Democratic Northwest. [volume] (Napoleon, Ohio) 1869-1894, 1891-12-10
Ok TALMAGE In ATHENS
WONDERS or THE AcRoPouIs AND
Irs SUGGESTIONS.

1@'~- - A~etattys
BROOKLYN, Nov e2.-The congregation
at the Tabernacle, led by cornet and organ,
Gang this morning with great power the
hymn OF Isaac Watts, beginning:
Our God. our help in ages past
Our hope for years to come.
The sermon, which was on tile Acropolis,
h the sixth Of the series DIR. Talmage is
preaching on the subjects suggested by his
tour in Bible lands. His text was taken
from Acts xvii, 10, "While Paul waited
for them at Athens his spirit was stirred
In him, when he saw the city wholly given
70 idolatry."
It seemed as II morning would never
come. We had arrived after dark in. Ath
ens, Greece, and the night was sleepless
with expectation, and my watch slowly
announced to me one and. two and three
and four o'clock; and at the first ray of
dawn called our party to look out of tbs
window upon that city to which Paul said
he,WRzua debtor, and to which the whole
earth a. debtor for Greek architecture,
Hreek sculnfuf - Greek poetry, Greek elo-
quence, 9Be<k proaess and Greek history.
: Thxt mornInR ~ Athens we sauntered
Forth armed With most generous and lovely
lettsFs ftcsn she president of the United
States aud his secretary of state, and dur
Ing all eur stay In that city those letters
caused every door and every gate and every
temple and every palace to swing open be-
fore u.s. The mightiest geographical name
en- earth today Is America. The signature
Of an American president and secretary Of
state will take man where an army could
not. Those names brought US into the
presence of a most gracious and beautiful
sovereign, the queen of Greece, and her
oordiality was moro like that of sister
than the occupant OF q throne room. Nc
formal bow as when monarchs are ap-
preached, but q cordial shake of the hand,
and earnest questions about our personal
welfare and our beloved country far away.
But this morning we pass through where
stood the Agors, the ancient market place.
the locality where philosophers used to
meet their disciples, walking while they
talked, and where Paul, the Christian 10
gician, flung many proud Stole and got
the laugh ON many Gn impertinent Epi-
curean. The market place was the center
of social and political life, and 1t was the
place where people went TO tell and hear
the news B, Jths and bazaars were set up
Cor merchandise of all kinds except meat,
but everything must be sold for cash, and
there must he no lying about the value Of
commodities, and ehe Agoranomi who
ruled the place could infiict severe punish
ment upon offenders. The different schools
of thinkers had distinct places set apart
for convocation. The PlateRns must meet
ct the cheese market, the Decelians at the
barber shop, the sellers Of perfumes at the
frankincense headquarters
The market place was aspace three hun
dred and fifty yards long and two hundred
and fifty wide, and it WIS given up to gos-
uip and merchandise, and lounging and
philosophzing. All this.you need to know
In order to understand the Bible when it
says of Paul Therefore disputed he in the
market daily with them that met him."
You see it was the best place to get an au.
dience, and If q man feels himself called to
preach he wants people to preach to. But
before We make our chief visits of today
we must take a turn at the Stadium. 1t Is
q little way out, but go we must. The
Stadium was the place where the footraces
occurred.
THE RACE IN THE STADIUM.
Paul had been out there no doubt, for he
frequently uses the scenes Of that place as
figures when he tells US, "Let US run the
race that is set before u.s." and again
"They do it to obtain corruptible gar
land, but we an ncorruptible." The
marble and the gliding have been removed
but the high mounds against which ths
seats were piled are still there. The Stadium
Is six hundred and eighty feet long, one
hundred and thirty feet wide, and he'd
forty thousand spectators. There is today
the very tunnel through which the defeat
IA Fa1 tba tod i'm mud
from the Kisses of the people, and there are
the stairs up which the victor went to the
top of the hill to be crowned with the
laurel.
In this place contests with wild beasts
sometimes took place, and while Hadrian
the emperor, sat on yonder height one
thousand be lsts were slain In one celebra
ton. But it was chiefly for foot racing
and 80 proposed to my friend that day
while we were in the Stadium that we try
which Of US could run the sooner from eDd
10 end of this historical ground, and Sc al
the word given by the lockers on we started
side by side, but before | got through
found out what Paul meant when he Ct n
pares the spiritual race with the race in
this very Stadium, as he says, Lay asite
svery weight" My heavy overcoat and
my friends freedom from such incIrr
branoe showed the advantage in any kind
sf race of "laying aside every weight"
We come now to the Acropelis. Il is 9
rock about two miles in circumference al
NE base and thousand feet in circumfer
snce at the top and three hundred feet
high. On it has been crowded more slAb
srate architecture and sculpture than In
any other place under the whole heavens
Originally q fortress, afterward = congre
cation of temples and statues and pillars
their ruins an enehantment from which
40 observer ever breaks away. No won
der that Aristides thought 1t the center oi
Ill things-Greecs, the center Of the world
Attica, the center of Greece; Athens, the
ssnter Of Attica, and the Acropolis the
ssnter of Athens. Earthquakes have
shaken it, Verres plundered It,
Lord Elgin, the English ambassador q,
Constantinople, got permission Of the
sultan to remove from the Acropolis fallen
pieces of the building, but he took from
the building to England the finest statues
removing them at an expense OF sisnt
hundred thousand dollars A storm ever.
threw many of the statues of the Acropolis.
Morosini, the general. attempted to re-
move from a pediment the sculptured car
and horses of Victory, but the clumsy ma
ehinery dropped it and all was lost
The Turks turned the building into a
powder magaHine where the Venetian guns
dropped fire that by explosion sent the
columns flying in the air and falling
cracked and splintered. But after all that
time and st m and war and iconoclasm
have effected the Acropolis Is the monarch
Of all ruins, ard before it bow the learning,
the genius, the poetry, che art, the history
Of the ages. Isaw it as it was thousands
Of years ago. had read 80 much about ii
and dreamed 90 much about 1t that need
ed no magician's wand to restore it.
At one wave of my hand on that clear
morning in 1889 1t rose before me in the
glory 1t had whas Pericles ordered It and