The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1890-11-06
THELAND JORDAN
Or. Talmage Dilates Upon the
River Jordan and the
Dead Sea.
Another Panoramic View of
What he Saw in the
Holy Land.


text. Psalm civ, 80: HE toucheth the
4 hills and they smoke. He said:
q David. the poet, here pictures volcano
4 and what Church's Cotopaxi does on paint
er's canvass, this author does in words. You
! zee a hill, ca:m and still, and for ages i'm
/ movable, but the Lord out of the heavens
shats His finger on the top of it and from it
srise thick vapors, intershot with fire. "He
sIeoucheth the hills and they smoke
God is the only being who can manage
q volcano and again and again has he EN-
gpluyed volcanic action. The pictures on the
Swaiis of Pompeii, the exhumcd Italian city,
as We saw them last November, demonstrate
\ that che city was not fit to live. In the first
century. that city engirdled with palaces,
Sempardised with gardens, pillared into
8Earchitectural exquisiteness, was ut the foot
soi mountain up the side OF which it ran
with vineyards and villas of mercha
princes, and all that MARBLE and bronze.
land imperial baths and arboriculture, and
3lTalnbowed fountains. and coliseum ut the
dedication of which 5000 beasts had been
Y slain. ard supernal landscape in which
4 the shore gave,roses to the sea and the seq
slGave crystals to the shore; yea, all TINT
y beauty, and pomp, and wealth could give.
II was there to be seen or heard But the bad
Il III Lue city nuQ shocked the WOflO.
4 In tie year 10; on the 4th of August. q
II black column arose aboye the adjoining
4 mountain and spread out Plny says, as
4 he saw 1T. like a great pine tree. wider and
4 wider. until it began to rain upon the city.
\! first thin ashes and then pumice stone. and
\ lSulphurous streams scOoped, and streams
sf'of mud poured through the streets till few
4 people escaped and the city. was buried, and
5f.some Of the inhabitants 1 800 years alter
4 were found embalmed in the scoria of that
\ awful doom. The Lord called upon yolcan-
v ic forces to ohliterate that prodigate city.
He touched the hills and they smoked.
4 Nothing but volcanic action can explain
j what shall show you at the Dead Sea upon
4 which looked last December, and of whose
s waters l took Il bitter and singing taste.
8Concerning all that region there has been a
II controversy enough to fill libraries, science
A saying one thing. revelation saying another
4 thing. But admit volcanic action diyinely
4 employed and both testimonies are one and
the same. Geology, chemistry. geography,
astronomy. ichthyology, ornithology and
II zoology are coming one by one to confirm
a the scriptures. Two leaves of one book are
1 revelation and crea ton, and the penman-
Il ship is by the same divine hand. Our horse
n back ride will not be so steep to-day and you
can stay on without clinginG to the pommel
of the saddle, but the scenes amid which we
ride shall, if possible, be more thrilling, and
by the time the horses snuff the sulphu rous
Sea, we shall be ready t. lismount and read
i from our Bibles about what was done that
day by the Lord when He touched the hills
Il and they smoked.
Take IL detour and pass along by the rocky
4 fortress OF Masada, where occurred some
thing more wonderful in the way of desper-
alton than you have ever heard Of unless
you have ever heard of that. Herod built
palace amid these heaps of black and awful
rocks which look like u tumbled might. A
d % :, fprh1 oil,
including their families, afterward held the
/ fortress. When the Roman army stormed
4 that steep and the bandits could no longer
hold the place, the chic. tain, Eleazar, made
1 a powerful speech which persuaded them to
A die be ore they were captured. First the men
Il kissed their families u loving and fearful
4 good bye and then put dagger into their
hearts and the women and children were
slain. Then ten men were chosen by lot to
STAY all the other men, and each man lay
\ down by the dead wife and children and
/ waited for these. executioners to do their
4 work. This done. one man Of the ten killed
the othernlne. Then the survivor committed
suicide. Two women and Eve children had
hid themselves and after all was over, came
forth to te OF the nine hundred and sixty
slaughtered. Great and rugged natural
\ scenery makes the most tremendous natures
] Tor good or evil. Great statesmen and great
robbers, great orators and great butchers
were nearly all born or reared among noun.
tain precipices. Strong natures are hardly
ever born upon the plain. When men have
anything greatly good or greatly evil to do,
they come down Off the rocks.
Pass on from under the shadow ofMasada
the scene OF concentrated diabolsm, and
4 come along where the salt crystals crackle
under the horses hoofs. You are near the
most Godtorsaken region Of alfthe earth
lou to whom the word lake hos hereto ore
suggested those bewitchments of beauty,
Luzerne or Cayuga, some great pearl set by
loving God III the bosom of the luxuriant
+ valley, change all your ideas about lake
and see this sheet Of water which the Bible
calls the Salt Sea or Sea Of the Plain, and
Josephus calls Lake Asphaltites. The mule
teers will take care of the horses while we
go down to the brink and dip up the LIQUID
mixture in the palm of the hand. The wa
tiers are u commingling OF birthstone and
pitch, and have six times larger percentage
I OF salt than those of the Atlantic ocean, the
ocean having per cent. Of salt, and this lake
26A per cent Lake Siri-kol O India is the
highest lake in the world. This lake, on the
banks OF which we ,kneel, il the lowest lake
1t emptles into no sea, among other things,
Tor the simple reason that water cannot run
uphill. 1t swallows up the river J Jordan.
and makes no response Of thanks, and never
reports what it does with 20.O OO 900 cubic
feet Of water annually received from that
sacred river. 1t takes the tree branches and
logs foated into it by the Jordan and
pitches them on the banks OF bitumen to de-
cay there.
The hot springs near its banks, by the
name of Calirlloe, where King Hprod came
to battle off his illness, no sooner pour into
this sen than they are poisoned. Not a fish
scale swms it. Not mn insect walks it. 1t
hates life. and if.you attempt to swim there
it lifts you by an unnatural buoyancy to the
surface. as much as to say, I'VE want no
life here, but deaf TIL is our preference, DEATH
Those who attempt to wade into this lake,
and submerge themselves. come out almost
maddened, as with the sting oi hundred
wasps and hornets, and with lips and eyelids
swollen with the strange ablution. The
sparkle Of it's waters is not like the sparkle
of beauty on other lakes, but metallic lus-
tire like unto the flash of sword that would
thrust you. The gnzelles and the ibexes
that live on the hills beside it, and the cranes
and the wild ducks that fly across-for, con-
trary to the old belief, birds do safely wing
their way over it-and the Arab horses you
have been riding. though thirsty enough,
will not drink of this dreadful mixture. A
mist hoyers over parts OF it almost continu-
ally. which, though natural evaporation,
seems like a wing of doom spread over iq-
uid desolation. 1t is the rnsings OF abom.
nation. 1t is an aqueous monster cooled
among the hills, or creeping ripples. and
stenchful with nauseating nalodors
In IONS n,,nn a&o r.