achite, green, brown, black, white, red
and gray. .. -r -H.
Coming forth from those pictured sub
terraneous passages we begin to climb
the steep sides of Calvary. As we go
up we see cracks and crevices in the
rocks which think were made by the
convulsions Of nature when Jesus died.
On the hill lay limestone rock, white
but tinged with crimson, the white SO
suggestive Of purity and the crimson of
sacrifice that said: THAT stone would
be beautifully appropriate for a memo
rial wall in my church, now building in
America, and the stone now being
brought on camel's back from Sinai
across the desert when put under it.
how significant Of the law and the Cos
pei! And these lips of stone will con-
tinue to speak of justice and mercy long
after all our living lips have uttered
their last message" So rolled 1t down
the hill and transported it. When that
day comes for which many of you have
dedication Of the Brooklyn
the third immense structure
We have reared in this city, and that
makes it somewhat difficult, being the
third structure. work such as no other
we invite you in the main entrance OF
that building to look upon memorial
wall containing the most suggestive
and solemn and tremendous antiquities
ever brought together; this, rent with
the earthquake at the giving OF the law
at Sinai, the other rent at the cruciflx-
ion at Calvary.
1t is impossible for you to realize
what our emotions were as we gathered,
a group of men and women, all saved by |
the blood Of the Lamb, on a bluff of
just wide enough to- contain
three crosses said to my family and
friends: II think here is where