The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1891-03-25
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINES SUN.
DAY SERMON.
Subject: The Evils of Liquor Drink.
ing

TEXT: Noah planted G vineyard, and hd
drank Of the 1Dine and 1Uas drunken.
Genesis tx, 20, 81.
This Noah did the best and the worst
thing for the world. He built an ark
against the deluge Of water, but intro
duced deluge against which the human
race has ever since been trying to build an
srk-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
history Of the world when, to say the least,
| thero was no lack of water. 1nebriation,
having entered the world, has not retreated.
| Abigail, the fair and heroic wife, who saved
] the focks Of Nabal, her husband, from con-
| hscation by invaders, goes home at night
and finds him so intoxicated she cannot tell
him the story of his narrow escape. Uriah
came to ses David, and David got him
| drunk and paved the way for the despolia-
| ton Of household. Even the church bishops
needed to be charged to be sober and not
| given to too much wine, and so familiar
, were people Of Bible times With the stagger-
| Ing and falling motion Of the inebriats that
Isaiah, when he comes to describe the final
dislocation of the worlds, says, "The earth
shall reel to and fro like drunkard."
Ever sinceapples and grapes and wheat grew
the world has been tempted to unhealthful
stimulants. But the intoxicants Of the olden
time were an innocent beverage, harmless
orangeade, quiet syrup, .peacef"l soda
water as compared with the liquids of mod
ern inebriation, into which madness and
| g fury, and gloom, and fire, and suicide,
and retribution have mixed and mingled.
Fermentation was always known, but 1t vas
not until a thousand years after Christ
that distillation was invented While
! we must confess that some OF the
ancient arts have been lost, the
Christian era is superior to all others in
the bad eminence Of whisky and rum and
gin. The modern drunk is q hundredfold
worse than the ancient drunk. Noah in his
intoxication became imbecile but the vic
Tins Of modern alcoholism have to struggle
with whole menageries Of wild beasts, and
jungles Of Kissing serpents and perdltlons Oh
of Disappearing demons
An arch fiend arrived in our world, and
he built an invisible caldron Of temptation
| He built that caldron strong and stout for
all ages and nations. First he squeezed into
the caldron the juices Of the forbidden fruit
| of Paradise. Then he gathered for it dis
| tillation from the harvest fields and the
orchards Of the hemispheres. Then he poured
into this caldron capsicum and copperas and
logwood and deadly nightshade and assault
| and battery and vitriol and opium and rum
and murder and sulphuric acid and theft and
potash and cochineal and rel carrots and
poverty and death and hops But it was a
| dry compound and it must be moistened and
| 1t must be liquefed, and so the arch fend
poured into that caldron the tears Of ceLtu-
| ries Of orphanage and widowhood, and he
poured in the blood Of twenty thousand as
| sassinations.
And then the arch fiend took shovel that
| he had brought up from the furnaces be-
meath and he put that shovel into this great
| caldron and began to stir, and the caldron
began to heave and rock and boil and sput-
| ter and hiss and smoke, and the nations gath
cred around it with cups and tankards and
demijohns and kegs, and there was enough
| for all, and the arch feni cried: AHA!
champion f1end am l! Who has done more
than have for cofflns and graveyards and
prisons and insane asylums, and the populat-
| ing Of the lost world? And when this caldron
is emptied Pll fill it again and I'll stir it
| again, and it will smoke again. and that
| smoke will join another smoke, the smoke OF
| e torment that ascendeth for ever and ever.
| I drove fifty ships on the rocks Of New
foundland, and the Skerries, and the Good
| wins. I have ruined more senators
than gather this winter in the ma
tional councils. have ruined more lords
than are now gathered in the house
of peers. The cup out of which ordinarily
| drink is a bleached human skull, and the
upholstery of my palace is 80 rich crimson,
because it is dyed in human gore, and the
mosaic of my floors is made up Of the bones
| of children dashed to death by drunken
parents, and my favorite music-sveeter
than Te Deum or triumphal march-my
| favorite music is the cry Of daughters turned
| out at midnight on the street because father
has come home from the carousal, and the
seven hundred voiced shriek Of the sinking
steamer because the captain was not him
self when he put the ship on the wrong
course. Champion fend am II I have
kindled more fires, have wrung out more
aeones, I have stretched out more mid
night shadows, have opened more Col
gothas 1 have rolled more Juggernauts
have damned more souls than any other
emissary Of diabolism. Champion fend
amir
Drunkenness is the greatest evil Of this
nation, and it takes no logical process to
prove to this audience that drunken nation
cannot long be free nation. call your at
tention to the fact that drunkenness is not
subsiding, certainly that it is not at stand
still, but that it is on an onward march, and
it is a double quick. There is more rum
swallowed in this country, and Of 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
drunkard's grave there are twenty drunk.
ards graves It is on the increase Talk
about crooked whisky-by which men mean
the whisky that does not pay the tax to gov
ernment-I tell you all strong drink Is
crooked. Crooked Otard, crooked Cognac,
crooked schnapps, crooked beer, crooked
wine, crooked whisky-hecause it makes a
mans path crooked, and his life crooked, and
his death crooked and his eternity crooked.
II could gather all the armies Of the dead
drunkards and have them coma to resurrec-
tion, and then add to that host all the armies
of living drunkards, five and ten abreast,
and then if could have you mount horse
and ride along that line for review, you
would ride that horse till he dropped from
exhaustion. and you would mount another
horse and ride until he fell from exhaustion,
and you would take another and another,
and you would ride along hour after hour
and day after day. Great host, in regiments
in brigades. Great armies Of them And
then If you had voice stentorian enough to
make them all hear, and you could give the
command, Forward, marchp' their first
tramp would make the earth tremble I do
not care which way you look in the commun-
ity to day the evil is increasing.
call attention to the fact that there are
thousands of people born with a thirst for
strong drink-a fact too often ignored.
Along some ancestral lines there runs the
river of temptation. There are children
whose swaddling clothes are torn of the
shroud Of death. Many father has made
will of this sort. I'm the name Of God,
amen bequesth to my children my houses
and lands and estates; share and share shall
they alike. Hereto I affix my hand and seal
in the presence Of witnesses" And yet per.
haps that very man has made another will
that the people have never read, and that
has not been proved in the courts. That will
put In writing would read something like
this: ''In the name OF disease and appetite
and death, amen. Ibequeath to my children