Herald and news. [volume] (West Randolph, Vt.) 1878-1943, 1892-11-10
AT THE TABERNACLE.
A SERMON ADDRESSED TO voT-
ERs JUST BEFORE ELECTION.

The Examples of Nineveh, Babylon, Tyre
sidon and Many More Warn Us-Thi
Nation Is Also Becoming Corrupt apS
Licentious-"Re Is Necessary"
BROOKLYN, Nov. Grey. DR.. Talmagt
today selected for his sermon subject sui
6ciently appropriate for these times wher
throughout the United States great polit
ical questions are being discussed and the
nation is about to go to the ballot box and
decide who shall rule in the neighborhood
town, city and nation. The text chosen
was Revelation xviii, 10, ALAS, alas, that
great city Babylon. that mighty city, for
in one hour is thy judgment comer'
Modern scientists are doing a splendid
work in excayating the tomb of a dead EN-.
pire holding in its arms dead city-moth-
er and child Of the same name, Babylon.
The ancient mound invites the spades and
shovels and crowbars while the unwashed
natives look on in surprise. These scien.
fists find yellow bricks still impressed
with the name of Nebuchadnezzar, and
they go down into the sarcophagus of a
monarchy buried more than two thousand
years ago. May the explorations of Raw
linson and Layard and Cheyalier and OPP
perto and LOTUS and Chesney be eclipsed
by the present archaeological uncoveringl
THE AWFUL RUIN
But is it possible this is all that remains
of Babylon-a city once five times larger
than London and twelve times larger than
/ New York? Walls three hundred and sew
enty-three feet high and ninety-three feet
/ thick Twenty-Five FURNISHED gates on
! ci1a Nth cfr a.t,unfstr, ,.laap
4 through to corresponding gates on the 9th
er side. Six hundred and twenty five
squares. More pomp and wealth and splen-
dor and sin than could be found in any
five modern cities combined city of
palaces and temples. A city having within
it garden on an artificial hill four hun
dred feet high, the sides of the mountain
terraced. All this built to keep the kings
wife, Amytis, from becoming homesick for
the mountainous region in which she had
spent her girlhood The waters of the
Euphrates spouted up to irrigate this great
altitude into fruits and flours and arbo.
rescence unimaginable A great river run
ming from north to south clear through the
city, bridges over it, tunnels under it.
boats on it.
A city of bazaars and of market places,
uhilN lOI dEOilldiiCb anu anu
high mettled horses with grooms by their
side, and thyme wood, and African ever
green, and Egyptian linen, and all styles
of costly texsle fabric, and rarest puppies
extracted from shellfsh on the Mediter-
ranean coast, and rarest scarlets taken
from brilliant insects in Spain, and worries
brought from successful elephant hunts in
India, and diamonds whose flash was
H. a. A.
tress, embattlement rising above embat-
Element Great capital of the ages But
one night, while honest citizens were
asleep, but all the saloons of saturnalia
were in full blast, and at the kings castle
they had filled the tankards for the tenth
time, and r,eling and guffawing and hic-
coughing around the state table We're the
rulers of the land, General Cyrus ordered
his besieging army to take shovels and
spades, and they diverted the river from its
usual channel into another direction, so
that the forsaken bed OF the river became
the path ON which the besieging army en-
tered
When the morning dawned the conquer
ors were inside the outside trenches Baby
lon had fallen, and hence the sublime
threnody OF the text, Alas, alas, that
great city Babylon, that mighty city, for
in one hour is thy Judgment Gomez But
do nations dieg Oh, yes; there is great
mortality among monarchies and republics.
They are like individuals in the fact that
they are born; they have middle life; they
have decease; they have cradle and
grave. Some Of them are assassinated
some destroyed by their own hand Let
me call the roll of some of the dead civiliza
tons and some OF the dead cities and lei
some one answer for them.
AS FoEETOLD BY THE PROPHETS.
Egyptian civilization, stand up. "Deadr
answer the ruins Of Karnak and Luxor, and
from seventy pyramids on the east side of
the Nile there comes up great chorus, cry
ing, Dead, dead" Assyrian empire, stand |
up and answer. Dead" cry the charred !
ruins of Nineyeh After six hundred years |
of magnificent opportunity, dead. Israel
itish kingdom, stand up. After two hun |
dred and fifty years Of divine interposition. |
and of miraculous vicissitude, and of heroic |
behavior, and of appalling depravity, dead |
Phgnicia, stand up and answer After in.
venting the alphabet and giving it to the |
world, and sending out her merchant cara
vans in one direction to central Asia and |
sending out her navigators to the Atlantic |
ottdh III dAOtHtT uiTtcNlOn, utdu.
Pillars of Hercules and rocks on which |
the Tyrian fisherman dried their nets all |
answer, Dead Phenicia." Athens, after |
Phidias after Demosthenes, after Mil |
tiades. dead. Sparta, after Leonidas, after
Euribiades, after Salamis, after Their |
mopyle, dead. Roman empire, stand up |
and answer-empire once bounded by the |
British channel on the north. by the Eu-
pirates on the east, by the great Sahara
desert IN Africa on the SOUTH by the At
lantic ocean on the west; home of three |
great civilizations, owning all the then dis. |
covered world that was worth owning
Roman empire, answer. Gibbon in his /
Rise and Fall of the Roman Elm
pire" says, "Deadl' and the forsaken
seats of the ruined Coliseum, and
the skeleton of the aqueducts. and
the miasma Of the Campagna, and the
fragments of the marble baths, and the
useless piers of the Bridge Triumphalis.
and the Mamertine prison, holding no more
apostolic prisoners, and the silent Forum
and BaSilira of Constantine anl Il |