The Caucasian. (Clinton, N.C.) 188?-1913, 1892-01-07
AT THE TABERNACLE.
DIR. TALNAGE PREACHES
ON THE YEAR JUST
CLOSED.
The First Sunday OF the New
Year Is a Fitting Time to
Think on the Uncertain
Ties of Life.-.The AM
tideluvian Patri-
archs.
ALL AROUND US.

DANGER ALL AROUND US.
BROOKLYN, Jan. 3.-This morning
the Tabernacle congregation, meeting
for the first Sunday service of the
new year, found the pastor disposed
to serious reflections on the fight of
time. The opening hymn gave the
keynote in the familiar words:
Ny days are gliding swiftly by.
And l, a pilgrims stranger.
Would not detain them they iy,
Those hours of toll and danger.
DR.. Talmage read several passages
relating to antediluvian longevity,
making characteristic comments as
he read, and then preached from the
ominous words, jeremiah xvii, 10,
This year thou shalt die"
Jeremiah, accustomed to saying
bold things, addresses Hananiah in
these words. They prove true. In
sixty days Hananiah had departed
this life.
This is the first Sabbath of the
year. 1t is time for review and for
anticipation. A man must be a gen.
ius at stupidity who does not think
now. The old year died in giving
birth to the new, as the life of Jane
Seymour, the English queen, de-
parted when that of her son, Edward
vi, dawned. The old year was
queen The new shall be a king.
The grave of the one and the cradle
of the other are side by side We
can hardly guess what the child will
be. It is only two days old. but |
prophesy for it an eventful future
Year of mirth and madnessl Year
of pageant and confagration! 1t will
laugh it will sing; it will groan; it
will die.
Isitnot time for earnestthoughta
The congratulations have been given
The Christmas trees have been taken
down, or have well nigh cast their
fruit. The friends who came for the
holidays are gone in the rail train.
While we are looking forward to an
other twelve months of intense activ-
tiles, the text breaks upon us like a
bursting thunderhead, This year
thou shalt die"
The text will probably prove true
of some of us. The probability is
augmented by the fact that all of us
who are over thirty years of age
have gone beyond the average of hui
man life. The note is more than
due. 1t is only by sufferance that it
is not collected. Wea are like debtor
who is taking the three days grace"
of the banks. Our race started with
nine hundred years for lifetime.
We read of but one antediluvian
youth whose early death disappoint
ed the hopes of his parents by his
dying at seven hundred and seventy
seven years of age. The world then
may have been ahead Of what it is
now, for men had so long a time in
which to study and invent and plan.
If an artist or philosopher has forty
years for work, he makes great
achievements; but what must the
artists and philosophers have done
who had nine hundred years before
them2
In the nearly two thousand years
before the food, considering the
longevity of the inhabitants, there
may have been nearly as many peo
Pile as there are now. The food
was not freshet that washed few
people off a plank, but a disaster that
may have swept away thousand
millions If the Atlantic ocean. by q
sudden lurch of the earth tonight,
should drown this hemisphere, and
the Pacific ocean, by sudden lurch
of the earth, should drown the other
hemisphere, leaving about as many
beings as could be got in one or two
ocean steamers, it would give you an
idea of what the ancient flood was.
HOW LIFE WAS SHORTENED.
At that time God started the race
with shorter allowance of life. The
nine hundred years were hewn down.
until, in the time of Vespasian. cen
sus was taken, and only one hundred
and twenty four persons were found
one hundred years old and th-ee or
four persons one hundred and forty
wears old. Now a man who has come
to one hundred years of age Is Il curl
osity and we 60 miles to see him.
The vast majority Of the race passes
off before twenty years. To every
apple there are FIVE blossoms that
never get to be apples. In the coun-
try church the sexton rings the bell
rapidly until almost through, and
then tolls it. For awhile the bell of
our life rings right merrily, but with
some of you the bell has begun to
toll, and the adaptedness Of the text
to you is more and more probable
This year thou shalt die"
The character of occupation adds
to the probability. Those who are
in the professions are undergoing
sapping of the brain and nerve
foundations. Literary men in this
country are driven with whip and
spur to their topnost speed. Not
one brain worker out of a hundred
observes any moderation. There Is
something so stimulating in our eli
mate that if John Brown, the essay
list of Edinburgh, had lived here he
would have broken down at thirty
five instead of ffty-fve, and Charles
Dickens would have dropped at forty.
There is something in all our occupar
tions which predisposes to disease
If we be stout, to disorders ranging
from fevers to apoplexy; if we be
fraI, to diseases ranging from con-
sumption to paralysis
Printers rarely reach fifty years.