The Brookhaven leader., 1891-11-19
TALMAGE'S SERMON.
Among the Holy Islands of the
Grecian Archipelago.
Good-By to Egypt and a Brief sojourn
Among the Islands where Paul and
Barnabas Prcached-PatmOs and
the Vision of st. John.

the Pyramids to the Acropolis" in the
brooklyn tabernacle, from the texts:
When we had discovered Cyprus We left It
on the left mandates xxL,a
j, John. was in the isle that Is
called Patmos. Revelation l.. g.
6ood-by Egypt! Although interest
ing and instructive beyond any country
in all the world, excepting the Holy
Land, Egypt was to me somewhat de-
pressing. 1t was n post-mortcm ex-
animation of cities that died four thou
sand years ago. The mummies, or
wrapped-up bodies of the dead, were
prepared with reference to the resur-
rection day, the Egyptians departing
this life wanting their bodies to be kept
in as good condition as possible, so that
they would be presentable when they
were called again to occupy them. But
If when Pharaoh comes to resurrec-
ton he finds his body looking as
/ saw his mummy in the museum
at Boulac, his soul will become an
unwilling tenant. The Sphinx also
was to me stern monstrosity, a statue
| carved out of a rock of red granite
sixty-two feet high and about one hun
dred and forty-three feet long and hav-
ing the head of n man and the body of
lion. We sat down in the sand of the
African desert to study it, With cold
smile it has looked down upon thou
sands of gears of earthly history;
Egyptian civilization; upon the rise
| and fall of thrones innumerablc: the
| victory and defeat of the armies of
centuries. 1t took three thousand years
to make one wrinkle on its red cheek.
1t is dreadful in its stOlidity. Its eyes
have never wept tear. Its cold ears
have not listened to the groanS OF the
| Egyptian nation, the burden of which
| tried to weigh last Sabbath. Its
| heart is stone. 1t cared not for Pliny
when he measured it in the first cen
tury. 1t will care nothing for the man
| who looks into its imperturba BILE
countenance in the last century.
Goodby. Egypt. This sermon finds
us on the steamer Minerva, in the Gre
clan archipelago. the islands of the New
Testament, and islands PauIinian and
JOhannian in their "reminiscences. What
Bradshaw's directory is to the travellers
| in Europe, and what the railroad guide is
to travellers in America, the book of the
| Acts in the Bible is to voyagers in the
Grecian, or, as | shall call it, the Cos
pei archipelago. The Bible geography
| of that region is accurate without
shadow of mistake. We are sailing
this morning on the same waters that
Paul sailed, but in the opposite direc-
ton to that which Paul voyagcd. lie
was sailing southwark and we north
ward. With him it was: Ephesus,
Coos, Rhodes, Cyprus. With us it is
reversed, and it is: Cyprus, Rhodes,
Coos Ephesus There is no book in the
world so accurate as the Divine Book
My text says that Paul left Cyprus on
the left; we, going in the opposite drec-
ton, have it on the right On our ship
Minerva We're only two or three pas
sengers beside our own party, SO we
had plenty of room to walk the deck
and oh, what night was Chri
night of 1850 in that Grecian archi-
pelago-islands of light above, islands
of beauty beneath, 1t is Il royal family
of islands, this Grecian archipelago:
the crown of the worlds scenery set
with sapphire and emerald and topaz
| and chrvsoprasus ard abaze with a
glory that seems let down out of celes-
tial landscapes. God evidently made
| up His mind that just here lie would
demonstrate the utmost that can be
done with islands for the Identification
| of earthly scenery.
| The steamer had stopped during the
night, and in the morning the ship was
as quiet as this floor, when we FASTENED
up to the deck and found that we had
anchored off the island of Cyprus. In
| a boat, which the natives rOwed stand
| ing up, as is the custom, instead of sit
| ting down as when we row, we were
| soon landed on the streets where Paul
| and Barnabas walked and preached.
Yea, when at Antioch Paul and Barna-
bias got into fight-as ministers some
times did and sometimes do, for they
all have imperfections enough to an
Choir them to this world till their work
is done, | say-when because of this
bitter controversy Paul and Barnabas
parted, Barnabas came back here to
Cyprus, which was his birthplace Is
land wonderful for history! Ithas been
the prize sometimes won by Persia, by
Greece, by Egypt, by the Saracens, by
the Crusaders and last of all, not by
sword but by pen, and that the pen of
the keenest diplomaist of the century,
Lord Beaconsfeld, who under a lease
which was as good as a purchase, set
Cyprus among the jewels of Victorias
crown. We went out into the excava-
tons from which Di Cesnola has en-
riched our American museums with
antiquities and with no better weapon
than our foot we stirred up the ground
deep enough to get a tear-bottle in
which some mourner shed his tears
thousands of years ago, and lamp
which before Christ was born lighted
the feet of some poor pilgrim on
his way. That island of Cyprus has
enough to set an antiquarian
wild. The most of its glory is
the glory of the past, and the
typhoid fevers that swept its coast and
she clouds OF locusts that often BACKED
is skies Though two hundred thousand
dollars were expended by the British
empire in one year for the extirpation
of these noxious insects, yet failing to
do the work. and the frequent change
of governmental masters, binders pros
perity. But when the islands of the
sea come to God Cyprus will come with
them, and the agricultural and COM
mercial opulence which adorned it in
ages past will be eclipsed by the agri-
cultural and c0mmercia al and reliriOus