Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-03-31
DR.. Talmage's Discourse in the
Brooklyn Academy of Music.
ga Dead Lion" is His Subject, "a Liy-
ing Dog is Better Than Dead
Lion" is His Text.
People Of Great Capacity Doing Nothing to
Improve Society, to Overthrow Evil or
For the Salvation Of Souls.
specisl to the Gazette.

standing room in the Academy of Music
this morning when the service COM
menced, the ordinary Tabernacle con-
gregation being increased by throngs of
people eager to listen 20 the eloquent
preacher. The service opened with the
singing of the long meter doxology by
the immense. audience. DR.. Talmage's
subject was "A Dead Lion, and his text,
Ecolesiastes tx, 4, GA living dog is bet
ter than a dead lion. - Following is a
verbatim report Of the sermon:
The Bible is the strangest, the love-
Iiest, the mIghtest, the weirdest, the
best of books. Written by Moses the
lawyer, Joshua the soldier, Samuel the
judge, Ezra the builder, Job the poet,
David the shepherd, Daniel the prime
minister, Amos the herdsman, Matthew
the custom house officer, Luke the doc
tor, Paul the scholar, John the exile;
and yet complete harmony from the
middle verse of the Bible, which is the
eighth verse OF the lI7th psalm, both
ways to the upper and lower lids, and
from the shortest passage, which is the
thirty fifth verse of the eleventh chapter
of John, to the longest verse, which
is the ninth verse Of the eighth chapter
of Esther, and yet not an 1mperfection in
all the 773, 693 words which it is
composed of. 1t not only reaches over
the past, but over the future; has in il
ferry boat, as in second Samuel; and a
telegraphio wire, as in JOB; and rail-
road train, as In Nahum; and introduces
US to a foundryman by the name OF Tutal
Cain, and ship builder by the name of
Noah, and an architect by the name Of
AhoIiab, and tells us how many stables
Solomon had to take care of his horses,
and how much he paid for those horses.
But few things in this versatile and COM
prehensiYe book interests me so much as
its apothegms, those short, terse, sem
tentlous, epigrammatic sayings, of which
my text Is one living dog is better
than a dead lion. -
Here the lion stands for nobility, and
the dog for meanness. You must know
that the dog mentioned in the text is not
one of our American OF European OF Scot
fish dogs that, in our mind, is a syno-
nvn for the beautiful, the graceful, the
affectionate, the sagacious, and the true.
The St. Bernard dog is a hero, and if
you doubt it, ask the SHOWS ofthe Alps,
out of which he picked the exhausted
traveller. The shepherd dog Is poem,
and if you doubt it, ask the highlands of
Scotland. The Arctic dog is the rescue
of explorers, and if you doubt it, ask
DR.. Kane's expedition. The watch dog
is a living protection, and if you doubt
it, ask
TEN THOUSAND HoMEsTEADs
over whose safety be watched last night.
But Solomon, the author of my text,
lived In Jerusalem, and the dog he speaks
Of in the text was dog
In Jerusalem. Last De-
cember passed days and nights within a
stones throw of where Solomon wrote
this text, and from what saw Of the ca
mines of Jerusalem by day, and heard of
them by night. can understand the
slight appreciation my text puts upon the
dog of Palestine. 1t is lean and snaTly
and disgusting, and afflicted with para
sites, and takes revenge on the human
race by filing the nights with clamOr.
All up and down the Bible, the most of
which was written in Palestine or Syria,
or contiguous lands, the dog is used in
contemptuous comparison. Hazael said,
lis thy servant dog that he should do
ro-Ph0nician woman said, "Even the
dogs eat of the crumbs which fall from
the Master 8 table. Paul saws, in Phil
ippians, beware of dogs, - and st.
John, speaking of heaven, says, with
out are dogs.
On the other hand the lion is healthy,
strong, and loud voiced, and ct its roar
the forests echo and the mountains trem-
bic, 1t is marvellous for strength, and
when its hide is removed the muscular
compsctneSs is something wonderful,
and the knife of the dissector bounds
back from the tendons. By the clearing
off of the forests of Palestine and the
use Of firearms, of which the lion is par
ticElarly afraid, they have disappeared
from places where once they ranged, but
they were very bold in olden times. They
attacked an army of Xerxes while march
ing through Macedonia. They were so
numerous that 1000 lions were slain in
forty years in the amphitheatre of Rome.
The Barbary lion, the Cape lion, the
Senegal lion, Assyrian lion, make up
most absorbing and exciting chapter in
natural history. As most of the
Bible was written in regions lion
haunted, this creature appears
In almost ali parts of the Bible as
simile. David understood its habits of
night proving ana DAY eiumDerlngs as IS
seen from his description: ''The young
lions roar after their prey and seek their
meat from God. The sun ariseth. they
gather themselves together and lay them
down in their dens.' And again he
cries out, "'My soul is among lions. -
Moses knew them and said, ''Judah is
yocuched like lion. Samson knew
them, for be took
HONEY FROM THE CARCASS OF A SLAIN
LION.
Solomon knew them and says, "The
kings wrath is as the roar of lion, -
and again, 1.-THE slothfrI man says,
There is lion in the way Isaiah
knew them, and says, in the millennium,
1.-The lion shall eat straw like an OK -
Ezekiel knew them, aud says, 1.-THE
third was as the face of lion.' Paul
knew them, and says: 81 wss delivered
out of the mouth of the lion.'' Peter
knew them and says, 1.-THE devil as a
roaring lion walkeLh about. - ST. John
knew them, and says of Christ, ''Behold