The Globe-republican., 1892-05-09
Good Game Wasted.


DR.. Talmage's text was Proverbs xii,
-, The slothful man roasteth not that
which he took in hunting"
David and jeremiah and Ezekiel and
Micah and Solomon of the text showed
that some time they had been out on
hunting expedition. Spears, lances,
swords and nets were employed in this
service. A deep pitfall would be digged.
II the center of it there was some raised
ground with a pole on which lamb,
would be fastened, and the wild beast not
seeing the pitfall, but only seeing the
lamb would plunge for its prey and dash
down, itself captured. Birds were
caught in gins or pierced with arrows.
The hunters in olden time had two mis-
siOns-one to clear the land of ferocious
beasts, and the other to obtain meat for
themselves and their families. The oc-
cupation and habit of hunters are
favorite Bible simile. David said he was
hunted by his enemy like a partridge
upon the mountain. MY text is hunt
ing scene.
A sportsman arrayed in garb ap-
propriate to the wild chase lets slip the
bloodtbirsty hounds from their kennels,
and mounting his fleet horse, with
halloo and the yell of greyhound pack
they are off and away, through brake
and dell, over marsh and moor. across
chasms where misstep would hurl horse
and rider to death, plunging into mire
up to the launches or into swift stres ms
up to the bit, till the game is tracked by
dripping foam and blood. and the antlers
crack on the rocks. and the hunter has
just time to be in at the death. Yet
after all the haste and peril of the chase,
my text represents this sportsman as be-
ing too indolent to dress the game and
prepare it for food. He lets it lie in the
dooryard of his home and become Dor
ton for vermin and beaks of prey. Thus
by one master stroke Solomon gives q
picture of laZiness, when he says, 1.-THE
slothful man rOasteth not that which he
took in hunting" The most of hunters
have the game they shot or entrapped
cooked the same evening or the next day,
but not so with this laggard of the text.
Too lazy to rip off the hide. Too lazy to
kindle the fire and put the gridiron on
the Goals.
The first picture l ever bought was an
engraving of Thorwaldsen's Autumn"
The clusters of grapes are ripe on the
vine of the homestead, and the returned
hounds, painting from the chase, are ~
ing on the doorSill and the hunter is I'M
shOuldering the game, while the house,
wife is about to take a portion of it ard
prepare it for the evening meal. Unlike
the person of the text, she was enough
industrious to roast that which had been
taken in hunting. But the world has
had many specimen since SOlomOn's
time Of those whose lasstude and i'm
providence and absurdity were depicted
in my text The most of those who have
made a dead failure of life can look back
and see a time when great opportunity
opened, but they did not know il.
They were not as wise as George
Stephenson, ''the father of railways"
who, when at 16 years of age he re-
ceived an appointment to work at
pumping engine for twelve shilIings a
week, cried out, "Now, / am a made
man for life" God gives to most men at
least one good opportunity. A great
Grecian general was met by group of
beggars, and he said to them: IF you
want beasts to pillow your land will lend
you some. If you want land l will give
you some. If you want seed to SOW your
land, will see that you get it. But
will encourage none in idlenesS." So
God gives to most people an opportunity
of eXtrication from depressed circum-
stances. AS if to create in us a hatred
for Incidence. God has made those ami
mails which are sluggish to appear lOath-
some in our eyes, while those which are
feet and active he has clothed with at
Effectiveness.
The tortoise. the sloth. the snail, the
Lo o,~l
the gazelle are as pleasing as they are
fleet, and from the swift wings of in
Vulnerable birds God has spared no pur-
pie or gold or jet or crimson or snowy
whiteness. Besides all this, the Bible is
constantly aSsaulting the vice of lazi-
ness. Solomon seems to order the idler
out of his sight as being beyond all hui
man instruction when he says: go to
the ant, thou sluggard; consider her
ways and be wise" And Paul seems to
drive him up from his dining table be-
fore he gets through with the first course
Of food with the assertion, ''lf any will
not work, neither shall he eat"
Now. what are the causes of laZinesS
and what are its evil results? KNEW a
man who was never up to time. 1t
seemed impossible for him to meet an
engagement. Nnen ne was TO De mar
ried he missed the train. His watch
seemed to take on the habits of its
owner, and was always too slow. He
had constitutional lethargy for which
he did not seem responsible. So in
dolence often arises from the natural
temperament l do not know but there
is constitutional tendency to this vice
in every man. However active you may
generally be, have you not on some warm
spring day felt touch of this feeling on
you. although you may have shaken it
off as you would q reptile? But some
are so powerfully tempted to this by
their bodily constitution that all the
work of their lite has been accomplished
with this lethargy hanging on their back
or treadinS on their heels.
You sometimes behold it in childhood.
The child mopinG and lounging within
doors while his brothers and sisters are
at play, or il he join them he is behind
in every race and beaten in every game.
His nerves, his muscles, his bones are
smitten with this palsy. He vegetables
rather than lives, creeps rather than
walks, yawns rather than breathes.
The animal in his nature Is stronger