Fort Worth daily gazette. (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1882-1891, 1890-03-17
An Eloquent SermOn--pr. Tai
mage on the Treatment
of Parents.
The Many Hardships Encountered by
Father and Mother In Your
Rearing Illustrated.
DIsagreeable Old Folks and Dlsagreeable
Young Folks all Treated Of by the
Great rooklyn Divine
Snecis1 10 the Gazette.

bkOOhLtNs ~ . l1uA IL ~ Inv ~
lowing sermon was preached this morn
ing by DR.. Talmage in the Academy of
Music, in which his church is worshIpping
during the rebuilding of the Brooklyn
tabernacle, and which will continue to be
% occupied until that edifice is COM
pleted. After expounding chapter de-
scribiug Absalom s carriage toward his
father, David, and the singing of an
appropriate hymn, DR.. Talmage an
nounced as his text the words, ga tool
ish son is the heaviness of his mother. "
Proverbs X, /. He said:
Ali parents want their children to turn
out well. However poorly father and
mother may have done themselves, they
want their sons and daughters TO do
splendidly. Up to forty years of age
parents may have ambitions for them
selves, after that their chief ambitions
are for their children. Some Of the old
time names indicate this The name of
Abner means &" his father s lamp The
name Abigail means ''her father s
Joy. - And what parental light was
Solomon to David, and Samuel TO Han
nah, and Joseph to Jacob! And the best
earthly staff that father has TO lean on
is q good son, and the strongest arm
mother has to help her down the steep of
years is that of grateful child. But
it is not a rare thing TO find people I'M
1ilial, and often the parents are them
selves TO blame. Aged persons some
times become querulous and snappy, and
children have their hands full with the
old fotks RafOpa enfari0p nrOfns-
sion was for three months what is called
cOlporteur. Que day in the country
districts I stopped at the house of good,
intelligent, genial farmer. The hospital
itv Of such a country house is especially
pleasing to me, for l was born in the
country. This farmer and his wife were
hardwOTking people, but tried to make
their home agreeable and attractive. The
farmers father. about sixty-tlve years
OF age, and his grandfather, about
ninety, were yet alive and with him.
Indeed, there were
FOUR GENERATIONS IN THE HOUSE,
for the farmer had little children playing
about the room. We gathered at the
dining table. After the blessing was
asked the farmer put some of the meat
upon his plate and courteously passed it
to me, when his father of sixty-five years
years of age cried out to his son, who
was at least thirtY-five years Of age:
'Why do you not pass the meat as you
always do, and let us take it off the plate
ourselves? You are trying to show of
because you have company - Mean
while his grandfather OF ninety sat with
his hat on at the table, his face unclean,
and his apparel untidy. Still the farmer
kept his patience and equipOise, and l
never think of him without admiration.
He must have had more grace than I
ever had.
Because people are old they have no
right 10 be either uugentlemanly or uu-
canny. They are old people so disagree
able that they have nearly broken up
some homes. The young married man
with whom the aged one lives stands it be-
cause he has been used TO it all his life,
but the young wife, coming from another
household can hardly endure it, and
sometimes almost cries her eyes out.
And when the children gather in the
house, they are afraid of the venerable
patriarch, who has forgotten that he
was ever a child himself, and cannot
understand why children should ever
want 10 play "hIde and seek - or roll
hoop, or fly kite, and he becomes impa-
tient at the sound from the nursery, and
shouts with an expenditure of voice that
keeps him coughing fifteen minutes
afterwards, Boys stop that racket!''
as though any boy that ever amounted TO
anything in the world did not begin life
by making a racket!
Indeed, there are children who owe
nothing to their parents, for those par
ents have been profigates. My lamented
friend, good and Christian and lovely
Henry Wilson, ice-presIdent of the
United States, in early life changed his
name. Henry Wilson was not his
original name. He droDped his fathers
name because that father was drunk
ard and a disgrace, and the son did not
feel called upon TO carry such a carcass
all his life. While children must always
be dutiful, l sympathize with all young
people who have disagreeable or unprIn-
cipled old folks around the house. Some
of US, drawing out of our memories,
know that il is possible, after sixty or
seventy or eighty or ninety years of age,
for the old TO be kind and genial; and
the grandest adornment Of 8 home is an
aged father and an aged mother, If the
process of years has mellowed them. Be-
sides that, if your old parents are hard
to get along with now, you must remem-
Der there was a time when they had hard
work
TO GET ALONG WITH YOU.
When you were about FIVE or seven or
ten or twelve years OF age what time
they had with you! If they had kept
written account of your early pranks and
misdoings it would make whole vol
ume. That time when you gave your
little sister clip; that tins when you
explored the depth of a jar of sweet
things for which you had no permission;
that havoc you one day made with your
jack knife; that plucking from the Or
chard OF unripe fruit; that day when,
instead of being at school, as your |
parents supposed, you went a-fshing;
and many time did you imperil your
young life in places where you had no
business to climb or swim or venture.
To get you through your first fifteen
years with your life and your good |
morals was fearful draft upon parental |
fidelity and endurance. Indeed, il may !
be that much of this preseut Dhysical |