The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1891-10-09
1TALMAGE'S SERMON.
The March OF Christ Through the
Passing Centuries.
The Footsteps OF the Redeemer Followed
from Bethlehem to Calvary and
Down Through the Sue
cecdinE Ages.


following sermon in the Brooklyn tab
ernacle, taking for his text:
On his head were many crowns.-Revela-
tIons XIX. II
May your ears be alert and your
thoughts be eoncentered, and all the
powers Of your soul aroused, while
speak to you of ''the march of Christ
through the centuries" You says''give
MS then good start, in rooms of YER
million and on floor of mosaic and
amid corridors of porphyry end under
canopies eyed in all the splendors of
the setting sun" You can have no
such starting place. At the time our
.Chieftain was born, there were castles
on the beach of Galilee, and palaces at
Jerusalem, and imperial bath rooms at
Jericho, and obelislzs at Cairo and the
Pantheon at Rome, with it's corinthian
sportico and its sixteen granite columns;
and the Parthenon at Athens with its
.glistening coronet Of temples;and there
were mountains Of fine architecture in
many parts of the world. But none of
sthem were to be the starting-p place Of
the Chieftain / celebrate
:. A cows stall, a winter month, an at
mosphere in which are the means of
camels and the baying of sheep and
the barking of dogs aud the rough ban
ter OF hostleries. He takes His first
Journey before He could walk. Armed
desperadoes with hands of blood were
ready to snatch Him down into butch
cry. Rev. William II. Thompson, the
veteran and beloved missionary, whom
i saw this last month in Denver, in bis
eighty-sixth year, has described, in his
volume entitled. ''The Land and the
Book" Bethlehem as he saw it. Win
ter before last / walked up and down
the gray hills of Jura limestone on
which the village now rests The fact
that King David had been born there
had not during ages elevated the viii
lage into any special attention. The
.other fact that it was the birthplace of
our Chieftain did not keep the place in
after years from special dishonor, for
.Hadrian built there the grove of Adonis
and for one hundred and eighty years
the religion there observed was the
most abhorrent debauchery the
Chieftain was considered dam
gerous from the start. The world
has put suspicious eyes upon Him
astrologers had seen stellar commo-
tions, a world out of its place and shoot
ing down toward caravansary. Star
divination was a science. As late as
the eighteenth century it had its vo-
taries- At the court of Catherine de
Medici it was honored Kepler, one of
the wisest philosophers that the world
ever saw, declared it was true science.
AS late as the reign of Charles IL, Lilly.
an astrologer, was called before the
house of commons in England to give
his opinion as to future events For
ages the bright appearance of Mars
meant war; of Jupiter, meant power;
of the Pleiades, meant storms at sea-
And as history moves in circles, / do
not know but that after awhile it may
be found that as the moon lifts the
tides of the seas and the sun affects
the growth or blasting of crops, other
worlds besides these two worlds may
have something to do with the destiny
of individuals and nations in this world
do not wonder that the connections
in the heavens-excited the wise men on
the night our Chieftain was born. AS
, He came from another world and after
thirty-three years was again to change
worlds, il does not seem strange to
me that astronomy should have felt
the effect of His coming. And instead
of being unbelieving about the one star
that stopped / wonder that all the
worlds in the heavens did not that
Christmas night make some special
demonstration. Why should they leave
to one world or meteor the bearing of
the news of the humanization of Christ?
Where was Mars that night that it did
not indicate the mighty wars that
were to come between righteousness
and iniquity2 Where was Jupiter that
night it did not celebrate omnipotencc
incarnated? Where were the Pleiades
that night that they did not announce
the storms of persecution that would
assail our Chieftain?
1t watching this march of Christ
through the centuries, we must not
walk before Him or beside Him, for
that would not be reverential or wor-
shipful. So we walk behind Him. We
follow Him, while not yet in His teens,
up Jerusalem terrace, to a building
six hundred feet long and six hundred
feet wide, and under the lowering
splendor of gatewavs, and by pillar
crowned with capital chiseled into the
shape of flowers and leaves, and along
by walls of beveled masonry, and near
marble screen. until group of white
haired philosophers and theologians
gather around Him, and then the boy be-
wilders and confounds, and overwhelms
these scholarly septuagenarians with
questions they can not answer, and un-
der His quick why's and whyfors, and
-hows and whens, they pull their white
boards with embarrassment and rub
their wrinkled foreheads in confusion,
and putting their staff hard down on
the marble door as they rise to go, they
must feel like Gliding the boldness that
allows twelve years of age to ask
seventy-fve years of age such puzzles.
Out of this building we follow Him
into the Quarantania, the mountain of
temptation, its side to this day black
with robbers dens. Lool1l Up the
side of this mountain, come all the
forces of perdition to effect our Chief
tain's capture. But, although weak
ened by forty days and forty nights of
abstinence, He hurls all Pandemonium
down the rocks, suggestive of how He
can hurl into helplessness all our temp
tations And now we climb right after
Him, up the rough sides of the Mount
of Beatitudes," and on the highest pull
pit of rocks, the Valley of Hatin before
Him. the lake of Galilee 70 the right