The Penn's Grove record., 1891-05-01
.RET. DR.. IALNAGE'S SERMON.
The brooklyn Divire's Sunday
Sermon,
Subject. "7he Bril1iancy OF Re-
Hyion."

St6ject:' "1he Brihfdncy OF ne
Hyion."
TEXT: "Thc crystal cannot equal a.
Job xviii, 4.
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 infdel
chemist or mineralogist would pronounce
the latter worth more than the former, but
job makes IN intelligent comparison, looks
at religion and then looks at the crystal md
pronounces the former as of superior value
TO the latter, exclaiming, in the words ofmy
text, t crystal annot equal it"
Now, it is not q part of my sermonic de-
found in Cornish mine or Hartz mountain or
Mammoth Cave or linking among the PEN
dants of the chandeliers Of a palace. The
crystal is the star OF the mountain; 1t is the
queen of the cave; 1t Is the eardrop OF the
hills; it finds its heaven in the diamond.
Among all the pages of natural history there
Is no page more Interesting to me than the
| page crystallographic. But l want to show
you that Job was right when, taking religion
in one and and the crystal in the other, he
declared that the former is OF far more value
and beauty than the latter, recommending it
70 all the people and to all the ages, declarl
I oEs Tut VIZ bbdi ChluDb tuudi v .i
In the first place, I remark that religion L.
superior to the crystal in exactpess. That
shnpeless 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 1t is a square. or It IA
lisa rectangle, or it Is a rhomboid, or in some
way 1t hath a 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
counting wrong. though He counts the grass
blades. and the stars, and the sands, and the
| cycles. His providences never dealing with I'd
perpendicularly whom 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 a six sided prism. Born at the right time,
dying at the right time. There are no 'hapi
| pen sosn in our theology. II l thought this
was a slipshod universe l would go crazy.
God is not an anarchist. Law, order, sym
rnetry, precision, a perfect square, a perfect
rectangle, a perfect rhomboid,. q perfect cir
clel The edge Of Gods robe of government
never trays out. There are no loose screws
in tho worlds machinery. 1t did not just
happen that Napoleon was attacked with in1
digestion at Borodino so that he became in!
competent for the day. 1t did rot just hap-I
zen that John Thomas, the missionary, on a
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 r. W. Robertson's dog, he
tells us, led to a line of events which brought
him from the army into the Christian min
I .-A,zr r-Iara h. ro-uaA GaI rutth -rA~lI 80
nowned usefulness. 1t did not merely hap
pan SO. l believe in a particular providence.
/ believe God geometry may be seen In all
our life more beautifully than in c~rystallog-
raphy. Job was right. 1.-THE crystal cannot,
equal it."
Again I remark that religion is superior
to the crystal In Transparency. We know
not when or by whom glass was FIRST dis
covered. Beads Of 1t ave been found In the
tomb of Alexander Severus. Vases Of it are
hrouQkt up from the ruins OF Herculaneu,n.
There were female adornments made out,
Of 1t three thousand years ago-those adorn-i
pents found now attached to the mum,
fnies of Egypt. A great many comment
tators believes that my text means glass.
What would we do without the crystalfI
The crystal in the window to keep out the.
storm and let in the day; the crystal over
the watch defending its delicate machinery,
yet allowing US to see the hour; the crystal
/ OF bl0 beltScopc, Dy Wulcu bu8 ubbT0uOmeI
brings distant worlds so near he can inspect
them. Oh, the triumphs Of the crystals.
in the celebrated windows Of Rouen and
| S~alisburyl
But there Is nothing so transparent In o.
crystal as in our holy religion. Itfsa trans
parent religion. You put it to your eye and
You see man-his sin. his soul, his destiny.
You look at God and you see something Of
the grandeur Of His character. 1t Is a trans
parent religion. 1nfdels tell US It is opaquen
| DO you know why they tell US It is opnquef
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
l be opened. When the eye salve cures our
blindness then we find that religion Is trans
parent.
tains of the Bible come ~out-Sinai, the noun
| tain of the law; Pisgah, the mountain Of
prospect; Oiivet, the mountain of instruc-,,
| ton: Calvary, the mountain Of sacrifice. Ali
| the rivers of the Bible COME out-Hfdskel, orr
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!
under the throne, clear as crystal. While
reading this Bible after our eyes have been.
| touched by grace we find 1t all transparent,
| and the earth rocks now with crucifixionl
agony and now with Judgment terror, and
| Christ appears in some of His two hundred
and hfty-six titles, as far as | can count them
the bread, the rock, the captain. the COM
mander, the conqueror, the star, and on and
| beyond any capacity Of mine to rehearse
| them. Transparent religionl
The providence that seemed dark before
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; 1t was to prepare you
came, it being the precursor of immortal
| iuvenescence. And now you understand
why they lied about you and tried to drive
YOU hither and thither. It was to put you
In the glorious company Of such men as
Ignatius, who. when he went out to be de-
| and the teeth OF the wild beasts must first
| grind me before l can become pure bread for
| Jesus Christi 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: ssfhe lions for Folycarp," replied: Let
\ them come on snd then stopped down to-
ward the cave where the wild beasts were
| roaring to get outs Let them come on -
| An. yes il IS persecution to put you in glo-
rious company; and while there are many
things natyou VIII nave 10 postpone TO the
| future world for explanation, / tell you that
it is the whole tendency of your religion to
unrayel and explain and interpret and H.
lumiue andirradiate. Job was right. 1t is G
glorious transparency. "lhe crystal cannot
remark again that religion surpasses the
crystal in its beauty. That lump Of crystal
is put under the magnifying glass of the
crystailographer, and he sees in it indescrib-
able beauty-snowdrift and splinter of hoar
frost and corals and wreaths and stars and
crowns and oscillations of conspicuous
beauty. The fact Is that crystal Is SO beau.
| the universe that is so beautiful, and that is
the religion of the Bible. No wonder this
Bible represents that religion as the day.
Of a kings banquet. II Is the Joy Of The
! whole earth. <,
feople talk too much about their cross and
| 10. aiIsngn about their crown Do you Know
/ sia Bible mentions a cross but twenty-seven
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