The Red Cloud chief., 1892-05-06
THE LAZY NOT WANTED,
Oh. Talmage Pays His Respects to
the Sluggard and Idler.
Activity Compared With Sluggishness-Ths
Sprightly Gazelle Delights the Eye
While the Sloth Is Loathsomo-
Lessons Drawn.

In a late ermo at Brooklyn Rev. 7
Dewitt Talmage discoursed on the ten
dency of many people to slothfulnes
and Incidence. His text was from
Proverbs xii. 81: 1.-THE slothful maj
roasteth not that which he took il
hunting" DR.. Talmage said:
David and jeremiah and Ezekiel ant
Slicah and Solomon of the text shove.
that sometime they had been out on
hunting expedition. Spears, lances
swords and nets were employed in theil
service. A deep pitfall would be digged
In the center of it there was some raised
ground with a pole on which a laml
would be fastened, and the wild beas1
not seeing the pitfall. but only seems
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-
slons, one to clear the land of ferOcious
beasts and the other to obtain meat fol-
themselves and families. The Occupa-
ton and habit of hunters are a favorite
Bible simile. David said he was hunted
by his enemies like a partridge upon the
mountain. My text is a hunting scene.
The first picture l 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, painting from the chase, are ly-
Ing on the door sill and the hunter is
unshouldering his game, while the
housewife is about to take a portion of
1T n prepare it for the evening meal.
unlike the person Of the text, she was
enough industrious to roast that which
a been taken in hunting. But the
world has had many a 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 a 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 rail-
ways" who. when at 16 years of age he
received an appointment to work at a
pumping engine for twelve shillings a
Week. cried out: Now l am a made
man for life" God gives to most men
at east one good opportunity. A great
Grecian general was me by a group of
begfars, and he said to them: IF you
wan beasts tOplow your land. l will lend
you some. If you want land, l will
give you some. If you want seed to
sow your land, I will see that you get
it. But l will encourage none in idle
ness" So God gives to most people an
opportunity of e~Xtrication from de-
pressed circumstances. As if to create
in us a hatred for Incidence, God has
made those animals which are sluggish
to appear lOathsome in our eyes, while
those which are feet and active he has
clothed with attractiveness. The tor
tOise, 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 wings of innumerable
birds God has spared no purple or gold
or jet or crimson or snowy whiteness.
Besides all this the Bible is constantly
assaulting the vice of laziness. Solo
mon seems to order the idler ont Of his
sight as being beyond all human in
struction when he says: Go to the ant,
thou sluggard: consider her ways and
be wise" And Paul seems to drive him
up from his dining table before he gets
through with tae first course of food
with the assertion: IF any will not
work, neither shall he eat"
Now, what are the causes of laziness
and what are its evil results? 1 knew
a man who was never up to time. 1t
seemed impossible for him to meet an
engagement. When he IA to be
married he missed the train. His
watch seemed to tase on the habits of
its owner and vas always too slow. He
had a constitutional lethargy, for which
he did 10 seem responsible. So indo-
lence often arises from the natural tenn
Z do not know but that
there is a constitutional tendency to
vice in every man. However
You may generally be, have You
not on some warm spring day felt a
touch OF this feeling on you, although
you may have shaken it off as you
would a reptile? But some are S pOwer-
fully tempted to this by their bodily
that all the work'of their
life has been accomplished with this
lethargy hanging on their back or
treading on their heels. You some
behold it in childhood. The child
moping and lounging within doors is
behind in every ace and beaten in
every game. His nerves, his muscles,
his bones are smitten with this palsy.
lie vegetables rather than lives, creeps |
rather than walks, yawns rather than
breathes. The animal in his nature
Is stronger than the intellectual. He
Is generally a great eater and active
only when he cannot digest that which
he a eaten. 1t requires as
much effort for him to walk as for
others to run. Languor and drowsiness
are his natural inheritance. He is built
FOR a slow sailing vessel, a heavy hulk
an insufficient cutwater. Place an
active man in such a bodily structure
and the latter would be shaken to pieces
n day. Every law of physiology
demands that he be supine. Such a one
IS not responsible for this powerful ten
1ency of his nature. His great duty is
When 1 See a man fighting
In unfortunate temperament, all INV