Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1890-10-18
REV. DR.. TALMAGE..
The Eminent Brooklyn Divines Sun
day Sermon.
subject. "In JerusaIem.'

am OF any Lnlng uuaL applOacneSlu lprecatiOu,
and yet can understand how any one who
has ever been at Jerusalem should in enthu-
siasm of soul cry out whether he be sitting
| by the Euphrates or the Hudson, or the
Thames IF forget thee, o Jerusalem let
my right hand forget her cuuning. You
see it is a city unlike all others for topog-
| raIhy for history, for significance, for style
1 of population, for water works, for ruins,
for towers, for dones, for ramparts, for lit
erature. for tragedies, for memorable birth
I places, for sepulehers, for CONGREGATIONS and
tamines, fof victories and defeats.
/ l am here at last in this very Jerusalem,
4 and on housetop. just after the dawn of
I the morning of December 3, with an old in-
! habitant to point out the salient features of
/ the scenery. Now l said, where is Mount
4 Ziong' Here at your right "''W here isMount
| Olivets" In front of where you stand9
'Where is the Garden of Gethsemane?' '1u
! yonder valley.n Where is Mount Caivaryp
Before he answered | saw it. No unpreju-
diced mind can have moments doubt as
4 to where it is. Yonder ! see a hill in the
/ shape of human skull, and the Bible says
/ that Calvary was the place of skull"
I Not only is it skull shaped, but just bs-
meath the forehead of the hill is a cavern
/ that looks like eyeless sockets. Within
the grotto under it is the shape of the in
side of skull Then the Bible says that
Christ was crucified outside the gate, and
erly selected was inside the gate. Besides
( that this skull hill was for ages the place
where malefactors were put to death, and
( Christ was slain as maefactor.
+ The Saviour's assassination took place be-
side thoroughfare along which people went
'waggiDg their heads" and there is the an
! Gent tho. oughfare / saw at Cairo, Egypt.
( a clay mould of that skull hill, made by the
late General 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 point out to
/ you was without doubt the scene of the most
terrific and overwhelming tragedy this
planet ever witnessed.
4 There were thousand things we wanted
to see that third day of December, and our
dragoman proposed this and that and the
other journey, but l said: First of all show
us Calvary. Something might happen if we
went elsewhere 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 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 first 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 side are malachite,
green, brown, black, white, red and gray.
Coming forth from those pictured subter-
raneous passages we begin to climb the steep
sides of Calvary. As we 90 up we see cracks
and crevices in the rocks, which l think were
made by the commissions 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 sac
rifice that said, That stone would be beau
tifully appropriate for a memorial wall in
my church. now building in America; and
the stone now being brought on camefS back
from Sinai across the desert, when put under
it, how significant of the law and the gospel
And these lips of stone will continue to speak
of justice and mercy long after all our living
bps have uttered their last message"
So | rolled it down the hill and trans
ported it. When that day comes 1or which
many of you have prayed-the dedication
of the Brooklyn Tabernacle, the third i'm
mense structure We have reared in this
city, and that makes it somewhat difficult,
being the third structure, a work such as
no other church was ever called on to I'M
dertake-we invite you in the main en-
trance OF that building to look upon a me-
mortal wall containing the most suggest
i've and solemn and tremendous antiquities
ever brought together-this, rent with the
earthquake at the giving of the law at
Eina', the other reLt at the crucifixion on
Calvary.
1t is impossible for you to realize what
our emotions were as we gathered group
OF men and women. all saved by the blood
of the Lamb, on a bluff of Cavalry, just
wide enough to contain three crosses. |
said to my family and friends: Il think
here is where stood the cross Of the impeni-
tent burglar, and there the cross of the
miscreant. and here between, think, stood
oil r. ~
As | opened the nineteenth chapter of John
to reGd chill blast struck the hill and a
Cloud lowered, the natural solemnity i'm
pressing the spiritual solemnity. I read
little, but broke down. | defy any emo
tional Christian man sitting upon Col
GOTTA to read aloudand with unbroken voice,
or with any voice at all, the whole of that
account in Luke and John, of which these
sentences are fragment: "They took Jesus
and led Him away and He, bearing His cross,
went forth into place called the place of a
skull, where they crucified Him and two 9th
ers with Him, on either side one, and Jesus
in the midst" Behold thy motherP' Il
thirst" This day shalt thou be with Me i'll
I Paradise" Father, forgive them, they know
not what they do;' ''If it be possible, let this
rup pass from Me- What signs, what sobs,
What tears. what tempests of sorrow, what
yurging oceans of agony in those utterances!
While We sat there the whole scene came
before us. Ali around the TOP and the sides
and the foot of the hill mob ragged. They
enash their teeth and shake their clinched
fists at Him. Here the cavalry horses champ
their bits and paw the earth and snort at the
smell of the carnage. Yonder a group of
gamblers are pitching up as to who shall have
the coat OF the dying Saviour. There are
women almost dead with grief among the
crowd-His mother and His aunt, and some
whose sorrows He had pardoned. Here a
man dips sponge into sour wine, and by
stick lifts it to the hot and cracked lips.
The hemorrhageo of the five wounds has done
its work.
The atmospheric conditions are such as the
the world saw never before or since. 1t was
not solar eclipse, such as astronomers
record or we ourselves have seen. 1t was q
bereavement of the heavensi Darkerl until
the towers of the temple were no longer visi-
bic. Darker! until the surrounding hills dis
appeared. DarkerI until the inscription
above the middle cross becomes illegible.
Darker until the chin of the dying Lord falls
upon the breast and He sighed with this last
sigh the words ut is flnishedm
As we sat there silence took possession of
us, and we thought, this is the centre from
which continents have been touched, and all
the world shall yet be moved. Toward this
bill the prophets pointed forward. Toward
this hill the apostles and martyrs pointed
backward. To this all heaven pointed down
ward. To this with foaming excavations
perdition pointed upward. Round it circles
all history. ali time, all eternity, and with
this scene painters have covered the might
lest canvas, and sculptors cut the richest
marble, and orchestras rolled their grandest
oratorios and churches lifted their greatest
doxologies and heaven built its highest
thrones.
Unable longer to endure the pressure of
this scene we moved on and into a garden Of
olives, garden which in the right season is
full OF flowers, and here is the reputei toni
OF Chrlst. You know the Book says In the
niasV OF the garden was q sepulchreo
thlnk this was the garden and this til,
-sepuichre. 1t is shattered, OF course. Abou
four steps down we went into this whicl
seemed family tomb. There is room in 4
Tor about five bodies. We measured it and
found 1t about eight feet high and nine feel
woe ana fourteen fest lcng. The CRYPT
where think our Lord slept was seven fee.
long. think that there once lay the King
wrapped in His last slumber. On some OF
these rocks the Roman government set its
seal. Atthe gate of this mausoleum on the
on the nrst Easter morning the angels rolled
the stone laundering down the hill Uo thes
steps walked the laceratei feet OF the Con
queror, and from these heights He looked of
upon the city that hal cast Him oat and
Upon the world He had come to redeem an
at the heavens through which He would soon
ascend.
But we must hasten back to the CITY.
There are stones in the wall which Solonon
had lifted. Stop here and see a startlinT
proof OF the truth Of the prophecy. II
Jeremiah, thirtY-first chapsr aud fortiath
verse it is said that Jerusalem snail b. bniit
through the ashes. What ashes. peo),s bays
been asking. Were those ashes put into tas
prophecy to ill up? MOI Tue meaning has