Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1892-03-21
LORD OF THE STARS.
Lessons From the Pleiades and Orion
by the Prophet Amos,
AS INTERPRETED BY DIR. TALMAGE.
Order, Justice and Beneyolence Of God Typi-
fed in Astronomy.
TEACHINGS OF HISTORIC TwINKLERS

Or. Talmage traverses wide realms o.
thought to teach useful, everyday Lessons
based on the text, Amos ", s: "Seek hin
that maketh the seven stars and Orion"
a country farmer wrote this text-Amos
of Tekoa. He plowed the earth and threshet
the grain by new threshing machine jus
invented, as formerly the cattle trod out the
grain. He was the son OF poor shepherd
and suffered; but before the stammerinG
rustic the Philistines, and Syrians, and
Phenicians, and Moabites, and Ammonites
and Edomites and Israelites trembled.
Moses was q 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 prophecy full
OF the odor of new-mown hay, and the rattle
oflocusts. He watched the herds by day,
and by night inha pited a booth made out of
bushes, so that through these branches he
could see the stars all night long, and was
more familiar with them than we who have
tight roofs to our houses, and hardly ever
see the stars except among tine tall brick
chimneys of the great towns. But at sea.
sons of the wear 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 silvered tassels
OF lunar light
Why Amos Studied the Stars.
What a life of solitude, all alone with his
herds, Poor Amos. So Amos, like other
herdsmen, got the habit or studying the
map OF the heavens, because it was so much
OF the time spread out before him. He no.
ticed some stars advancing and others re-
ceding. He associated their dawn and set
ting with certain seasons Of the year. He
q
night, and month by month, and year by
year, the poem of the consultations, di-
vinely rhythmic.
But two rosettes of stars especially at
tlacted his attention while seated on the
ground or lying on his back under the open
scroll of the midnight heavens-the Plei-
ades or Seven Stars, and Orion. The former
group this rustic prophet associated with
the spring, as it rises about May l. The lat
ter he associated with the winter, as it
comes to the meridian in January. The
Pleiades. or Seven stars, connected with all
sweetness and joy; Orion, the herald of the
tempest The ancients were the more apt
to study the physiognomy and juxtaposition
of tie heavenly bodies, because they
thought they had a special influence upon
the earth; and perhaps they were right Ii
the moon every few hours lifts and lets
down the tides OF the Atlantic Ocean, and
the electric storms of the sun, by all scien-
ti1ic 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 SUI
perstition which connected the movements
ard appearance of the heavenly bodies
with great moral events on earth.
Some Famous stars of History.
Did not q meteor run on evangelistic er-
rand on the first Christmas night, and desig-
nate the rough cradle of our Lordo Did not
the stars in their courses fight against Sis
era? Was it merely coincidental that be-
fore the destruction of Jerusalem the moon
was cciipsed for II consecutive nights? Did
it merely happen so that a new star ap.
peared in constellation Cassiopeia and then
disappeared just before King Charles IX, of
France, who was responsible for the st.
out significance that III the days of the Ro-
man Emperor Justinian war and famine
were preceded by the dimness of the sun,
which for nearly year gave no more light
than the moon, although there were no
clouds to obscure ii?
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
Enotted fingers, the pen of prophet, and
advised the recreant people of his time to
return TO God. This command, which Amos
gave 1s5 wears 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 1t was
NOT SO DluCll Il Sl;if mere anu q star there
that impressed the inspired herdsman. but
seven in one group and seven in the other
group. He saw that night after night and
season after season and decade after decade
thew had kent step of light each one in its
own place, sisterhood never clashing and
never contesting precedence.
Order Sedative for Troubled Spirits.
What a sedative to you and me, to whom
communities and nations sometimes seem
going pell-mell, and the world ruled by some
fend at haphazard, and in all directions
nlaladministration. The God who keeps
seven worlds in right circuit for 60O0 years
can certainly keep all the affairs of individ-
uals and nations and continents in adjust
nent. If God can 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.
In your occupation, your mission, your
sphere, do the best you can, and then trust
to God; and If things are all mixed and dis
quicting, and your brain is hot and your
heart sick, get some one to go 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
namely, 2U0 stars in the Pleiades, and that
in what is called the sword of Orion there is
q nebula computed to be :, 200 coo. 600 600 times
larger than the sun. Oh, be peace with
the God vino made all that and controls all
rhat-the wheel of the consultations turning
in the wheel of galaxies for thousands of
years without the breaking of a cog or the
slipping OF band or the snap of an axle.
Again, Amos saw, we must see, that the
God who made these two groups of the text
was the God of light Amos saw that God
was not satisfied with making one star or
two or three stars, but he makes seven; and
having finished that group of worlds, makes
another group-Sroup after group.
Gods Remarkable Love of Light
1t seems that God likes light so well that
he keeps making it. Only one being in the
universe knows the statistics of solar lunar
stellar, meteoric creations and that is the
Creator himself And they have all been
lovingly christened, each one a name as dis
tinct as the names of your children. HE
telleth the number of the stars. he calleth
them all by their namesn
But think of the billions and triIlions of
daughters OF starry light that God calls bv
name as they sweep by him with beaming
brow and lustrous robe, So fond is God Of
light-natulal light, moral light snfritual
light. Again and again is Tight hs messed
for symbOliZatlon-Christ, the bright and
morning star, evangeliZation, the da ybrea k:
the redemption of nations, sun of righteous.
ness rising with healing in His wings Oh
men and women, with so many sorrows and
sins and perplexities. if you want light of
comfort, light of pardon, light of goodness
in earnest prayer through Christ, seek Him
that maketh the Seven Stars and Orion ;,
Again, Amos saw, We must see that tho
God who made these two archipelagoes of
stars must be an unchanglng God There
had been no change in the stellar appear.
auce in this herdsman's life time, and his
father, q shepherd, reported to him that
there had been no change in his life time
rial arbor now just as they were the first
night that they shone on the Edenic bowers
the same when the Egyptians built the
Pyramids from the top of which to watch
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