Fort Worth gazette. [volume] (Fort Worth, Tex.) 1891-1898, 1892-03-24
And the Rough Shepherd Boy
Took Up His Pen
ND WROTE AS A PROPHET.
Seek Him That Naketh the Seven Stars and
Orion and Return to God.
The Moon Lifts and Lets Down the Tides
Every Few Hours-Hny Not the
Stars Have Some Influence
on Humanity's Courze7
God Of the Starr.

you u INC
Special to the Gazette.
Brooklyn, N. Y, March 2O-In this ser
mon DR. Talmage traverses wide realms o.
thought to teach useful everyday lessons
based on the text, Amos V, s: 'sSeek hin
that maketh the seven stars and Orion"
A country farmer wrote this text-AmoS
Of Tekoa. He plowed the earth anC
threshed the grain by new threshing ma
chine Just invented as formerly the cattle
trod out the grain. He gathered the fruit
of the sycamore tree and scarifed it with
an iron comb just before ii was getting ripe
as 1t was necessary and customary in that
way to take from it the bitterness. He was
tue son OF poor shepherd, and suffered
but before the stammering rustic the Phil
istlnes. and Syrians, and PhBnicians, and
Moabites, and AmmOnites, and Edomites
and Israelites trembled.
Moses was a law-giver; Daniel was q
prince Isaiah a courtier, and David king
but Amos, the author of my text, was a
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 of locusts, and the rumble of
carts with sheaveS, and the roar of wild
beasts devouring the flock while the shep-
herd came out in their defense. He
watched the herds by day, and by night in
habited booth made out of bushes, so that
through these branches he could see the
with them than we who have tight roofs to
our houses and hardly ever zee the stars.
except among the tall brick chimueys of
the great towns. But at seasons Of the
year when the herds were in special dan
ger, 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.
What a life of solitude, all alone with his
herds Poor AmOsl And at u o'clock at
night, bark to the VOLTS bark, and the
lions roar and the BEARS growl, and the
OWLS te-whit-to-who, and the serpent's
hiss, as he unwittingly steps too near while
moving through the thickets. So Amos,
like other herdsmen. got the habit of
studying the map Of the heavens. because
II was so much of the time spread out be-
fore him. He noticed some stars advanc-
Ing and others recedlng. He associated
their dawn and setting with certain sea-
sons OF the year He had poetic nature,
and he read, night by night, and month by
month, and year by year, the poem of the
consultations, divinely rhythmic. But two
rosettes of stars especially 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 as
ISOLATED with the spring, as it rises about
the first Of Nav. The latter he associated
with the winter as it comes TO the merld-
ian in January. The Pleiades, or seven
stars, connected with all sweetness and
Joy; Orion, the herald Of the tempest. The
Rncients were the more apt 20 study the
physioguomy and jUxtaposition of the
heavenly bodies, because they thought they
had q special influence upon the earth, and
perhaps they were right. If the moon
every few hours lifts sad let's down the
tides OF the Atlantic ocean, and the cleo
trio storms Of the sun, by all scientific ad-
mission affect the earth why not the stars
have proportionate eifect}
And there are some things which make
me think that it may not have been all su-
perSutiOn which connected the movements |
and appearance of the heavenly bodies with |
great moral events on earth. Did not a |
msteOr run on evangehstic errand on the !
first Christmas night and designate the /
cradle of our Lordl DID not the stars in 1
their courses fight against Sisera2 Was it |
merely coincidental that before the destruc- |
ton Of Jerusalem the moot was eclipscd |
for twelve consecutive nightSl Did it I
merely happen so that new star appeared |
in constellation Cassiopeia and then disap- |
peared Just before King Charles IN of |
France, who was responsible for the st. Bar
tholomew massacre, died} Was it without !
that in the days OF the Roman
Emperor JUstiniRn war and famine were
preceded by the dimness OF the sun. which
for nearly a year gave no more light than |
the moon, although there were no clouds to
obscure it,
Astrology. after all, may have been some
thing more than brilliant heatheuism.
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 |
kpotted fingers the pen OF prophet, and
advised the reCreant people OF his time TO !
NNsaaN IL d,
naketh 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
snd Orion must be the Goa Of order. 1t
was not so much q star here and starther
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 dec
de, they h ad kept step Of light, each one
n its own place, siSterhOod never clash
ng and never contesting precedence. From
he time HeSiod called The PleiadeS the
seven daughters Of Atlas" and Virgil |
wrote in his -A,neid of STORMY Orionn
Until now, they have observed the order
established for their coming and going;
irder written not in manuscript that may |
be pigeon-holed, but with the hands Of the
Almighty on the dome OF the sky, so that all ! /
rider. Sublime order. Omnipotent order
What sedatiYe &c you and me, to whom
and nations sometimes seem
'oing pell-mell, and world ruled by some I
lend at hap-hazard, and in all directions
The God who keeps
even worlds in right circuit for COCO {
ears can certainly keep all the affairs /
+ individuals and nations and continents s
n adjustment We had not better fret I
much, for the PEASANTS argument of the S
ext was right. II God can take care of the
even worlds of the Pleiades and the four
hief worlds of Orion, he can probably take !
are of the one world we iahaDit
L feel very much as myfather felt one day !
hen we were going to the country mill 70 a
ct grist ground, and I, 5 boy Of seTen j