The Iola register. [volume] (Iola, Allen County, Kansas) 1875-1902, 1890-04-11
THE DEAD LION.
Dr.. Talmage breaches From an
Unusual Text.
The Bible Strange But Entirely Consist.
ent Book-The World Full OF Dead
Lions-ApplIcation of the Text
to Worldly Affairs.

"a Dead Lion" and his text, Eccles il.
4: "A living dog is better than dead
lion" Following is the sermon:
The Bible is the strangest. the low
lest. the mightiest 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, Mathew
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
psalm cvxii, 8, both ways to the upper
and lower lids. and the shortest passage,
which is John ri, S5, to the longest
verse, which is Esther. viii, Q, and yet
not an imperfection in all the 713, 693
words which it is composed Of. 1t not
only reaches over the past but over the
future; has in it ferry boat as in Sam
uel III, and telegraphic wire as in Job;
and a railroad train, as in Nahum; and
introduces to US a foundryman by the
name of Tubal Cain, and shipbuilder
by the name of Noah, and an architect
by the name of Aholiab. and tells US
how many stables Solomon had to take
care of his horses, and how he paid for
those horses. But few things in this
versatile and comprehensive book in
terests me so much as its apothegms,
those short, terse, sententious, epigram-
matte sayings, of which my text is one:
"A living dog is better than 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. or European
or Scottish dogs that in our mind is
synonym for the beautiful. the graceful,
the affectionate, the sagacious and the
true. The st. Bernard dog is hero,
and if you doubt it ask the SHOWS of the
lips, out OF which he picked the ex-
hausted traveller. The shepherd dog is
a poem, and if you doubt it ask the high
lands of Scotland. The Arctic dog is
the rescue of explorers. and if you doubt
it ask DR.. kane's expedition. The watch
deg is living protection, and If you
doubt it ask ten thousand homesteads
over whose safety he watched last night.
But Solomon, the author of my text,
lived in Jerusalem, and the dog he
speaks of in the text was a dog in Je-
rusalem. Last December passed days
and nights within stones throw of
where Solomon wrote his text, and from
what saw of the CANNES 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 snarly and disgusting. and
afflicted with parasites, and takes revenge
on the human race by filling 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 COM
parison. Hazael said: rs thy servant
dog that he should do this thing?" In
self-abnegation the Syro-Phenician
woman said: Even the dogs eat Of the
crumbs which fall from the masters
table" Paul says. in Philippians: BE
ware of dogs" and st. John, speaking
of Heaven. says: without are dogs"
On the other hand the lion is healthy,
stong and loud voiced, and at its roar
the forests echo and the mountains
tremble. 1t is marvellous for strength
and when its hide is removed the mus
cular compactness is something wonder
full and the knife of the dissector bounds
back from the tendons. By the clearing
off of the forest of Palestine aud the use
Of firearms, of which the lion is particu-
larly afraid, they have disappeared from
places where once they ranged, but they
IL IL
attacked an army of Xerxes while
marching through Macedonia They
were so numerous that 1000 lions were
slain in forty years in the amphitheater
of Rome.
AS most of the Bible was written in
regions Gon-haunted, this creature APP
pears in almost all parts of the Bible as
a smile David understood it's habits
of night proving and day slumbering,
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 togeth-
er, and lay them down in their dens."
And. again he cries out: my soul is
among lions" Moses knew them and
said: Judah is couched like lion"
Samson knew them, for he took honey
from the carcass OF slain lion. Solo
mon knew them and says: THE Kings
wrath is as the roar of a lion," and
again: 1.-The slothful man says, there
is lion in the way" Isaiah knew
them, and says in the millennium, THE
lion shall eat straw like an OK" Ezekiel
knew them, and says: THE third was
as the face Of lion" Paul knew them,
and says: II was delivered out of the
mouth of the lion" Peter knew them
and says: THE devil as a roaring lion
walketh about" St John knew them,
and says CT Christ: Behold the Lion Of
the tribe IF JUDAH
Now, what does my text mean when it
puts living dog and dead lion side by
side and gays the former is better than
the latter? 1t means that small facul-
ties actively used are of more value than
great faculties unemployed How often
you see it, Some man of limited capac-
ity vastly useful. He takes that which
God has given him and says: my men,
tai endowment is not large and the world
would not rate me high for my intelli-
gence, and my vocabulary is limited,
and my education was defective, but
here goes what have for God and saliva
ton and the making of the world good
and happy" He puts in word here
and q word there, encourages faint
hearted man. gives Scripture passage
in consolation to some bereft woman,
picks up child fallen in the street and
helps him brush of the dust and puts a
fve-cent piece in his hand, telling him
not to cry. so that the boy is singing be-
fore he gets around the corner; waiting
on everybody that has letter to carry