The Kinsley graphic. [volume] (Kinsley, Kan.) 1890-1940, 1891-02-27
CURSE OF GAMBLING.
Or. Talmage Begins q Series of Ser
mons on Great Evils.
Gambling ia Every Form Denounced as a
Curse to the PsOpIe-The ResuIA
sure to BE Moral. Mental and
Financial Ruin

commenced series OF sermons at
Brooklyn and New York City on 1.-The
Ten Plaques of these Three Cities
His text was taken from Exodus, ix-1s,
IA: Let my people go that they may
serve me: for ! Will at this time send
all my plaques He said:
Last winter in the museum at Cairo,
Egypt, I saw the mummy or embalmed
body of Pharaoh, the oppressor of the
ancient 1sraelites. Visible are the very
teeth that he CRASHED against the
Israelitish brickrnal1ers. the sockets of
the merciless eyes with which he looked
upon the overburdened people of God,
the hair that fiOated in the breeze off
the Red sea, the very lips with which
he commanded them to make brick
. without straw. 1t was to compel this
tyrant to let the oppressed go free that
70 the memorable ten plaques were sent.
Sailing the Nile and walking amid the
ruins of Egyptian cities, I saw no re-
mains of those plaques that smOte the
water or the air. But there are ten
plaques still singing and befouling and
cursing our cities and like angels of
wrath shifting not only the first born
but the last born
Brooklyn, New York and Jersey City.
though called three, are practically one.
The average condition of public morals
in this cluster of cities is as good, if
not better, than in any other part of
men in all times, if they live or have
lived in a metropolis noted for dignity
or prOwess. Cesar boosted of his ma
tive Rome; Lyeurgus of Sparta; Virgil
of An des; DemOsthOnes of Athens;
Archimides of Syracuse; and Paul of
Tarsus. 1 should suspect a man of
Observation-Disclosures who carried about with
him no feeling of complacency in re-
gard to the place of his residence.
have noticed that men never like a
place where they have not behaved
we'll Men who have free rides in
prison vans never like the city that fur
nishes the vehicle. When see in his
tory Argos, Rhodes, Smyrna, Chios,
COlophOn and several other cities claim
ing Homer, 1 conclude that Homer be-
haved we'll Let US not war against
this pride OF city, nor expect to build
up ourselves by pulling others down.
In infancy the great metropolis was
laid down by the banks of the Hudson.
Its infancy was as feeble as that of
Moses, sleeping in the bullrushes by the
Nile; and, like Miriam, there our fathers
stood and watched 1t. The royal spirit
of American commerce came down to
the water to battle; and there she found
1T. She took it in her arms, and the
child grew and waxed strong; and the
ships of foreign lands brought gold and
spices to its feet; and stretching itself
up TITO EIS DTOEOEllOA-S OA q lAltIiOAJDiIE
it has looked up to the mountains and
off upon the seattle mightiest of the
energies of American civilization.
Grand old New York! What southern
thOroughfare was ever smitten by pes
thence, when our physicians did not
throw themselves upon the sacrifice:
What distant land has cried out in the
agony of famine, and our ships have not
put out with breadstuffs? What street
of Damascus, or BeyrOut or Madras that
has not heard the step of our mission
aries? What struggle for national life
in which our citizens have not poured
their blood into the trenches? What
gallery OF exquisite art, in which oui
painters have not hung their pictures;
What department of literature or science
to which our scholars have not con
tributed?
need not speak of the institutions
for the blind, the lame, the deaf and the
dumb, for the incurables, the widow,
the orphan and the Outcast; or of the
thousand armed machinery that sends
streaming down from the reservoirs the
clear, the bright, the sparkling, God
given water that rushes through oul
aqueducts and dashes out of the
hydrants. All this premise in open
ing this course of sermons on the tel
plaques of these three cities, lest some
stupid man might say I am deprecatinS
you to-day concerning the plague o
gambling Every man aAd woman il
this house ought TO be interested in thi
theme.
Gambling is the risIking of somethin.
more or less valuable in the hope 0
winning more than you hazard. Tn
instruments of gaming may differ, bu
the principle is the same The shufi1ins
and dealing cards, however full of temp
tation. is not gam bling unless stake
are put up; while on the other han'
gambling may be carried on withou
cards or dice or billiards or a ten phi
alley. The man who bets on horses, OF
elections, on battles-the man VIII
deals IN fancy" stocks or conducts
business which hazards extra capital o
goes into transactions without fOunda
ton, but dependent upon what men cal
s'lucl,' is a gambler. Whatever yo
expect to get from your neighbOr with
out Offering an equivalent in money o
time mr. skill is either the product q