Martinsburg herald. [volume] (Martinsburg, W. Va.) 1881-1920, 1891-10-24
REV. DR.. 7ALMAGH.
The Eminent Brooklyn Divine's Sun
day Sermon.
Subject. "The Lesson of the Pyramids.

TEXT: IA that dau shall there be an
altar to the Lord in the midst of the land
Of Egypt and q pillar at the border there
of to the Lord And 1t shall be for a ssga
and for tcttaess. Isaiah xix, 10, %.
Isaiah no doubt here refers to the great
pyramid at Gizsh, the chief pyramid Of
Egypt. The text speaks of a pillar in Egypt
and this is the greatest pillar ever lifted:
and the text says it is to be at thu border Of
the land, and this pyramid is at tia border
Of the land; and the text says it shall be for
witness and the object of this sermon is to
tell what this pyramid witnesses. This SER
mon is the first of a course of sermons en-
titled. From the Pyramids to the Acropolis
or What l saw in Egypt and Greece Con
frmatory of the Scriptures
We had on a morning OF December, 1889,
| landed in Africa Am id the bowling boat
men at Alexandra we had come ashore and
taken the rail train at Caro- Egypt along
I the banks of the most thoreu 5hly harnessed
! river of all the world the river Nile We
/ had at eventde entered the city of Cairo. the
/ city where Christ dwelt while staying in
Egypt during the Heroiic persecution IL
| was our first night in Egypt No DESTROYING
angel sweeping through as once, but all the
stars were out. and the SKY was filled with
/ ange's of beauty and angels of light, ami the
/ air was balmy an American June. The
/ next morning we were early awake and at
the window, looking upon the palm trees in
full glory Of LEAKAGE, and upon gardens OF
fruits and flowers at the very season WHEN
our homes far away are canopief by bleak
skies and the last leaf OF the forest has gone
/ down in the equinoctials.
But how can describe the thrill of ex-
! pectation. for to-day we are to see what all
! The world has seen or wants to see--the
pyramids. We are mounted for an hour
| and halls ride. We pass on amid bazaars
/ stuffed with rugs and carpets and curious
fabrics of all sorts from Smyrna, from Al
4 giers, from Persia, from Turkey, and through
streets where we meet people of all colors
and all CARDS, carts loaded with garden pro-
auctions. priests in gowns women in black
wells, Bedouins in long and seemingly super
duou.5 ap arel, JanisSarieS i'll Jacket of en-
broidere1 gold-out an / on toward the great
| pyramid for though there are sixty -nine
pyrami still standing, the pyramid at Gizeh
Is the monarch of pyramids. We meet
camels granting under their loads and see
/ buffaloes on either side browsing in pasture
! fields.
The road we travel is for part of the way
nnder clumps of acacia aud by long rows OF
/ sycamore and tamaris5, but after awhile it
4 Is path of rocl and sand, and we find we
have reached the margin of the desert, the
great Sahara DESERT and we cry out to the
| great dragoman as we see hu ,e pile OF rock
looming in sight, ''Dragoman, what is thatY
His answer is, The pyramid and then it
ieemed as if we were living century every
minute. Our thoughts and emotions were
100 rapid and intense for utterance, and we
| ride on IN silence until we come to the foot
Of the pyramid spoken OF in the text, the
oldest structure in all the earth-four thou
| sand years old at least Here it is We stand
under the shadow OF structure that shuts
put all the earth and all the sky. and we look
sp and strain our vision to appreciate the
| Instant top, AMI are overwhelmed while We
Try, The pyramid The Pyramid
Each person in our party had two or three
! guides or helpers One OF them unrollel his
!urhan and tied it around my waist and he
held the other end OF the turoan as a matter
! Of safety. Many of the blocks of stone are
four or five feet high and beyond any oriin-
ary human stride unless assisted. But, two
Arabs to pull and two Arabs to push, / found
myself rapidly ascending from heighth ID
heighth. and on to attitudes terrific, and at
! asst at the tiptop we found ourselves on level
space of about thirty feet square. Through
clearest atmosphere we looked off upon the
sesert, and off upon the winding Nile, and
IF upon the Sphinx with its features OF
everlasting stone, and yonder upon the mir
Rrets of Cairo giittering in the sun, and yon
der upon Memphis in ruins aud off upon the
wreck OF empires and the battlefelds of ages,
! radius of view enough to fill the mind aud
shock the nerves and oyerwhelm ones entire
being
After looking around for awhile, AMI
kodak had pictured the group, we descenje1.
The descent was more trying than the
ascent, for climbing you need not SEQ the
depths beneath but coming down it was i'm
/ ossble not to sea the abysns below. But
| two Arabs ahead to help d down, AMI two
Arabs to hold US back we were lowered,
hand below hand, until the ground was in
vitingly near AMI amid the jsrgon o. the
/ Arabs we were safely landed. Then came
/ bne of the most won ierful feats of daring
aud agility. One of the Arabs solicite | a
dollar, saying he wonld rua up and down
the pyramid in seven minutes. We would
rather have given him dollar not to go,
but this ascent and descent in seven minutes
he was determined on, and so by the watch
/ in seven minutes he went to the top and was
back again at the base. 1t was a b,oodcuc-
ding spectacle
| said the dominant color OF tae pyramid
was gray, but in certain lights it seems to
shake off the gray OF centuries and become
blond, and the silver turns to the golden.
1t covers thirteen acres OF ground. What
an antiquity II was at least two thousand
years old when the baby Christ was carried
within sight OF it h. His fugitive parents,
Joseph and Mary. Thestor Of forty can.
turtles have drenched it bombarded it,
Swallowed it flashed upon it, but there it
stands, ready to take another forty cen
turtles of atmospheric attack if ths world
should continue to exist. Ths oldest build
lngs OF the earth are juniors to this great
senior OF the centuries
HerodotuS says that for ten wars nrana-
ratIonS were beng made for the building of
this pyramid. II has eighty-two million
1 one hundred and eleven thousand cubic feet
of masonry. One hundred thousand workmen
atone time toiled in its erection. To bring the
STONE from the quarrles cauSeTay sixty
feet wide was butt. Phe top stones wero
lifted by machinery such as the world
Knows nothing o. to-day. Il Is seven hun
| dred and forty-six feet each side of thu
square base The structure is four hundred
and fifty feet high; higher than the cathe-
erals OF Cologne, Strasburg, Rousn st.
Peters and st Paups. No surprise to ma
tnat it was put at the head of the seven won
ders of the world. 1t has a subtarraneous
room OF red granite called the 'xing's cham
Der, aud another room called the queens
chamber, and the probability is that thsr9
are other rooms yet uuexnlored.
Inc evident design of the architect was to
make these rooms as inaccessible as possible
After all the WORK Of exploration and all the
digging and blasting, if you would enter
THESE subterra15ous rooms you must 90
through passage only thre5 feet eleven
Inches high and less than four feet wide A
sarcophagus Of rel granite stands down I'M
der this mountain of masonry. The
sarcophagus could not have been carried in
1 AFTER the pyramid was built 1t must have
( reared. Probably in taat sarcophagu; oacs
iay WOODEN cofia cont timing a dead king,
Out Ine has destroyed tbs GOTTA and de
sIroyed the last yesSige of human remains
FOR three thousand years this sapujclral
room was unopene and would have bae1
I until to- lay PROBABLY unopened hal NOT a
! ssuparstitious i'm preston got abroad that til i.
/ heart Oh the pyramid was filed with silver
and gold and diamonds and under AL
Manoun an excavating party went to WORK.
and having bored AMI blasted through a hun
dred feet OF rock, they founl no opening
/ ahead, and were about to giva up the at.
tempt when the workmen heard stone roll
doWn INTO seemingly hollow place anil en-
Outraged oy that they resumed their work
ana came into the underground rooms
The disappointment Of the workmen in
finding the sarcophagus empty of all silver
and gold and precious stones was so great
that they would have assassinate1 AL Ma
noun, who employed them, had he not hid
in another part Of the pyramid as much sill
yer AMI gold as would pay them for their
work at ordinary rates of wages aud in
duced them there to dig till they to their
surprise came upon adequate compensation.
wonder not that this mountain of lime
stone and red granite has been the fascina-
ton of scholars, of scientists, of intelligent
Christians in all ages Sir Joan Herschel.
the astronomer, said he thought it hal as
Economical significance. The wise men who
accompanied Napoleon's army into Egypt
went into profound stuiy of the pyramid
In 1865 Professor Smyth and his wife lived
in the empty tombs near by the pyramid
that they might be as continuously as poJ-
sibe close to the pyramid which they were
investigating. The pyra MD built mora
than four thousand years ago being a COM