Connecticut western news., 1892-11-03
THE WARNING TO FLY

DR. TALMAoE POINTS TO THE BIRD MIGRATION AS A LESSON FOR MAN. How the Prophets Studied Nature-They
 Make Music as They Fly-They Know
 Their Times, They Fly in Season, but
 Man Is Less Wise. ...s....
 BROOKLYN, Oct. 30.-The futter of bright colored leaves which every wind blows from the trees in the avenues around the Tabernacle reminded the thousands who entered its doors this morning that winter is approaching. Dr. Talmage, with his usual tact, turned the impression to account in his sermon, which was on the text, Jeremiah viii, 7, "The stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times, and the turtle, and the crane, and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the Lord"
 When God would set fast beautiful thought, he plants it in tree. When he would put it afoat, he fashions it into fish. When he would have it glide the air, he molds it into a bird. My text speaks of four birds of beauti- full instinct-the stork, of such> strong affection that it is allowed familiarly to come, in Holland and Germany, and build it's nest over the doorway; the sweet dispositioned turtledove, min gling in color white and black and brown and ashen and chestnut; the crane, with voice like the clang of 8 trumpet; the swallow, swift as dart shot out of the bow of heaven, falling, mounting, skimming, sailing -four birds started by the prophet twenty-five cen .turies ago, yet flying on through the ages, with rousing truth under glossy wing and in the clutch of stout claw. I suppose it may have been this very season of the year-autumn-and the prophet out of doors, thinking of the impenitence of the people of his day, hears great cry overhead.
 Now you know it is no easy thing for one with ordinary delicacy of eyesight to look into the deep blue of the noon day heaven; but the prophet looks up, and there are focks of storks and turtle doves and cranes and swallows drawn out in long lines for flight southward. As is their habit, the cranes had ar ranged themselves into two lines mak- ing an angle, 8 wedge splitting the ai.' with wild velocity, the old crane, with commanding call, bidding them onward while the towns, and the cities, and the continents slid under them. The prophet, almost blinded from looking into the dazzling heavens, stoops down and be- gins to think how much superior the birds are in sagacity about their safety than men about theirs, and he puts his hand upon the pen and begins to write, "The stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times, and the turtle, and the crane, and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the Lord.''
 THE LORDS MARCHING ORDERS.
 If you were in the field today, in the clump of trees at the corner of the field you would see convention of birds, noisy as the American congress the last night before adjournment, or as the English parliament when some unfor- tunate member proposes more economy in the queens households convention of birds all talking at once, moving and passing resolutions on the subject of migration; some proposing to go to- morrow, some moving that they go to- day, some moving that they go to Bra gil, some to Florida, some to the table lands of Mexico, but all unanimous in the fact that they must go soon, for they have marching orders from the Lord, written on the first white sheet of the frost and in the pictorial of the changing leaves.
 There is not 8 belted kingfsher, or 8 chaffinch, or fire crested wren, or a blower, or red legged partridge but expects to spend the winter at the south, for the apartments have already been in Africa, and after thousands of miles of flight they will stop in the very tree where they spent last January. Fare we'll, bright plumagel Until spring weather, awayl Fly on, great band of heavenly musiciansl Strew the conti- nents with music, and whether from northern fields, or Carolina swamps, or Brazilian groves men see your wings or hear your voice, may they bethink them selves of the solemn words of the text, 'The stork in the heaven knoweth her appointed times, and the turtle, and the crane, and the swallow observe the time of their coming; but my people know not the judgment of the Lord."
 Ipropose, SO far as God may help me, this morfing, carrying out the idea of the text, to show that the birds of the air have more sagacity than men. And begin by particularizing and saying that they mingle music with their work. The most serious undertaking of birds life is this annual travel from the Hud- son to the Amazon, from the Thames to the Nile. Naturalists tell us that they arrive there thin and weary and plum age rufled, and yet they go singing all the way; the ground, the lower line of the music, the sky, the upper line of the music; themselves, the notes scattered up and down between.
 suppose their song gives elasticity to their wing and helps on with the jour- ney, dwindling thousand miles into four hundred. Would to God that we were as wise as they in mingling Christian song with our everyday work! believe there is such thing as taking the pitch of Christian devotion in the morning and keeping it all the day. think we might take some of the dullest, heaviest, most disagreeable work of our life and set it to the tune of Antioch" or "Mount PisgahS
 INSPIRING EFFECTS OF SONG.
 It is good sign when you hear 8 workman whistle. It is 8 better sign when you hear him hum roundelay. It is still better sign when you hear him sing the words of Isaac Watts or Charles Wesley. A violin chorded and strung, if something accidentally strike it, makes music, and I suppose there is such thing as having our hearts so at. tuned by divine grace that even the rough collisions of life will make a heavenly vibration. I do not believe