Connecticut western news., 1891-10-22
BUILD FOR ETERNITY.
GUeiIME LESSONS TAUGHT BY THE
 GREAT PYRAMID OF GIzEH.


 Entitled, "From the Pyramids to the
 Acropolis," Enforcing and Illustrating
 the Truths of Scripture.
 BROOKLYN, Oct. 19.-The vast cen at the Brooklyn Tabernacle this morning was delighted by an ea- quisite rendering, by Professor Henry Eyre Browne, on the new organ, of Denier's second sonata in G. Dr. Talmage's sermon was the first of a series he intends preaching on his east ern tour, entitled, From the Pyramids to the Acropolis, or What I Saw in Egypt and Greece Confirmatory of the His text was Isaiah xix, 19, 20: 'In that day shall there be an altar to tue Lord in the midst of the land of Egypt and pillar at the border thereof to the Lord. And it shall be for a sign and for witness"
 Isaiah no doubt here refers to the great pyramid at Gizeh, the chief pyra mid of Egypt The text speaks of pillar in Egypt, and this is the great est pillar ever lifted; and the text says it is to be at the border of the land, and this pyramid is at the border of the land; and the text says it shall be for a witness, and the object of this sermon is to tell what this pyramid witnesses. This sermon is the first of a course of sermons entitled, "From the Pyramids to the Acropolis, or What I Saw in Egypt and Greece Con- firmatory of the Scriptures.
 We had, on Q morning of December, 1889, landed in Africa. Amid the howl ing boatmen at Alexandria we had come ashore and taken the rail train for Cairo, Egypt, along the banks of the most thoroughly harnessed river of all the world--the river Nile. We had, at eventide, entered the city of Cairo, the city where Christ dwelt while staying in Egypt during the Herodic persecu- ton. It was our first night in Egypt. No destroying angel sweeping through as once, but all the stars were out and the skies were filled with angels of beauty and angels of light, and the air was balny as an American June. The next morning we were early awake and at the window, looking upon palm trees in full glory of leafage, and upon gar dens of fruits and flowers at the very season when our homes far away are by bleak skies and the last leaf of the forest has gone down with the equinoctials.
 But how can describe the thrill of for today we are to see what all the world has seen or wants to see-the pyramids. We are mount ed for all hour and halfs ride. We pass on amid bazaars stuffed with rugs and carpets and curious fabrics of all sorts from Smyrna, from Algiers, from Persia, from Turkey, and through streets. where we meet people of all colors and all garbs, carts loaded with garden productions, priests in gowns, women in black veils, Bedouins in long and seemingly superhuous apparel, Janissaries in jackets of embroidered gold-out and on toward the great pyramid; for though there are sixty nine pyramids still standing, the pyra mid at Gizeh is the monarch of pyra- mids. We meet canels grunting under their load, and see buffaloes on either side browsing in pasture fields
 The road we travel is for part of the way under clunps of acacia, and by long rows of sycamore and tamerisk, but after awhile it is 8 path of rock and sand, and we find we have reached the margin of the desert, the great Sahara desert, and we cry out to the dragoman as we see a huge pile of rock looming in sight, "Dragoman, what is that2' His answer is, ''The pyra- mid," and then it seemed as if we were living century every minute. Our thoughts and emotions were too rapid and intense for utterance, and we ride on in silence until we come to the foot of the pyramid spoken of in the text, the oldest structure in all the earth, four thousand years old at least. Here it is We stand under the shadow of a structure that shuts out all the earth and all the sky, and we look up and strain our vision to appreciate the dis tant top, and are overwhelmed while we cry, "The pyramid! The pyramid l"
 "AFRAID OF THAT WHICH IS HIGH"
 I had started that morning with the determination of ascending the pyra- mid. One of my chief objects in going to Egypt was not only to see the base of that granite wonder, but to stand on the top of it. Yet the nearer I came to this eternity in stone the more my determination was shaken. Its altitude to me was simply appalling. A great height has always been to me a most disagreeable sensation. As we dis1nounted at the base of the pyramid I said: "Others may go up it, but not l. I will satisfy myself with a view from the base. The ascent of it would be to me foolhardy undertak- ing"
 But after had given up all idea ot ascending found my daughter wss de ter1nined to go, and could not let hel go with strangers, and I changed my mind, and we started with guides. IL cannot be done without these helpers. Two or three times foolhardy men have attempted it alone, but their bodies
 came tumbling down unrecognizable
 and lifeless. Each person in our party
 had two or three guides or helpers. One
 of them unroIed his turban and tied il
 around my waist, and he held the other
 end of the turban as matter of safety
 Many of the blocks of stone are four ol
 five feet high and beyond any ordinary
 human stride unless assisted. But, two
 Arabs to pull and two Arabs to push
 found myself rapidly ascending iron
 height to height, and on to altitude
 terrific, and at last at the tip top W
 found ourselves on level space o
 -l l~s c.