The Abbeville press and banner. [volume] (Abbeville, S.C.) 1869-1924, 1892-04-06
REV. DIR. TALMAGE.
THE BROOKLYN DiVINE'S SUN
DAY SERMON.
Subject: "Divinity in the stars"


Stars and Orion."-Amos v, 8.
A country farmer wrote this text-AmoS
of Tekoa. He plowed the earth and thrashed
the grain by new thrashing machine just
invented, as formerly the cattle trod out the
grain. He gathered tho fruit Of the syca-
more tree and scarified it with an iron comb
just before it was getting ripe, as it was
necessary and customary in that way to take
from it the bitterness. He was the con or q
poor cSepherd and suffered, but before the
stammering rustic the Philistines and Syr-
fans and Phenicians and Moabites and Am
monites and EdomiteS and Israelites trem-
bled.
Moses was a law giver, Daniel was
prince, Isaiah a courtier and David king;
but Amos the author of my text was
peasant, and, as might be supposed. nearly
all his parallelisms are pastoral his proph.
ecy full of the odor Of new mown hay. and
the rattle Of locusts, and therumble Of carts
with sheaves aud the roar Of wild beasts
devouring the flock while the shepherd came
out in their defense. He watched the herds
by day, and by night inhabited 9 booth
made out of bushes so that through these ne
could see the stars all night lotg, and was
more familiar with them than we who have
tight roofs to our houses and hardly ever see
the stars, except among the tall brick
chimneys of the great towns. But at sea-
sons Of the years when the herds were In
special danger. he would stay out in the open
field all through the darkness his only
shelter the curtain Of the night heaven, With
the stellar embroideries and silver tassels OF
lunar light.
What life OF solitude, all alone with his
herds! Poor Amos! And at 10 o'clock at night
hark to the VOLTS bark, and the lions roar,
and the bears growl. and the owls te-whit-
y, rs ha
tingly steps too near while moving through
the thickets! So Amos, like other herdsmen,
got the habit Of studying the map OF the
heavens, because it was Sc much OF the time
spread out before him. He noticed some
stars advancing and others receding. He
associated their dawn and setting with GER
tain seasons of the year. 81 had poetic
nature, and he read night by night, and
month by. month, and year by year. the
poem of the consultations dlvinely
rhythmic. But two rosettes OF stars espe-
cially attracted his attention while seated on
the ground or lying on his back under the
open scroll of the Midnight heavens-the
Pleiades, or Seven Stars, and Orion. The
former group this rustic prophet associated
with the spring, as it rises about the first OF
May. The latter he associated with the
winter, as it comes to the meridian IN Janu-
ary. The PleiadeS, or Seven Stars, con-
uected with all sweetness and joy; Orion,
the herald Of the tempest. The ancients
were the more apt to study the physiosnomy
and juxtaposition Of the heavenly bodies,
because they thought they had special in
fuence upon the earth, and perhaps they
were right. If the moon every few hours
lifts and lets down the tides Of the Atlantic
ocean, and the electric storms Of the sun, by
all scientific admission, affect the earth, why
not the stars have proportionate effect?
And there are some things which make me
think that it may not have been all super
stition which connected the movements and
appearance of the heavenly bodies with
great moral events on earth. Did not me
teor run on evangelistic errand on the first
Christmas night and designate the rough
cradle OF our Gords Did not the stars in
their courses fight against Siseca? Was it
merely coincidental that before the destruc-
ton OF Jerusalem the moon was eciipsed for
twelve consecutive nightsf Did 1t merely
happen so that new star appeared IN con-
stellation Cassiopeia, and then disappeared
Just before King Charles TX Of France, who
was responsible for the st. Bartholomew
massacre, died? Was without significance
that in the days Of the Roman emperor JUS
tinian war and famine were preceded by the
dimness of the sun, which for yearly year
gave no more light than the moon, although
GQer6 were no CLOUDS IOODSCuT0 IL.
Astrology, after all, may have been some
thing more than brilliant heathenism. No
wonder that Amos of the text, having heard
these two anthems of the stars, put down
the stout rough staff of the herdsman and
took into his brown hand and cut and
knotted fingers the pen Of prophet and
advised the recreant people OF his time to
return to God, saying Seek Him that
maketh the the Seven Stars and Orion"
This command, which Amos gave 7S5 years
B. c., is just as appropriate for US, 1892
A. D.
In the first place, Amos saw, as we must
see, that the God who made the Pleiades
and Orion must be the God Of order. It
was not 80 much star here and star
there that impressed the inspired herdsmau,
but seven in one group and seven in the
other group. He saw that night after night
and season after season and decade after de-
.ade they had kept step Of light, each one in
Its own place, and sisterhood never clashing
and never contesting precedence. From the
time Hesiod called the Pleiades the 'tseyen
daughters Of Atlas" and Virgil wrote in his
.Eneid Of STORMY Orion" until now, they
coming and going; order written not in man.
uscript that may be pigeonholed, but with
the hand Of the Almighty on the dome OF the
sky, so that all nations may read it. Order.
Persistent order. Sublime order. Omnipo-
tent order.
What sedative to you and me- to whom
communities and nations sometimes seem
going pellmell, and world ruled by some
6end at haphazard and in all directions
maladministration !! The God who keeps
seven worlds in right circuit for six thous-
of individuals ana nations and continents in
adjustment We had not better fret much,
for the peasants argument Of the text was
right. II God car take care Of the seven
worlds OF the Pleiades and the four chief
worlds of Orion, He can probably take care
Of the one world we inhabit.
So feel very much as my father felt one
\ day when we were going to the country mill
to get grist ground, and /. a boy Of seven
years, sat in the back part Of the wagon, and
our yoke of oxen ran away with us and along
aIabyrinthiner road through the woods, so
that thought every moment we should be
dashed to pieces, and made terrible out.
cry of fright, and my father turned to me
with face perfectly calT, and said: "De
Witt, what are you crying about? 1 guess
we can ride as fast as the oxen can run"
And hearers, why should we. be affrighted
and lose our equilibrium in the swift move
Went Of worldly events, especially when We
are assured that it is not yoke Of unbroken
Steers that are drawing US on, but that or
der and wise government a:e in the yoke!
In your occupation, your mission, your
sphere do the best you can and then trust
TO God; and if all things ara all mixed and
disquieting, and your brain is hot and your
heart sick, get some one to 60 out with you
into the starlight and point out to you the
Pleiades, or, better than that get into some
observatory, and through the telescope see
further than Amos with the naked eye could
nancy, TWO nundreL stars IN tne fielades,
and that in what is called the sword of Orion
there is nebula computed to be two trillion,
two hundred thousand billions times larger
than the sun. Oh, beat peace with the God
who made all that and controls all that-the
wheel of the consultations turning in the
- -Io 0p 80