The Manning times. [volume] (Manning, Clarendon County, S.C.) 1884-current, 1890-11-26
AMONG THE BED0UINS.
DR.. TALMAGE breaches HIS EIGHTH
SERMON ON PALESTINE.

DR.. TALMAGE breaches HIS EIGHTH
SERMON ON PALESTINE.
Night After Night In Tent In Pales-
tine-A Fanou. Well In History. from
Drawn.
BROOKLYN. Nov. 16-The following
is DR.. Talmage's Eighth Sermon on his
visit to Palestine. His subject was
Among the Bedouins," and his text,
Numbers x.31: "Forasmuch as thou
knowest how We are to encampin the
wilderness"
Night after night we have slept in
tent in Palestine. There are large vii
lagos of Bedouins without a house. and
for three thousand years the people OF
those places have lived in black tents,
made out Of dyed skins, and when the
winds and storms wore out and tore
loose those coverings, others Of the
same kind took their places. Noah
lived in a tent. Abraham in a tent,
Jacob pitched his tent on the noun
tain. Isaac pitched his tent in the
valley. Lot pitched his test toward
Sodom. In tent the woman Jael
nailed Sisera, the general, to the
ground, first having given him sour
milk called "leben" as q soporific to
make him soundly sleep, that being the
effect Of such nutrition, as modern
travellers can TESTIFY. The Syrian
army in a tent. The ancient battle
shouts was ITO your tents, 0 Israeli
Paul was tent-maker. Indeed,
Isaiah, magnifcently poetic, indicates
that III the human race live under a
blue tent when he says that God
'stretheth out the heavens as a curtain
and spreadeth them out as a tent to
dwell in," and Hezekiah compares
death to the striking of a tent, saying.
my age is removed from me as a
shepherds tent"
Nothing surprised me so much as
the persistence Of everything. a sheep
or horse falls dead and. though the sky
may one minute before be clear of all
wings, in FIVE minutes after the skies
are black With eagles cawing, scream
ing, plunging. fighting for room, con-
tending for largest morSels OF the ex-
tinct 0uadruped. All, now I under
stand the force of Christ's illustration
when he said: "Wheresoever the car
cass Is there will the eagles be gathered
together" The longevity Of these
eagles is wonderful. They live fifty or
sixty and sometimes 100 years. All,
that explains what David meant when
he Thy youth is renewed like the
eagles" I say a shepherd with the
folds Of his coat far bent outward and
I wondered what was contained in
that amplitude of apparel and I said to
the drago,nan: what has that shep-
herd got under his coat?" And the
dragoman said: at is g very young
lamb he is carrying, it is too young and
too weak and too cold to keep up with
the flock" At that moment | saw the
lamb put its head out from the shep-
herds bosom and said, There it is
now, Isaiah's description of the ten
derness OF God-sHe shall gather the
lambs with His arm and carry them IN
His bosom"
But here we found ourselves at
Inooh,s rb.ll, the famous weil- IN his
tory, most distinguished for two
things, because it belonged to the old
patriarch after whom it was named,
and for the wonderful things which
Christ said, seated on this we'll curb, to
the Samaritan woman. We dismount
from our horses in driZZling rain, and
our dragoman climbing up to the we'll
over slippery stones, stumbles and
frightens US all by nearly fulling into
it. measured the well at the top and
found it six feet from edge to edge
Some grass and weeds and thorny
arowths oYerhang it. In one place the
roof is broken through. Large stones
embank the wall on all sides. Our
dragcman took pebbles and dropped
them in, and from the time they left
his hand to the instant they clicked on
the bottom you could hear it was deep,
though not as deep as once, for every
day travellers are applying the same
test, and though in the time of Maun-
drell, the traveller, the we'll was d
hundred and sixty-hye feet deep, now it
is only seventy-tive. So great is the
curiosity of the world to know about
that well, that during the dry season a
Captain Anderson descended into this
well, at one place the sides 50 close he
had to put his hands over his head in
order TO get through and then he
tainted away, and lay at the bottom of
the well as though dead, until hours
after recovery, he came to the surface.
1t is not like other wells digged down
to fountain that 6llS it. but res
ervoir to catch the falling rains and to
that Christ refers when speaking to the
SarNorifAn ohn1rf SnIrIfnal
supply, he said that he would, if asked,
have given her living water" that is,
water from flowing spring in dis
tinction from the water of that well
which was rain water. But why did
Jacob make 8 reservoir there when
there is plenty of water all around and
abundance OF springs and fountains
and seemingly no need Of that reser-
voir? Why did Jacob go to the vast
expense OF boring and digging z well
perhaps two hundred feet deep as first
completed, when, by going little Way
off be could have water from other
fountains at little or no expense. All,
Jacob was wise. He wanted his own
well. Quarrels and wars might arise
with other tribes and the supply of
water might be cut off, 80 the shorels
and pick-axes and boring instruments
were ordered and the well OF nearly
four thousand years ago was sunk
through the solid rock.
When Jacob thus wisely insisted on
having his own well he taught US not
to DO unnecessarily dependent on
others. Independence Of business
character. Independence of moral
character. Independence of religious
character. Have your own well Of
grace, your own we'll Of courage, your
own well Of divine supply. If you are
an invalid you have a right to be de-
pendent on others. But if God has
given you good health, common sense,
and two eyes. and two ears, and two
hands, and two feet. He equipped you
for independence of all the universe
except Himself. If He had meant you