Alma record. (Alma, Mich.) 1878-1928, 1891-10-23
GOSPEL OF PYRAMIDS.
DR.. TALMACE'S DISCOURSE AT
BROOKLYN TABERNACLE.
The First OF series of Sermons on
His Eastern Tour-"Wh 4 Saw
I'm Egypt aud Greece Confirmatory
OrthescrIpiures-.

ItnNA u VII lAlo NAnANAh ANAi
entitled "WhaJ | saw in Egypt and
Greece confrmatory of the scr ptures. "
HIS text was Isaiah 10: 10, 20; ''ln that
day shall there be an altar to the Lord
in the midst of the land of Egypt and
a pilar at the border thereof To the
ord. And il shall be for sign and
for witness
Isaiah no doubt mere refers TO the
great pyramid at Gizeh, the chief
pyramid of Egypt. The text speaks
OF pi lar in Egypt, and this is the
grea e,t pillar ever LITE /; and the
text saws it is 10 be at the border of
the land, and this pyramid is at the
| border of the land; ana the text SAYS
it shall be for witness. and the oh
| ivct of this sermon is 10 tell what this
pyramid witnesses.
We had, on morning OF December,
lss9, landed in Africa. Amid the
bowling boatmen at Alexandria we
had come ashore and taken the rail
train for Cairo, Egypt, along the
banks of the most thoroughly har-
messed river of all the w rld-the river
/ Nile. We had, at even-tide, entered
the city of Cairo, the cIty where
/ Christ dwelt win staying in Egypt
! during the Herodic persecution. 1t
was our first night in Egypt.
But how can | describe the thrill of
/ expectat ion, 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 halfs ride Thou h
there are siXty-nine pyramids still
standing, the pyramid of Gizeh is the
monarch of pyramids.
| We stand under the shadow of a
I -. lao q, oil - i
and a / the sky and we look up and
strain our vision to appreciate the dis
! tant top, and are overwhelmed whilo
we cry The pyramid! The pyramid
! -Four thousand years old at least.
had started chat morning with the
determination of ascending the pyra-
mid. One of my chief obJec in going
TO Egypt was not only 70 see the base
of that granite wonder, but to stand
on the top of it Yet the nearer |
came TO this eternity in stone the more
my determination was sh ken. Its
altitude to me was simply appalling.
a great height has always been To me
n most disagreea BILE sensation As we
dismounted at the base of the pyra-
mid l said Others may go
up il, but not ]. will
satisfy myself with view from
the base. The ascent of il would be to
me foolhardy undertaking. But
after / had given up all idea of ascend
ing, | found my daughter was de-
termined TO go, and | uld not let her
go with strangers, and l changed my
mind and we started with guides. 1t
cannot be done without these helpers
Two or three times foolharJy men
have attempted it alone, but their
bodies came tum bling down unre- og-
nizable and lifeless. Each person in
our party had two or three guides or
helpers One of them unrolled his tur-
ban and tied it around my waist and
he held the other end of the tur-
ban as matter of safety. Many
Of the blocks of stone are four
or five feet high and beyond any
ordinary human stride unless assisted.
But, two Arabs to pull and two Arabs
to push, found myself rapidly ascend
ing from height TO height and on, to
attitudes terrific, and AT last at the tip
top we found ourselves on leve-
space of about thirty feet square.
Through clearest atmosphere we
looked off upon the desert. ana off
upon the winding Nile, and off upon
the Sphinx with its features of ever
lasting stone, and yonder upon the
minarets of afro glittering in the sun,
and yonder upon Memphis in ruins,
and off UPON the wreck of empires and
the battle-helds of ages, a radius of
view enough to fill the mind and shock
the nerves and overwheIm ones entire
Icing.
After looking around for awhile. and
| n kodack had pictured the group, we
descended. The descent was more
trying than the ascent, for climbing
you need not see the depths beneath.
but coming down il was impossible not
TO see the abvsms below. But two
Ara rs ahead TO help us down, and two
Ara los TO hold us back, we were low
cred hand below hand, until the
ground was invitingly near, and amid
the iargon of the Arabs we were safe
~ landed. Then came one of the most
wonderful feats of daring and agility.
One of the Arabs solicited dollar,
saying he would run up and down the
pyramids in seven minutes We would
rather have given him dollar not to
90, but this ascent and descent in seven
minutes he was determined on and SO
by the watch in seve minutes he went
TO the top and was back again at the
base
NudI an hnIlqulty! IL was aJ ledSt
1000 years old when the baby Christ
was carried within sight OF it by his
fugitive parents, Joseph and Mary.
The storms of forty centuries have
drenched, bombarded it, Swallowed it.
flashed upon it, but there it stands
ready to take another forty centuries
OF atmospheric attack if the world
should continue TO exist. The oldest
buildings of the earth are juniors to
this great senior of the centuries
Herodotus says that for ten years pre-
parations were being made for the
building of this pyramid. 1t has
So, III. 200 cubic feet of masonry. One
hundred thousand workmen at one
time tolled in ITS erection. 10 bring
the stone from the quarrlcs cause
way 90 feet wide was built. The top
stones were lifted by machinery such
as the world knows nothing of to-day.
1t is 74G fe { each side Of the base.
The structure is $50 feet high, higher
than the cathedrals of Cologne. Stras-
burg, Eouen, ~. Peters, and ~.
iaurs. No surprise to me that il was
put at the head of the seven wonders of
the world.
/ wonder not that tins mountain of