Alma record. (Alma, Mich.) 1878-1928, 1891-11-06
LESSONS FROM PHARAOH
DR. TALMAGE CONTINUES HIS
SERIES ON EGYPT.


morning. The vast edltice filled To its
utmost capacity with eager listener,
shows how the popular preacher re-
tains his power over the people. AL
though he has been preaching in
brooklyn for more than twenty-fouI
years, his audiences were never sc
large as now, and although the largest
Protestant church in America has been
built for him there never was time
when SO many persons were turned
away for lack of room. The sub iect OF
this mornings sermon was bricks
Without Straw" continuation of the
series on the confirmation of Holy
Scripture which DIR. Talmage found in
has journey from the Pyramids to the
Acropolis. His text was, Isaiah 10 l F:
1.-THE burden Of Egypt"
In this course of sermons ] am only
serving you as footman, and clearing
the way for your coming into the won
ders of Egyptology, subject that l
would have you study far beyond any
thing that can be said in the brevlty
OF pulpit utterances Two hundred
and eighty-nine times does the bible
refer to Egypt and the Egyptians No
wonder, for Egypt was the mother of
nations Egypt, the mother OF Greece;
Greece, the mother of Rome; Rome, the
mother of England; England, the
mother of our own land. According to
that Egypt is our great-great- grand
mother. On other Sabbaths | left
you studying what they must have
been in their glory; the Hy-
postyle Hall of Karnac, the archi-
tectural miracles at Luxor, the colon
made OF Horemheb, the cemeteries of
Memphis, the value of a kingdom in
] 4. L Il.
with lips of stone speaks loud enough
to be heard across the centuries Hello
polls and Ioan, the conundrum of
archeologists But all that extrava-
gance OF palace and temple and monu-
ment was the cause of an oppression
high as heaven, and deep as he'll The
weight of those blocks of stone
heavier than any modern machinery
could lift came down upon the Hebrew
slaves, and their blood mixed the
mortar for the trowels.
We saw again and again on and
along the Nile boss workman
roughly smite "A subordinate who did
not please him. 1t is no rare occur
renee TO see long lines of men under
heavy burdens passing by task masters
at short distances, flashing them as
they go by into greater speed and then
these workmen, exhausted with the
blasting heats of the day, lying down
upon the bare ground, suddenly chilled
with the night hir, crying out in
prayer; VA Allah" "Ya! Allah!"
which means Oh! God! Oh! Cod But
what must have been the olden times
cruelty shown by the Egyptians to-
wards their lsraelitish slaves is in
dicated by a picture in the BENZ Has
san tombs, where a man is held down
on his face by two men and another
holds up the victims feet while the
officials beat the bare back of the vic
tim, every stroke, l have no doubt,
fetching the blood.
Now you see how the Pharaohs
could afford to build sucn costly
works. 1t cost them nothing for wages,
nothing but the tears and blood of the
toilers, and tears and blood are a cheap
drink for devils. Bricks without
straw may not suggest so much hard
ship until you know that the bricks
were usually made with crushed
straw, straw crushed by the feet of the
oxen in the threshing. and, this crushed
straw denied to the workmen, they
had TO pick up here and there piece
of stubble or gather rushes from the
waterside. TINS story of the bible is
confirmed by the fact that many of the
brick walls of Egypt have on the lower
layers brick made with straw. but the
higher layers OF brick made out of
rough straw, or rushes from the river
bank, the truth of the book of Exodus
thus written in the brick walls dis
covered by the modern explorers.
That governmental outrage has al
ways been characteristic of EGYPTIAN
rulers. Taxation TO the point of
starvation was the Egyptian rule in
the bible times as well as it is in our
own time. A modern traveller gives
the figures concerning the cultivation
of seventeen acres, the value of the
yield of the field stated in piastres:
frohuce...... .........................lS
HApehses' ''''''''..'..'.'.'.'..... VS.,
Clear produce. .... sOs,,
IaAes' .......................... 4B
Amount cleared by the farmer... 815IS
Or, as my authority declares, 20 per
cent. of what the Egyptian farmer
makes, is paid for taxes to the govern
ment Now that is not so much taxa
ton as assassination. What think YOU I
of that? You who groan under heavy
taxes In America? | heard that in l
Egypt the working people have a song
like this: They starve us, they starve I
us, they beat us, they beat us, but
there's some one above, there's some /
one above, who will punish them well, |
who will punish them we'll" But /
20 per cent. of government tax
in Egypt is mercy as compared
to what the Hebrew slaves suffered
there in bible times They got moth
ing but food hardly fit for dog and
their clothing was of one rag and their
roof burning sky by day and the
stars of heaven by night You say
why did they stand IT," because they
had TO stand it. You see along back
in the worlds twilight there was a
famine in Canaan, and old Jacob and
his sons came to Egypt for bread.
The old mans boy Joseph
was Prime Minister and Joseph
suppose the father and the brothers
called him Joe. for 1T does not make
any difference how much boy Is ad-
in worldly success, his father
and brothers and sisters always call
him by the same name that he was
NaaEN