The morning news. [volume] (Savannah, Ga.) 1887-1900, 1891-04-06
PLAQUES OF THE CITIES.
TALMAGE SHOWS UP TIE GREAT
SIN o. INFIDELITY.

houses of Hope
NBw YoRK, April 5-Continuing his
course OF sermons on The Ten Plaques Of
the Cities Rev. DR.. Talmage to-day took
for bis subject The Plague of Inddelity."
The discourse was delivered to large and
sppreciative audiences at the Brooklyn
Academy of Music In the forenoon and tie
New York Academy Of Music in the even
ing. The text was Romans ill.,, 4: Let God
be true, but every man liar"
That's. IL God says one thing and the
whole human race says the opposite, Paul
would accept the divine veracity. But
there are many in our time who have dared
arraign the Almighty for falsehood Inn
deity Is not only a plague. but it is the
mother OF plaques
1t seems from what we hear on all sides,
that the Christian religion is a huge blum
der; that the Mosaic account OF the creation
is an absurdity large enough to throw all
nations into rollicklug guffaw; that Adam
aud Eve never existed; that the anciens
flood and Noah's Ark were impossibiities;
that there never was a miracle that the
Bible Is the friend Of cruelty, of murder, Of
polygamy. OF all forms Of base crime: that
the Christian religion is woman's tyraue
and man's qualification; that the Bible from
lid to lid is fable. n cruelty, a humbug. a
sham, a lie that the myrtyrs who died for lis
truth were miseral dupes; that the Church
OF Jesus Christ is properly gazetted as fool:
that when Thomas Carlyle, the skeptic.
said, THE Bible isa noble book he was
dropping into imbecility; that when Theo-
dore Parker declared in Musir Hail. Boston,
Mover boy or girl in all christendoIn but
was prohted by that great book, y he was be-
coming very weak>minded: that it is some
kts 90 Eust.a Il. 4. a -
patriot that John Adams, the father OF
American Independence, declared. "The
Bible is the best book in all the world" aud
that Ion-hearted Andrew jackson turned
into snivellng coward when he said, That
book, sir, is the rock on which our republic
rests;o and that Daniel Wet ster abdicated
the throne Of his intellectual power and re-
signed his logic, and from being the
great expounder Of the constitution
and the great lawyer Of his age,
turned into an IDIOT when he
said, MY heart assures and treasures me
that the gospel OF Jesus Christ must be
divine reality. From the time that at my
mothers feet, or on my fathers knee, first
learned 20 lisp verses from the sacred writ
ings, they have been my daily study aud
Vigilant contemplation, and II there is any
thing in my style or thought TO be COM
mended, the credit is due to my kind par
ents in instllling into my mind an early
love OF the Scriptures aud that William
I'll. Seward, the diplomatist Of the century,
only showed bis puerility when he declared,
tine whole hope Of human progress is sus-
pended on the ever-growing influences Of
the Bible;" and that 1t is wisest for us to
take that book from the chrome In the affec-
tions of uncounted mulsitudes, and put 10
under our feet to DO trampled upon bv
hatred and kissing contempt; aud that YOUR
Old father was no 1dwlnked, aud cajoled,
and cheated, aud befooled, when ne leaned
on this as a staff after his hair grew gray,
and his hands were tremulous, aud his stops
shortened as he came up to the verge of the
grave; and that your mother sat with
pack of lies on her lap while reading Of the
better country, and of the ending Of all her
aches and pains. and reunion not only with
those of you who stood around her. but with
the children she had buried with infinite
heartache, so that she could read no more
until she took Off her spectacles, aud wiped
from them the heavy mist Of many tears.
Alas that for forty and fifty wears
they should have walked under this
delusion and had IL under their pill
low when they lay a-dyiug in the
back room, and asked that some words
from the old book might be cut upon the
tombstone under the shadow Of the old
country meeting house, where they sleep
to-day, waiting for resurrection that will
never come. This book, having deceived
them, and having deceived the mighty in
tellects OF the past. must not be allowed TO
deceive our larger, mightier. vaSter, more
stupendous intellects. And so out with the
book from the court room, where it Is used
in the soiemnization of testimony. Out
with 1t from under the foundation
OF church and asylum. Out with il
from the domestic circle Gather
together all the Bbles-the children's
Bibles, the family Bibles, those newly
bound, and those with lid nearly worn out
aud pages almost obliterated by the fingers
long ago turned to dust-bring them all TO-
gether, and let us make bonfire Of them,
and by it warm our cold criticism, and
after that turn under with the ploughshare
OF public indignation the polluted ashes of
that loathsome, adulterous, obscene, cruel
and deathful book which Is so antagonistic
to mans liberty, and woman's honor, and
the worlds happiness.
Now that is the substance of what inf
delity proposes and declares, and the attack
on the Bible is accompanied by great
jocosity, and there is hardly any subject
about which more mirth Is kindled than
about the Bible. | like fun; no man was
ever built with keener appreciation of it.
There is health in laughter instead Of harm
physical health, mental health, moral
health, spiritual health-proyided you
laugh at the right thing. The morning is
tizes the cataract Minnehaha, or laughing
water. You have not kept your eyes open.
or your ears alert, If you have not seen the
sea smile, or heard the forests clap their
hands, or the orchards in blossom week
aglee with redolence. Buu there is laugh
ter which is deathful, there is laughter
which has the rebound Of despair. 1t is not
healthy to giggle about God or chuckle about
eternity, or snirk about the things of the
immortal soul You know what caused the
accident years ago on the Hudson River
railroad. 1t was an intoxicated man who
for joke pulled the string OF the air-brake
and stopped the train at the most dangerous
point OF the journey. But the lightning
train, not knowing there was any impedi-
ment in the way, came down crushing out
of the mangled victims the immortal souls
that went speeding instantly to God and
Judgment 1t was only joke. He thought
it would be such fun to stop the train. He
stopped i'll And so inhdelity is chiefly
anxious to stop the train OF the Bible, and
the long train of the churches, and the long
tram Of Christian influences, while coming
down upon US are death, Judgment aud
eternity, coming thousand miles minute,
coming with more force than all the ava
lanches that ever slipped from the Alps.
coming with more strength than all the
lightning express trains that ever whistled.
or sheirked, or thundered across the CON-
tiDent.
Now in this sentiment of infdel thinkers
1 cannot join. and | propose to give you