The Forrest City times., 1890-12-20
CEDARS OF LEBANON
UR TALAAGE TALKS ABOUT MEN
 AND TREES

etruCt1On Oi SOIOmou's Temple FuI-
 " Described.--Manyo Of the Trec's
 Characterists Similar to Thvse ot
 the Christian.--An EMbicM of the
 Saviour.
 BROOKLYN, N. r., Dec. IL. ls90.-To- day Dr. Talmage preached another sermon of h.s series on Palestine aud the a,sc.n- ing countries, After delivering it in tho morning in the Academy of Music in this rity, he preached it again in the evening in New York. Text--Psalm lo4, l6: "rhe cedars of Lebanon which he hath planted.S In our journey we change stirrup Tor wheel. It IS four o'clock in tue morning, at Damascus, Syria, and WIG arc among the lanterns Of the hostelry waiting for the stage to start. A Mohommedan in high life is putting his three wives on board within an apartment by themselves. and cur party occupy the main apartment of ono of the most uncomfortable vehicles in which mortals were ever damned and half strangulated. But we must not let the discomforts annul or disparaee the oppor- tunitics. We are rolling on and out and up the mountains of Lebanon, their fore head under a crown Of snow, which coro- net the fingers of the hottest summer can not cast down. We are ascending heights around which is garlanded much of the finest pocsy of the Scriptures, and arc rising toward the migbtiest dominion that botany ever recognized. reigned over by the most imperial tree that ever swayod a Ieafy sceptre--the Lebanon cedar; tree euloSized in my text as having grown from nut put into the ground by God himself, and no human hand had anything to do with its planting; ''The trees of Lebanon which he hath planted"
 The average height of this mountain is seven thousand feet, but in one place, 1t itftsits head to an altitude of ten thousand. No higher than six thousand feet can vegc- 'atiop exist but below that line at the right season, arc vineyards and orchards, and olive groves, and flowers that dash the mountain side with a very carnage of color, i'll the air with aromatics that Hosea, the prophet, and Solomon, the king. celebrated as ''the smell of Lebanon" At height of six thousand feet is a grove of cedars, the oaiy descendants of those vast forests from which Solomon cut his timber for the tenn pie of Jerusalem, and where at one time there were one hundred thousand axemen hewing out the beams from which great SiticS Ntlt bub iulS uttit1 of trees has by human iconoclasm been rnassacred until only small group is left. This race of giants is nearly extinct, but have no doubt that some of these were here when Hiram. King of Tyre, ordered tho assassination of those cedars of Lebanon which the Lord planted. From the multi. tude of uses to which it may be put and the employment of it in the Scriptures, the rss1ar a hp diyipa foxrp fa h., plains to be seen from the window of this stage in which VIC ride today are parched under summer heats, and not grass-blade survives the fervidity, this tree stands in lssariance defying the summer sun. And W. Sn the storms of winter terrify the earth and hurl tho rocks in avalanche down the mountain side, this tree grapples the hurri- cane of snow in triumph, and leaves the spent fury at its feet. From sixty to eighty feet high arc they, the horizontal branches ot great sweep, with their burden of leaves needle-shaped the topof the tree pyramidal, throne of foliage on which might, and
 spiendor, and glory sit. But 30 continuous ly has tho extermination of trees gone on,
 that for the most part the mountains oi Lebanon arc bare of foliage, while an sorry to say, the eartc in all lands is being likewise denuded.
 The axe is staying the forests all round the earth. To stop the slaughter God opened tho coal mines of England, and Scotland, and America, and the world practically saying by that: Here IS fuel. as far as possible let my trees alone.n And by opening for the human race the great quarries of granite, and showing tho human family how to make brick. God is prncti- cally saying: ''Here is building material let my trees alone"
 One of the Lebanon cedar was examined by scientist, and from its concentrio cir cles, it was found to be thirty-fve hundred years old and still standing, and there is such a thing as everlasting strength, and such a stanchness of Chris nan character that all time and all eternity instead of being its demolition shall be its opportunity. Not such arc those vacillatine Christians who arc so pous on Sunday that they have no religion left for the week day. As tho anaconda gorges itself with food, and then seems for a long while to lie thoroughly insensible, So there arc men who will on Sunday get such religious surfeit that the rest of the week they seem thoroughly dead to all religious emotion. They weep in church under charity sen mon, but if on Monday a subject of wan, s safety will depend entirely on quick limbs and an unobstructed stairway. 1t takes all the grace they can get to keep them from committing assault aud battery on those !ntruders who come with pale faces and stories of distress and subscription papers. The reason that God planted these codars in the bible was to suggest to us that we ought, in our religious char acter, to be deep like the cedar, high like the cedar, broad-branched as the cedar. A traveller measured the spread of the boughs of one of these trees and found if one hundred and eleven feet from branch tip 10 branch tip, and have seen cedars of Christian character that through their ! prayers and charities put out one branch to the utscrmost parts of America, and an- other branch to the uttermost parts of Asia. and these wide -branchcd Christians | will keep on multiplying until all the | earth is ovcrshadowed with mercy |
 But mark you. these cesiars of Lebanon | could not grow If planted in mild climates | and in soft air and in carefully watercd | gardens, They must have the gymnasium | of the midwinter hurricane to develop their { arms Tacy must play the athlete with a | thousand winters before their feet ars 1 rightly planted, and their forcheads rightly | lifted, and their arms rightly muscled. And | II there be any other way for developing I strong Christian character except by storms | Of trouble l never heard of it. Call the | roll Of martyrs, call tho roll of the prophets, call the roll of the apostles. and see which | of them had an easy time of it. Which of | these eedars grew in the warm valley? | Not ono of them. iioneysuclSles thrive | bcst on the south sidc of the house, but cedars In q Syrian whirlwind Men and | women who hear this or read this. instold | of your grumbling because you have it hard l thank God that you are in just the best | school for making heroes and heroincs. It | IS true both for this world and the next f Rock that baby in a crafile cushioned a.d I sanoEaed; graduate him from that into a | costly high chair and give him gold | spoon; send him to school wrapped in furs | enough for an arctic explorer; send him l through college where ho win not have to | study in order to get a diploma, because | ais father is rich; start him in profession where hc begins with an oflioe the floor |