Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1891-03-02
Second of the Series of Sermons Upon
the Cities Ten Plaques.
AN ATTACK UPON INTEMPERANCE,
With Strong Appeal TO the Churches TO
Arouse to Action.
DRINKING STEADILY ON THE INCREASE
-srEcIAL TELEeHAM TO THE DISPATCH,

plague which he places second on the list is
intemperance, and on that subject he dis
coursed this morning in the Academy of
Music, Brooklyn, and this evening in New
York AT the close of the service III the
New YORK Academy of Music, DR.. Talmage
went over to the Union Square Theater,
where his son, Mr.. Frank Dewitt Taimage,
was holding an over-fowing meeting, and
briefly addressed the crowded house. The
text Of the Doctors sermon was taken from
Genesis ix 20, 2l: Noah planted vine
yard; ana he drank of the wine and was
drunken"
This Noah did the best and the worst thing
for the world, He built an ark against the de-
luge of water but introduced deluge against
which thS human race has ever since been try
ing aid an ark-the deluge of drunkenness.
In my text we hear his staggering steps. Shem
and Japhet tried to cover up the disgrace, but
there he is, drunk on wine at time in The his
tory of the world when, to say the least there
was no lack of water. Inebriation. having en-
tered the world. has notsretreated. Abigail,
the fair and heroic wife, who saved the 1ocks
Of Nabal her husband, from cohtiscation
by invaders. goes home at night and
finds him so intoxicated she cannot tell him the
story of his narrow escape. Uriah came to see
David. and David got him drunk, and paved
the way for the despoliauon of a household.
Even the church bishops needed to be charged
10 be sober and not given to too much wine, and
so familiar were people of Bible times with the
staggering and falling motion OF The inebriate,
that Isaiah, when he comes to describe the final
dIslocation of worlds says: The earth Shall
reel to and fro like drunkard.'
Ever since apples and grapes and wheat
grew the world has been tempted to unhealth-
fu stimuianus. But the intoxicants of the
olden time were an innocent beverage,
harmless orangeade, quiet syrup, peaceful
soda water. compared with the liquids of
modern nebriatIon. into which a madness, and
a fury and gloom, aud fire, and suicide,
and 4 retribuTion have mixed and mingled.
Fermentation was always known, but it was
not until thousand wears after Christ that dis
tillation was invented. While we must confess
that some of the ancient arts have been
lost, the Christian superior to
all others IN the bad emlnence
of whisky and rum and gin. The modern
drunk is hundred fold worse than the ancient
drunk. Noah, in his lntoXication, became i'm
hecile. but the victims of modern alcoholism
have to struggle with whole menageries of wild
beasts and junEles Of kissing serpelts and per-
ditinns of blaspheming demons. An arch fend
arrived in our world, and he built an invisible
caldron of temptation. He built that cal
dron strong and stout for all ages and all
na,ions. First he squeezed into the caldron
the juice of the forbidden fruit of Paradise.
Then he gathered for 1t a distillatiOn from the
harvest fields and the orchards of the hemls-
pheres.
Bad Ingredients Without Number.
Then he poured into this caldron capsicum,
and couperas, and logwood, and deadly night
shade, and assault and battery and vitriol, and
opium, and rum and murder, and sulphurlc
acid, and theft and potash and cochineal, and
red carrots, and poverty, and death and hops.
But it a dry compound, and it must be
moistened, ara it must be nquefied. and so the
areb-fienG poured into that caldron the tears
Of centuries OF orphauage and widowhood, and
he poured in the blood of 20. 600 asSaSSinations
\ nj 7 han bn aTpl for mn CHI
he had brought up from the furnaces beneath
and he put that shovel into this great caldron
and began TO stir, and the caldron began to
heave, aud rock. and boil, and SputteT, and hiss
and smoke. and the nations gathered around it
with CUPS and tankards and demiiohns and
kegs and there was enough for ALL and the
aTch-hend cried: "Ahai champion fend am l." |
Who has done more than l have for cofins
and graveyards and prisons and insane asy-
lums. and the populating of the lost world?
ana when tins Caldron Is emptled I'll fill II
again, and I'll stir it again. and it will smoke
again, and that smoke will join another smoke
the smoke of a torment that ascendeth for
ever and ever. l drove 80 ships on the rocks of
Newfoundland and the Skerries and the Good
wins. l have ruined more Senators than gather
this winter in the national councils. / have
ruined more lords than are now gathered in the
House of Peers.
The cup out of which l ordinarily drink is a
bleacbed human skull, and the upholstery of
my palace is 30 rich crimson because 1t is dyed
IN Eun3n gore and the mosaic of my floors is
made up OF the bones of children dashed to |
death by drunken parents, and my favorite |
than TIE Deum or triumphal |
favOrte music is the cry of dauph- |
ters turned out at midnight on the street be- |
cause father has come home from the carousal |
and the Seven-hundred-voIced shrek of the |
sinking steamer, because the captain was not /
himself when he put the ship on the wrong |
course. Champion fend am y have kindled |
more fires. have wrung out more agonies / |
have stretched out more midnight shadows. 1 |
nave opened more Golgothas, have rolled |
more Juggernauts I have damned more souls |
than any other emlssary of diabolism. Cham |
pion tend am -
Greatest Evil of the Time
Drunkenness is the greatest evil of this ma.
tion. and it takes no logical process to prove to
this audience that drunken nation cannot |
long be free nation. ! call your attention to |
the fact that drunkenness is not subsdinc. cer-
tainly that 1t is not at standstl but that 1t is
on an onward march, and it is a doubIe-uuick.
There is more rum swallowed in this country
and of a worse kind. than was ever Swallowed
since the first dIstillery began its work of death.
Where there was one drunken home there are
ten drunken homes. Where there was one
grave there are % dTunkards' |
graves 1t is on the increase. Talk about
crooked whisky-by which men mean the
whisky that does not pay the tax to Govern
tell you all strong drink is crooked |
Crooked Otard, crooked Cognac, crooked
schnapps. crooked beer. crooked wine, crooked !
1t makes mans path crooked
and his death crooked, and his eternity
crooked
If I could gather all the armies of the dead
and have them come to resurrection. |
md then add 20 that host all the armies of Inv
ng drunkards, nve and ten abreast, and then if
could have you mount horse and ride along
hat line for review, you would ride that horse |
lntll he dropped from exhaustion, and you
would mount another horse and ride until he |
ell from exhaustion, and you would take an |
lther and another, and you would ride along |
iour after hour, and day after day. Great host,
n regiments, in brIgades. Great armies of |
hem. And then if you had voice stentorian
nouEh TO make ;hem all hear and you could
I'VE the command, Forward. marchr' their
irst tramp would make the earth tremble do
lot care which way you look in the community
o-day, the evil is increasing.
I call attention 10 the fact that there are
thousands of people born with thirst for
trOng drink TACT too often ignored, Along |
ONE ancestral lines there runs the river Of
emptaton. There are children whose swad-
ling clothes are torn off the shroud of DEATH
lany father has made a will of this sort: "In |
he name of GOD, amen. l bequeath to my
Gildren my houses and lands and estate; share
nd share shall they alike. Hereto / affx nv
and and seal in the presence of witnesses" |
md yet perhaps that very man has made |
mother Will that the people have never read, |
nd that has not been proved in the courts |
hat will put in writing would read something
Ike this: In the name of disease and appetite |
nd death. amen. j bequeath TO my children |
ny evil habits. my tankards shall be theirs, my |
rinecup shall be theirs, my destroyed repu. |
atAou sudll te luelTS oudIe duO SudIe ailke | 4
bal! they in the infamy. Hereto affix my
and and seal in the presence of all the APP
laudIng harpies of hell"
The Expenditure of Money.
Gather up the money that the working classes
aye spent for rum during the last 30 years and
Will build Tor every workingman a house and
~ out Tor HIM garden, and clothe his sons in
roadcloth and his daughters in silks, and
and at his front door prancing span of sor-
els or bays and secure him policy of life in
lrance so that the present home may be we'll