Connecticut western news., 1892-04-28
AT THE TABERNACLE.
DR. TALMAGE SCORES THE IDLERS,
 TRlFLERS AND FLOATERS.


 Soon Discover That the Id1er Is Not
 Susceptible to Religious Truth.
 BROOKLYN, April 24.-A visitor to the Brooklyn Tabernacle this morning would have no difficulty in understand ing the secret of the attraction which fills the vast building Sunday after Sum- day with throngs of eager listeners. Avoiding abstruse theological subjects, Dr. Talmage preached a sermon on a practical topic giving shrewd common sense lessons of inestimable value to his hearers, especially to the young people who make up large part of his congre- gation. His text was Proverbs xii, 27, ''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 at some time they had been out on a hunting expedition. Spears, lapces, swords and nets were employed in this service. A deep pitfall would be digged. In the center of 1t there was some raised ground, with 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 a fa- vorite 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 appro- priate to the wild chase lets slip the bloodthirsty hounds from their kennels, and mounting his fleet horse, with a hal loo and the yell of the greyhound pack they are off and away, through brake and dell, over marsh and moor, across chasms where a misstep would hurl horse and rider to death, plunging into mire up to their launches or into swift streams 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.
 
 chase, my text represents this sportsman as being too indolent to dress the game and prepare it for food. He lets it lie in the dooryard of his home and become a portion for vermin and beaks of prey. Thus by one master stroke Solomon gives a picture of laziness, when he says, "The slothful man roasteth not that which he took in hunting." The most of hunters have the game they shot or entrapped cooked the sam even- ing 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 coals.
 A BEAUTIFUL PICTURE.
 The first picture 1 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, panting from the chase, are ly- ing on the doorsill, and the hunter is unshouldering the game, while the housewife is about to take portion of it and 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 lassitude and improvidence and absurdity were depicted in my text. The most of those who have made dead failure of life can look back and see a time when a great opportunity opened, but they did not know it.
 They were not as wise as George Stephenson, "the father of railways, who, when at sixteen years of age he re- ceived an appointment to work d pump ing engine for twelve shillings week, cried out, "Now, am 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 blow your land, I will lend you some. If you want land, will give you some. If you want seed to SOW your land, 1 will see that you get it. but will encourage none in idleness. | So God gives to most people an oppor. tunity of extrication from depressed cir cumstances.
 AS if to create in us hatred for in dolence, God has made those animals which are sluggish to appear loathsome in our eyes, while those which are fleet and active he has clothed with attract iveness. The tortoise, the sloth, the snail, the crocodile repel us, while the deer and the gazelle are as pleasing aS they are fleet, and from the swift wing. of innumerable birds God has spared nc purple or gold or jet or crimson or snowy 1 whiteness. Besides all this the Bible i! constantly assaulting the vice of lazi 1 ness. Solomon seems to order the idlel out of his sight as being beyond all hu man instruction when he says, "Go tt the ant, thou sluggard; consider hel ways and be wise" And Paul seems tC drive him up from his dining table, be fore he gets through with the first cours, of food, with the assertion, If any vii not work, neither shall he eat"
 Now, what are the causes of lazines and what are its evil results? I knew , man who was never up to time. l seemed impossible for him to meet al engagement. When he was to be mar ried he missed the train. His watcl seemed to take on the habits of its owne and was always too slow. He had 1; constitutional lethargy, for which he di' not seem responsible. So indolence oftel arises from the natural temperament
 do not know but that there is consti tutional tendency to this vice in ever. man. However active you may gener ally be, have you not on some warn spring day felt touch of this feeling ol you. although you may have shaken i off as you would reptile? But som are so powerfully tempted to this b. their bodily constitution that all thu work of their life has been accomplished with this lethargy hanging on their bacl or treading on their heels.
 You sometimes behold it in childhood