St. Landry clarion. (Opelousas, La.) 1890-1921, 1891-04-18
TEN PLAQUES OF GOTHAM
Rev. T. Dewitt Talmage initiates a
Series Of Inter esting Sermons.

OO
Series Of Inter esting Sermons.
The Moral Plaques that Beset the Deni-
zens of the Great Metropolis Lead
Ing to Ruined Fortunes and
Ruined Homes.
The following is the initial discourse
of a series just begun by Rev. T. De-
Witt Talmage on the moral plaques of
New York and it's sister cities. His
text was:
Let my people go that they may serve me:
for will at this time send all my plaques
Exodus tx, 13, II.
Last winter, in the museum at Cairo,
Egypt, saw the mummy or embalmed
body of Pharaoh, the oppressor of the
ancient Israelites. Visible are the very
teeth that he gnashed against the
Israelitish brickmakers, the sockets of
the merciless eyes with which he looked
upon the overburdened people of God,
the hair that foated in the breeze off
the Red sea, the very lips with which
he commanded them to make bricks
without straw. Thousands of years
after, when the wrappings of the num-
my were unrolled, old Pharaoh lifted
up his arm as if in imploration, but his
skinny bones can not again clutch his
shattered scepter. 1t was to compel
that tyrant to let the oppressed go free
that the memorable ten plaques were
sent. Sailing the Nile and walking
amid the ruins of Egyptian cities, l saw
no remains of those plaques that smote
the water or the air. None of the
frogs t|roaked in the. one, none of the
locustsx sounded their rattle in the
other, and the cattle bore no sign of
the murrain, and through the starry
nights lowering about the pyramids no
destroying angel swept his wing. But
there are ten plaques still stinging and
befouling and cursing our cities, and,
like angels of wrath, shifting not only
the first born but the last born.
Brooklyn, New York and Jersey City,
though called three, are practically one.
The one bridge already fastening two
of them together will be followed bv
other bridges and by tunnels from both
New Jersey and Long Island shores,
until what is true now will, as the
years go by, become more emphatically
true. The average condition of public
morals in this cluster of cities is as good
if not better than in any other part of
the world. Pride of city is natural to
men, in all times, if they live or have
lived in metropolis noted for dignity
or prowess. Caesar boasted of his ma
tive Rome; Lycurgus of Sparta; Virgil
of Andes; Demosthenes of Athens;
Archimedes of Syracuse, and Paul of
Tarsus. should suspect man of base
heartedness who carried about with
him no feeling of complacency in re-
gard to the place of his residence; who
gloried not in its arts, or arms, or be-
havior; who looked with mo exultation.
upon its evidences 81 prosperity, its
artistic embellishments, and its scien-
tific attainments.
/ have noticed that men never like q
place where they have not behaved well.
Men who have free rides in prison vans
never like the city that furnishes the
vehicle. When / see in history Argos,
Rhodes, Smyrna, Chios, Colophon and
several OluCI C1blCS C1dlIAlu 1lOnO1s
conclude that Homer behaved well. Let
us not war against this pride of city, nor
expect to build up ourselves by pulling
others down. Let Boston have its Com
mons, its Faneuil hall, and it's m agnifi-
cent scientific and educational institu-
tions. Let Philadelphia talk about its
mint, and Independence hall, and Gil
rard ollege, and it's old families, as vir-
tuous as venerable. When find a man
living in one of those places who has
nothing to say in favor of them, I feel
like asking him: What mean thing did
you do, that you do not like your native
city?'' New York is goodly city, and
when I say that mean the region be-
tween Spuyten Duyvil creek and Ja-
maica in one direction, and Newark
flats in the other direction. That which
blasts one blasts all. Sin is a giant;
and he comes to the Hudson or Con-
necticut river. and passes it as easily as
we step across figure in the carpet.
The blessing of God is an angel; and
when it stretches out its two wings,
one of them hovers over that and the
other over this.
In infancy the great metropolis was
laid down by the banks of the Hudson.
Its infancy was as feeble as that of
Moses sleeping in the bulrushes by the
Nile; and, like Miriam, there our fathers
stood and watched it. The royal spirit
of American commerce came down to
the water to bathe; and there she found
it. She took it in her arms, and the
child grew and waxed strong; and the
ships of foreign lands brought gold and
spices to it's feet: and stretching itself
up into the proportions Of metropolis,
it has looked up into the mountains and
off upon the seattle mightiest of the
energies of American civilization. The
character of the founder of a city will
be seen for many years in its inhab-
itants. Romulus impressed his life upon
Rome. The Pilgrims relaxed not their
hold upon the cities of New England.
William Penn has left Philadelphia an
inheritance Of integrity and fair deal
ing; and on any day in that city you
may see in the manners, customs and
principles of its people his tastes, his
coat, his hat, his wife's bonnet, and his
plain meeting house. The Hollanders
still WELD an influence over New York.
Grand old New FORK! What Southern
thoroughfare was ever smitten by pesti-
lence, when our physicians did not
throw themselves upon the sacrifice
What distant land has cried out in the
agony of famine, and our ships have
not put out with breadstuffs! What
sfreat of DamasniIS or ReyrO11t- or