The Russellville Democrat., 1890-12-25
oEDARs OF LEBANON.
Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage's Holy
 Land Series Continued.
A Journey from Damascus Up the Rugged sides of the Snow-Capped Mountains Of Lebanon, and Thoughts
 Suggested Thereby.


 in Brooklyn and New York City from the text:
 The cednrs of Lebanon which He hath pianted.-Psalm civ, IS.
 In our journey we change stirrup for wheel It is four o'clock in the morning at Damascus, Syria, and we are among the lanterns of the hostelry waiting for the stage to start A Mohammedan in high life is putting his three wives on board within an apartment by them selves, and our party occupy the main apartment of one of the most uncom- fortable vehicles in which mortals were ever jammed and half-strangled. But we must not let the discomforts annul or disparage the opportunities. We are rolling on and out and up the mountains of Lebanon, their forehead under a crown of snow, which coronet the fingers of the hottest summer can not cast down. We are ascending heights around which is garlanded much of the finest poesy of the Scriptures, and are rising toward the mightiest dominion that by any ever recognized, reigned over by the most imperial tree thatever swayed leafy scepter-the Lebanon cedar, a tree eulogized in my text as having grown from nut put into the ground by God Himself. and no human hand had any thing to do with it's plant ing: "The trees of Lebanon which He hath planted"
 The average height of this mountain is seven thousand feet, but ill ore place 1t lifts its head to an altitude of ten thou sand. No higher than six thousand feet can vegetation exist, but below that line at the right season, are vineyards and orchards, and olive groves, and flowers that dash the mountain side with a very carnage of color, and fill the air with aromatics that Hosea, the prophet, and Solomon. the King, cele- brated as ''the smell of Lebanon" At a height of six thousand feet is grove of cedars, the only descendants of those vast forests from which Solomon cut his timber for the temple at Jerusalem, and where at one time there were ten thousand axemen hewing out the beams from which great cities were construct ed. But this nation of trees has by hu- man iconoclasm been massacred until only small group is left. This race of giants is nearly extinct, but 1 have no doubt that some of these were here when Hiram, King of Tyre, ordered the assassination of those cedars of Lebanon which the Lord plant ed. From the multitude of uses to which it may be put and the employ ment of it in the Scriptures, the cedar is the Divine favorite. When the plains to be seen from the window of this stage in which we ride to-day are parched under summer heats, and not a grass blade survives the fervidity, this tree stands in luxuriance, defying the summer sun. And when the storms of winter terrify the earth and hurl the rocks in avalanche down this mountain side, this tree grapples the hurricane of snow in triumph, and leave the spent fury at its feet. From sixty to eighty feet high are they, the horizontal branches of great sweep with their bur den of leaves needle shaped, the top of the tree pyramidal, throne of foliage on which might and splendor and glory sit. But so continuously has the exter- imitation of trees gone on that for the most part, the mountains of Lebanon are bare of foliage, while I am sorry to say the earth in all lands is being like wise denuded.
 The axe is staying the forests all round the earth. To stop the slaugh- ter God opened the coal mines of En- gland, and Scotland, and America, and the world, practically saying by that: Here is fuel; as far as possible let my trees alone" And by opening for the human race the great quarries of gran ite, and showing the human family how to make brick, God is practically say ing: Here is building material; let my trees alone" We had better stop the axes among the Adirondacks. We had better stop the axes in all our for ests, as it would have been better for Syria if the axes had long ago been stopped among the mountains of Leba- non To punish us for our reckless as sault on the forests we have the disor- dered seasons; now the droughts because the uplifted arms of the trees do not pray for rain, their presence, according to all scientists, disposing the descent of the showers; and then we have the cyclones and the hurricanes multiplied in number and velocity because there is nothing to prevent their awful sweep.
 As we ride over Lebanon to-day there is a bowling wind sweeping past and a dash of rain, all the better enabling us to appreciate that description of tenn pest, which was suggeted by what David had seen with his own eyes among these heights, for as a soldier he carried his wars clear up to Damascus, and such q poet as he, warrant, spent many a day on Lebanon. And perhaps while he was seated on this very rock against which our carriage jolts he writes that wonderful description of a thunder storm; ''The voice of the Lord is full of majesty The voice of the Lord break eth the cedars of Lebanon. Yea, the Lord brealteth the cedars of Lebanon. He malSeth them also to skip like calf, Lebanon and Sirion like a young uni corn The voice of the Lord divideth the flames of fire.
 As the lion is the monarch of the fields, and behemoth the monarch of the waters, the cedar is the monarch of the trees And think one reason why it is so glorified all up and down the Bible is because we need more of it's eharae- teristics in our religious life. We have too much of the willow, and are easily bent this way and that, too much of the aspen, and we tremble under every zephyr of assault; too much of the bram- ble-tree, and our sharp points sting and wound; but not enough of the cedar, ide-branched, and heaven-aspiring, and tempest-grappling. But the reason these cedars stand SO well is that they are deep-rooted. They run their am chors down into the eaverns of the mountain and fasten to the very foun- dations of the earth, and twist around and clinch themselves on the other side of the deepest layer of rock they can reach. And that is the difference be- tween Christians who stand and Chris