Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1891-10-29


wall. Ezekiel prophesied its blotting
out, and the prophecy has been full
filled. ''Ride on I said to our party
land don't wait for me-" And as I stood
there alone, the city Of Memphis in the
glory of past centuries returned. And L
heard the rush of her chariots and the dash
of her fountains and the conviviaiity Of her
palaces, and saw the drunken mobiles roll on
the floors of mosaic, while in startling con-
trast amid all the royalties of the place
saw Pharaoh look up into the face of aged
rustic Jacob. the shepherd. saying: "How
old art thoul'
But back to the Nile and on and up till
you reach Thebes, in Scripture called the
city of No. Hundred-gated ThebeS. A
quadrangular city four miles from limit to
limit. Four great temples, two of them
karnac and Luxor, once mountains OF ex-
quiSite sculpture and gorgeous dreams So
lidified in stone. Statue of Rameses ii.
Ss7 tons in weight, and seventy-fve feet
high, but now fallen and scattered. Walls
abloom with the battlefields of centuries.
The surrounding hills of rock followed into
sepulchers on the wall of which are CHS
eled in picture and hieroglyphics the con-
tirmation of Bible story in regard to the
treatment of the Israelites in Egypt SO that,
as explorations go on with the work, the
walls of these
sEPULCHERs BECOME COMMENTARIES
VI luC llt WIZ
ten upon parchment here cut into eyerlaSt-
ing stone. 1hebes mighty and dominant
five hundred years. Then she went down
in fulfllment of Ezekiel's prophecy con-
corning the City of No. which was another
name for Thebes: Il will execute Judgment
in No. | will cut off the multitudes of No"
jeremiah also prophesied: Thus saith the
Lord, will punish the multitudes of No"
This city of Thebes and all the other dead
cities of Egypt iterate and reiterate the
veracity of the scriptures, telling the same
story which Moses and the prophets told.
Have you noticed how God kept back these
archaeological combinations of the Bible
until our time, when the air is full of unbe-
lief about the truthfulness of the dear old
book2 He waited until the printing press
had been set up in its perfected shape, and
the submarine cable was laid. and the world
was intelligent enough TO appreciate
the testimony, and then he resur-
rected the dead cities of the
earth, and commands them, saying:
''Open your long-sealed lips and speak!
Memphis and Thebes! Is the Bible true2"
''True!' respond Memphis and Thebes.
Babylon! is the book of Daniel true?"
"True!' responds Babylon. Ruins of
Palestine and Syria! Is the New Testament
true," ''Truei" respond the ruins all the
way from Joppa to the Dead Sea, and from
Jerusalem to Damascus. What mercy
that this testimony of the dead cities should
come at time when the Bible is especially
assailed. And this work will go on until
the veracity and divinity of the scriptures
will be as certain to all sensible men and
women as that two and two make four, as
that an isosceles triangle is one which has
two of its sides equal, as that
THE DIAMETER OF A CIRCLE
is line drawn through the center and ter
minated by the circumference, as certain as
any mathematical demonstration. Never
did | feel more encouraged than when after
preaching sermon on evidences of the
truth of the Bible drawn from Oriental
lands, 4 distinguished senator of the United
States, known and honored everywhere, but
now deceased. came up TO the platform and
said: Il was brought up in the faith of
Christianity. but | got to specializing on all
these subjects. and had given up my faith
in the Bible, but those facts and arguments
archaeological take me back to my old faith
in the Bible, which my father and mother
taught me.'' The tears rolling down ais
checks evinced the depths of his emotion.
When | read of the senator's death l was
comforted to think that perhaps / may have
helped him little in the struggle OF his
life, and perhaps given him an easier pillow
on which to die.
Two great nations, Egypt and Greece,
diplomatized and almost came to battle for
one book, a copy of 4Eschylus. Ptolemy, the
Egyptian king, discovered that in the great
library at Alexandria there was copy of
1Eschylus. The Egyptian king sent up to
Athens, Greece, to borrow the book and
make copy of it. Athens demanded de-
posit of Sl1, 200 as security. The Egyptian
king received the book. but refused to re-
turn that which he had borrowed, and so
forfeited the Si7,100. The two nations rose
in contention concerning that one book.
Beautiful and mighty book indeed. But it
is a book of horrors, the dominant idea that
we are the victims of hereditary influences
from which there is no escape, and. that fate
rules the word, and although the author
does tell of PrometheuS, who was crucified
on the rocks for sympathy for mankind, a
powerful suggestion of the sacrifice of
Christ in later years, it is very poor book
compared with that book which We hug to
our hearts because it contains our only
guide in life, our only comfort in death and
our only hope for a blissful immortality. If
two nations could afford to struggle for one
copy of .EISchyluS, how much more can all
nations afford to struggle for the possession
and triumph of the Holy Scriptures?
But the dead cities strung along the Nile
not only demoilsh intidelity. but thunder
down the absurdity of the modern doctrine
of evolution which says the world started
with nothing and then rose, and human
nature began with nothing but evolved into
Nay: the sculpture of the world was more
wonderful in the days of Memphis and
Thebes and Carthage than in the days of
Boston and New York, Those blocks of
stone weighing 800 tons. high up in the
wall at Karnac, imply machinery equal to,
if not surprising, the machinery of the
Nineteenth century. How was that statue
of RameseS, weighing SS1 tons transported
from the quarries 200 miles away, and how
was it liftedl Tell US, modern machinists.
How were those galleries of rock, still
standing at Thebes, filled with paintings
surpassed by no artists pencil of the
present daya Tell US, artists of the
Nineteenth century. The dead cities of
Egypt so far ar they have left enough
pillars or statues or sepulchers or temple
ruins to tell the story-Memphis, Migdol,
Hierapolis, Zoan, Thebes, Goshen, Car
thage-all of them developing downward
instead of upward. They have evoluted
from magniilcence into destruction. The
gospel of Jesus Christ is the only elevator
of individual and social national character
Let all the living cities know that pomp
and opulence and temporal prosperity are
no security. Those ancient cities lacked
nothing but good morals. Dissipation and
sin slew them, and unless dissipation and
sin are halted they will some day
SLAY OUR MODERN CITIES,
and leave our palaces of merchandise and
our galleries of art and our city halls as
fiat in the dust as we found Memphis on
the afternoon of that Thanksgiving day.
And if the cities go down, the nation will
go down. ''Oh,' you say. that is impossi-
bic; we have stood so long-yea, over a
hundred wears as a nation" Why what of