The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1891-05-06
REV. DR.. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DIVINES SUN.
DAY SERMON.
Subject 1.-The Brilliancy Of Religion. !"

! 1EHT: Inc crystal cannon eqUdt w. -
Job xviii, z.
! Many of the precious stones of the Bible
have come to prompt recognition. But for
the present take up the less valuable crys-
tai. Job, in my text compares saving wis.
dom with a specimen Of topaz An inhdel
! chemist or minoralogist would pronounce
the latter worth more than the former, but
Job makes an intelligent comparison, looks
at religion and then looks at the crystal and
pronounces the former as OF superior value
to the latter, exclaiming, in the words of my
text ''The crystal cannot equal it,
Now, it is not part of my sermonic de-
sign to depreciate the crystal, whether it be
found in Cornish mine or Hartz mountain or
dants of the chandeliers of q palace. The
crystal is the star of the mountain; it is the
queen of the cave; it is the eardrop of the
hills; it finds it's heaven in the diamond.
Among all the pages of natural history there
is no page more interesting to me than the
page crystallographic. But want to show
you that Job was right when, taking religion
in one hand and the crystal in the other, he
declared that the former is of far more value
and beauty than the latter, recommending it
to all the people and to all the ages, declar-
ing, 1.-THE crystal cannot equal it,"
| In the first place, remark that religion is
superior to the crystal in e1actness. That
shapeless mass Of crystal against which you
accidentally dashed your foot is laid out
with more exactness than any earthly city.
There are six styles Of capitalization, and all
of them divinely ordained. Every crystal
has mathematical precision. Gods geometry
reaches through it, and it is square, or it is
is a rectangle, or it is rhomboid, or in some
way it hath mathematical figure. Now,
religion beats that in the simple fact that
spiritual accuracy is more beautiful than
material accuracy Gods attributes are
exact Gods law exact. Gods DEGREES exact
Gods management Of the world e2act-neVer
! counting wrong, though He counts the grass
blades. and the stars, and the sands, and the
cycles. His providences never dealing with us
perpendicularly when those providencesought
to be oblique, nor lateral when they ought to
be vertical. Everything in our life arranged
without any possibility of mistake: Each
life six sided prism Born at the right time,
| dying at the right time. There are no hap
pen SOS" in our theology. If thought this
was slipshod universe I would go crazy.
God is not an anarchist. Law, order, SYM
metry, precision, a perfect square, perfect
| rectangle, perfect rhomboid, perfect cir
Gle. The edge of Gods robe Of government
never trays out. There are no loose screws
in the worlds machinery. 1t did not just
happen that Napoleon was attacked with ln-
digestion at Borodino so that he became in
competent for the day. 1t did not just hap
zen that John Thomas, the missionary, on
heather island, waiting for an outfit and
orders for another missionary tour, received
that outfit and those orders in a box that
, foated ashore while the ship and the crew
that carried the box were never heard Of.
The barking of F. W Ro5ertson's dog, he
tells us, led to line of events which brought
him from the army into the Christian min
istry, where he served God with world re-
nowned usefulness. 1t did not merely hap
pen so. believe in particular providence.
/ believe Gods geometry may be seen in all
our life more beautifully than in crystallog-
raphy. Job was right. "The crystal cannot
equal it."
Again remark that religion is superior
to the crystal in transparency. We know
not when or by whom glass was arst as aLs
covered. Beads of it have been found in the
tomb of Alexander Severus. Vases of it are
brought up from the ruins of Herculaneum.
There were female adornments made out
of it three thousand years ago-those adorn-
ments found now attached to the num-
mics of Egypt. A great many commen-
tators believes that my text means glass
What would we do without the crystal?
The crystal in the window to keep out the
storm and let in the day: the crystal over
the watch defending its delicate machinery,
vet allowing us to see the hour; the crystal
Of the telescope, by which the astronomer
brings distant worlds so near he can inspect
them. Oh, the triumphS Of the crystals
in the celebrated windows OF Rouen and
Salisbury!
But there is nothing so transparent in
crystal as in our holy religion. Its trans.
parent religion. You put it to your eye and
you see paan-his sin. his soul, his destiny:
You look at God and you see something OF
<ba nf nor I iS a trans
parent religion. Infidels tell us it Is Opaque?
Do you know why they tell us it is Opaque?
! 1t is because they are blind. The natural
man receiveth not the things of God because
they are spiritually discerned. There is no
trouble with the crystal; the trouble is with
the eyes which try to look through it. We
pray for wisdom, Lord, that our eyes might
be opened When the eye salve cures our
| blindness then we find that religion is trans
/ parent.
:, It is transparent Bible. All the noun
tains Of the Bible come out-Sinai, the noun
! tain of the law: Pisgah, the mountain OF
, prospect; Oliyet, tho mountain Of instruc-
ton; Calvary, the mountain Of sacrifice. All
the rivers of the Bible come out-Hidekel or
the river Of paradisaical beauty; Jordan, Or
/ the river Of holy chrism; Cherith, or the
river of prophetic supply; Nile, or the river
of palaces, and the pure river Of life from
| reading this Bible after our eyes have been
touched by grace we find it all transparent,
and the earth rocks now with crucif1ion
agony and now with judgment terror, and
Christ appears in some Of His two hundred
and fifty-sx titles. as far as can count them
the bread, the rock, the captain, the COM
rnander, the conqueror, the star, and on and
beyond any capacity of mine to rehearss
them. Transparent religion.
\ hat. ,DI do r1r hnfN
becomes pellucid. Now you find God is not
trying to put you down. Now you under.
stand why you lost that child, and why you
lost your property; il was to prepare you
for eternal treasures. And why sickness
came, it being the precursor of immortal
! juvenescence. And now you understand
why they lied about you and tried to drive
you hither and thither. 1t was to put you
| in the glorious company Of such men as
| IgnatiuS, who when he went out to be de-
/ stroyed by the lions, said: Il am the wheat,
and the teeth of the wild beasts must first
grind me before can become pure bread for
Jesus Christ or the company of such men as
| Polycarp, who, when standing in the midst
| of the amphitheatre waiting for the lions to
come out of their cave and destroy him, and
the people in the galleries jeering and shout
ing: The lions for Polycarp," replied Let
them come on, and then stopped down to-
ward the cave where the wild beasts wera
roaring to get out: "Let them come on. '
Ah. yes. it is persecution to put you in glo-
rous company. and while there are many
things that you will have to postpone to the
future world for explanation, tell you that
it is the whole tendency Of your religion to
unravel and explain and interpret and il
Iumiue and irradiate. Job was right: 1t fs
glorious transparency. ''The crystal cannot
equal it."
L remark again that religion surpasses the
crystal in it's beauty. That lump Of crystal
| :, ,rt ,,ndor tho maonifyinp plass Of the