Marble Hill press., 1892-05-19
THE DUMB DEVIL.
x0U MUST KEEP AN EYE OPEN
FOR HIM,
Or Else. Says DIR. Talmage. You Will
Suffer the Conscquences-A Memors-
BILE Sunday Sermon In Tabernacle
Pulpit, Brooklyn.


cumbent upon christians of embracing every
opportunity that offers in this life to do good
and to advance the cause of the kingdom OF
Christ by a bold acknowledgment of their
principles before men. The text selected was
Mark Q: .. Thou dumb and deaf spirit
charge thee come out of him"
Here was a case of great domestic
anguish. The son of the household
was possessed of an evil spirit which,
among other things, paraly his
tongue and made him speechless
When the influence was on the patient
he could not say word-articulation
was impossible. The spirit that capt
ured this member of the household
was dumb spirit-so-called by Christ
"a spirit abroad to-day aid as lively
and potent as in New Testament times.
Yet in all the realms of sermonology, l
cannot find discourse concerning this
dumb devil which Christ charged upon
in my text, saying: Come out OF
him."
There has been much destructive su-
perstition abroad in the world concern
ing possession by evil spirits. Under
the torn of belief in witchcraft, this
delusion swept the continents Persons
were supposed to be possessed with
some evil spirit which made them able
to destroy Others In the Sixteenth
century, in Geneva, 1.5OO persons were
burned to death as witches. In one
neighborhood of France 1000 persons
were burned. In two centuries 200, 900
persons We're slain as witches So
mighty was the delusion that it in
cluded among it's victims some of the
greatest intellects of all time, such
as Chief Justice Matthew Hale and
Sir Edward Coke, and such re-
nowned ministers of religion as Cot
ton Mather, one of whose books, Ben
jamin Franklin said, shaped his life
and Richard Baxter. aud Archbishop
Cranmer, and Martin Luther: and,
among writers and philosophers, Lord
Bacon. That belief, which has become
the laughing stock of all sensible peo-
pile, counted its disciples among the
wisest and best people of Sweden, Ger
many, England, France. Spain and
New England. But, while we reject
witchcraft. any man who believes the
bible must believe that there are dia-
bolical agencies abroad in the world.
While there are ministering spirits to
bless, there are Internal spirits to him
der, to poison and to destroy. Christ
was speaking to spiritual existence,
when, standing before the afflicted one
of the text, he said, "Thou dumb and
deaf spirit. come out of him."
Against this dumb devil of the text,
l put you on your guard. Do you think
that this agent of evil has put his
blight on those who, by omission of the
vocal organs, have lad the golden
gates of speech bolted and barred.
Among those who have never spoken a
word are the most gracious and lovely
and talented souls that were ever in.
carnated. The chaplains OF the
asylums for the dumb can tell you en-.
chanting stories of those, who never
called the name of father of mother OF
child, and many of the most devou,
and prayerful souls will never, in this
world, speak the name of God or Christ
Many a deaf mute have seen with the
angel of intelligence seated at the win
dow of the eye, who never came forth
from the door of the mouth. What
a miracle of loveliness and knowledge
was Laura Bridgman of New Hamp
shire, not only without faculty O.
speech, but without hearing and with
out sight. all these faculties removed
by sickness when two years of age
vet, becoming wonder at needle
work. at the piano, at the sewing ma
chine, and an intelligent student of thu
Scriptures, and confounding philoso
phers, who came from all parts of th'
world to study the phenomenon
Thanks to Christianity for what it ha
done for the amelioration of the condi
ton of the deaf and the dumb. Bacl
in the ages, they were put to death a
having no right, with such paucity 0
equipment, to live, and for centuries
they were classed among the IDIOT
and unsafe But IN the sixteenth
came Pedro Ponce, th'
AniS6 monk; and in the seventeenth
lssn4sYy came Juan Pablo Bonet
another spanish monk, with dacsylol
nry ~ the finger alphabet; and 10 on
own century, We have had John Braid
wood and Drs. Mitchell and Ackerl,
l and Peet and Gallaudet, who have give
70 uncounted thousands Of those who's
tongues were forever silent, the powe
TO- spell out on the air by q manua
alphabet their thoughts about thi
world and their hopes for the next
We rejoice in the brilliant invention
in behalf of those who were borl
dumb. One Of the most impressive au
.diences ever addressed was in the fl
West two or three yeare ago-an au
.dicnce OF about 6G0 persons, who ha,
never heard sound or spoken word
an interpreter standing beside m