Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1891-10-31

Eabtt6 bndb inspired GHHrO10S dream Oh E13
lean kline and the fat kline.
Here we dissnbars a little while for
Memphis, off the Nile to thsright Memphis
founded by the first king of Egypt and for
long time the capital. A city Of marble aud
gold. Home OF the Pharaohs. City OF nine
teen miles in circumference. Vast colon
nades through which imposing professions
marched. Here stood the Temple OF the
Sun itself in brilliancy a sun snone on by
another sun. Thebes in power over a thou
sand and hunire years, or nearly ten times
as long as the United States have existed.
Here is resumbsnt statue sevanty-ave feet
long. Bronzsd gateways. A metropolis
called the haven of the blest.r Here
Joseph was prime minister Hare Pharaoh
received jacob. All possible splendors wers
built up into this royal city. Hosea, Ezekiel,
Jeremiah ana Isaiah spsak of it as some
thing wonderful
Never did l visit city with such exalted
anticipations, and never did my anticipa-
lions drop so fat. Not pillar stands. Not
wall is unbroken. Not foundation losses
in the SUI. Even the ruins have been ruined
and all that remains are chips of marble
small pieces offractured sculpture and splin-
tered human bones. Here and there letter
of some elaborate inscription, a toe or ear
of statue that onca stood in niche of palace
wall. Ezekiel propaesiel It's blotting out
aud the prophecy mas been fulfilled. Ride
pui 4 stlu W our parry. anu QOl . walt IOf
me-" And as | stool there alone the city of
Memphis in tae glory of past centuries re-
turne1. And heard the rush of her ehari-
OTIS, and the dash OF her fountains, and the
conyiviality of her palaces. and saw the
drunken MOBILES rel on the floors of mosaic.
while in startling contrast amid all the re-
galitlss Of the place | saw Pharaoh look up
into the face OF aged rustic Jacob, the shep-
herd, saying How old art thouf'
But back to the Nile and on and up till you
reach Tnebes, in Scripture called the City of
No. Hunired gated ThsbeS. A quadran-
guiar city four miles from limit to limit.
Four great temples, two Of them Karnae
and Luxor. once mountains of exquisite
sculpture and gorgeous dreams solicited in
stone. Statue of Rameses IL eight hundred
and eighty-seven tons in weight and seven
ty-tive feet high, but now fallen and scat
tered. Walls abloom with the battlefields Of
centuries.
The surrounding hills of rock followed
into sepulchers on the wall of which are
chiselei in picture and hieroglyphics the
confirmation of Bible story in regard to the
treatment of the Isrdelites in Egypt so that,
as explorations go on with the work, the
walls of these sspulchers become com
mentaries of the Bible, the Scriptures
originally written upon parchment here cut
into everlasting stone. Tasbes mighty and
dominant five hundred years Then she went
uONh Ill OIL IaH5kl9iS prophecy
concerning the City of No, which was another
name for fheoes: II will execute Judgment
in No. | will cut off the multituies of No"
Jeremiah also prophesie1, Thus saith the
Lord, | will punish the muititoies of Mo-
This city Of Thsbes and all the other dead
cities o Egypt iterate and reiterate the
veracity of the Scriptures, telling the same
story which Moses and the prophets told
Have you noticed how Go kept back these
archaeological! infirmations of the Bible UNI
til our time, when the air is full of uubelief
about the truthfulnsss of the dear old book
He waited until the printing press had been
set up in its perfected shape AMI the subma-
rine cable was laid and the world was in
teliigent enough to appreciate the testimony,
and then He resurrecte1 the dead cities of
the earth. and commanded them. saying:
Open your long sealed lips aud speak
Memphis and Thebes is the Bible true"
''Truer responds Memphis aud Thebes.
Babylon is the Book of Daniel truey
''fruer' responds Babylon ''Ruins of Pal
estine and Syria, is the New Testament
true:H ''Truew respond the ruins all the
way from Joppa to the Dead Sea and from
Jerusalem TO Damascus
What a mercy that this testimony of the
dead cities should come at time when the
Bible is especially assaile1. And this work
will go on until the veracity of the Scrip
lures will be as certain to all sensible men
and women as that two and two makes four,
as that an IsosceleS triangle is one which has
two of its sides equal, as that the diameter
of a circle is a line drawn through the centre
and Terminated by the circumference, as
certain as any mathematical demonstration
Those ancient cities lacked nothing but
good morals. Dissipation and sin slew them
and unless dissipation and sin are halted
they will some day Stay our modern cities
and leave our palaces OF merchandise and
our galleries of art and our city hall as fiat
in the dust as We found Memphis on the after
noon Of that Thanksgiving day. And if the
cities go down, the nation will go down.
"0h, you say. that is impossible; we have
stood so long-yea, over hundred years as
q nation Why, what OF that Thebes
stood five hundred years. Memphis stood
thousand years. God does not forget One
cay with the Lor1is a. thousand years and
thousand years as one day.
Rum and debauchery and bad politics are
more rapidly working the destruction of our
American cities that sin of any kind aud all
kinds worked for the destruction of the cities
of Africa, once so mighty and now so pros
trate. But their gods were idols and could
do nothing except for debasement. Our
God made the heavens aud sent His Son to
redeem the nations, Aud our cities will not
go down, and our nations will not perish be-
cause the gospel is going to triumph. For
ward all schools aud colleges and churches {
. y y
organizations. Forward all the influences
marshaled to bless the world. Let our mod
ern European an1 American cities listen to
toe voice of thoss ancient cities resurreete5,
( and by hammer and chsel and crowbar be
( compelled to speak.
I notice the voice of those ancient cities is
/ hoarse from the exposure of forty centuries
and they accsntuate slowly with lips that
were palsiei for ages, but all together those
cities along the Nile intons these words:
Hear us, for we are very old, and it is hard
| for us TO speak. We were wise long before
| Athens learned her first lesson We sailed
I our ships while yet navigation was unborn.
These obslisks, these pyramids, these fallen
[ pillars, these wrecked temples, these colossi
/ of black granite, these wrecked sarcophag
under the brow OF the hills, tell you of what
I was in grandeur and of what am coming
down to be- We sinnei and we fell Our
1 learning could not save Us. See those
half oblterated heroglyphics on yonder
wall. Our architecture could not save
us See the painted columns of
PnilR, and the shattered temple of Esneh.
/ Our heroes could not save US. Witness
Menes Dio1orus, Rames3s aud Ptolemy.
! Our Gods Anmon aud o iris could not save
us See their fallen temples all along the
four thousand miles of Nile. Oh ye modern
cities get some other God; God who can
help, God who can pardon, a God who can
save. Called up as we arc for a little while
to give testimony, again the sands Of the
desert will bury us. Ashes TO ashes. dust to
dust~ AMI as these voices of porphyry and
granite ceased, all the sarcophagi under tbs
hills responded, "Ashes to ashes~ and the
capital OF a lofty column fell grinding itself
to powder among the rocks and responding
dust to DUST
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