Daily tobacco leaf-chronicle. (Clarksville, Tenn.) 1890-1895, 1891-11-23
DIR. TALMAGE in ATHENS
WONDERS OF THE ACRoPoLls AND
ITS SUGGESTIONS.

BROOKLYN, Nov % The congregation
at the Tabernacle, led by cornet and organ,
sang 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 the Acropolis,
Is the sixth of the series DIR. Talmage is
preaching on the subjects suggested by his
tour in Bible lands. Ills 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
to idolatry."
IL seemed as II morning would never
come We had arrived after dark in Ath-
ems, Greece, and the night was slcepless
with expectation and my watch slowly
announced to me one and two and three
and four O'clock and ut the first ray of
dawn l called our party to look out of the
window upon that city TO which Paul said
he was a debtor, and to which the whole
earth is debtor for Greek architecture,
Greek sculpture, Greek poetry, Greek elo-
quence, Greek prowess and Greek history.
That morning in AAiens we sauntered
forth armed with most generous and lovely
letters from the president Of the United
States and his secretary Of state, and dur
ing all our 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
on earth today is America. The signature
Of an American president and secretary of
state will take IA man where an army could
not. Those names brought us into the
presence of II most gracious and beautiful
sovereign, the queen of Greece, and her
cordially was more like that of sister
than tho occupant Of throne room. Nc
formal bow as when monarchs are APP
preached, but a cordial shake of the hand
and earnest questions about our personal
welfare and orr beloved country far away
But this morning we pass through where
stood the Agora, the ancient market place,
the locality where philosophers used to
meet their disciples walking while they
talked, aud where Paul, the Christian 10
gician, flung many proud Stole and got
the laugh on many an impertinent Epi
curean. The market place was the center
OF social and political life, and it was the
place where people went to tell and hear
the news Booths and bazaars were set up
for merchandise of all kinds except meat,
but everything must be sold for cash, and
commodities, aud the Agoranomi who
ruled the place could inhict severe punish
ment upon offenders. The different schools
Of thinkers had distinct places set apart
for convocation. The PHtmans must meet
at the cheese market, the Dccelians at the
barber shop, the sellers Of perfumes at the
frankincense headquarters.
The market place was u space three hun.
bred and fifty yards long and two hundred
and fifty wide and il was given up to eos
sip and merchandise, and lOunging and
philosophizing. All this you need to know
in order TO understand the Bible when it
says Of Paul, "lhcrefore disputed he i'm the
market daily with them that met him. "
You see it was the best place TO get an au.
dience, and If a man feels himself called TO
preach he wants people to preach to. But
before we make our chief visits of today
we must take turn at the Stadium. 1t IS
n little way out, but go we must. The
Stadium was the place where the footraces
occurred.
TUE 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 1t TO obtain a cOrruptibe gar
land, but we IN lncOrruptbIe." The
marble and the gliding have been removed,
but the high mounds against which the
seats were piled are still there The Stadium
is six hundred and eighty feet long, one
hundred and thirty feet wide, and held
forty thousand spectators. There is today
the very tunnel through which the defeat
ed racer departed from the Stadium and
from the Kisses Of the people, and there are
the stairs up which the victor went TO the
top of the hill to bo crowned with the
laurel.
In this place contests with wild beasts
sometimes took place, and while lladrian,
the emperor, sat on yOnder height one
thousand beasts were slain in one celebra
ton. But it was chiefly for foot racing,
and so proposed to my friend that day
while we were in tho Stadium that we try
which Of us could run the sooner from end
to end of this historical ground, and 50 at
the word given by the lockers on we started
side by side, but before got through
found out what Paul meant when he com.
paras the spiritual race with the race in
this very Stadium, Us he says, Lay aside
every weight" My heavy oyercoat and
my friends freedom from such incum-
brauce showed the advantage in any kind
of a race of laying aside every weight"
We come now to the AcrOpois, 1t is a
rock about two miles in circumference ut
the base and a thousand feet in circumIer
ence at the top and three hundred feet
high On it has been crowded more clab-
crate architecture and sculpture than in
any other place under the whole heavens.
Originally fortress, attcrward a COngre
cation of temples and statues and pillars,
thor ruins an cnchantment from which
no observer ever breaks away. No won
der that Aristides thought it the center Of
all things-GreeCe, the centor of the world,
Attica, the center OF Greece, Athens, the
center of Attica, and the Acropolis the
center of Athens Earthquakes have
shaken it, Nerres pluudcred it.
Lord Elgin, the English ambassador at
Constantinople, got permission of the
sultan to remove from the Acropuiis fallen
pieces of the building, but he took from
the building To England the finest statues,
removing them at an expense of eight
hundred thousand dollars. \ storm over.
threw many of the statues OF the Aovopols
Morosini, the general, attempted to re
move from pedimeut the sculpured car
and horses Of Victory, but the clumsy ma
shinery dropped it and all was lost.
The Turks turned the building into a
powder magazine where the Venetian guns
dropped a fire that by explosion sent the
columns flying ia the air and falling
cracked and splintered. But after all that
time and storm and war and iConoclasm
have effected, the Acropolis is the monarch
of all ruins, and before it bow the learning,
the genius, the poetry, the art, the history
of the ages. ! saw IL as 1t was thousands
of years ago. had read SO much about it
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