The Bolivar bulletin. (Bolivar, Tenn.) 1888-1946, 1892-11-25


The trouble is, when men sacrifice
themselves on this altar suggested in
the text, they not only sacrifice them
selves, but they sacrifice their families
If a man by an i'll course is determined
to go to perdition / suppose you will
have to let him go; but he puts his
wife and children in an equipage that
is the amaZement of the avenues, and
the driver lashes the horses into two
whirlwinds, and the spoxes flash in the
sun, and the golden headgear of the
harness CLEANS until Black Gala nifty
takes the bits of the horses and stops
them and shouts to the luxurious oc-
cupants of the equipage: sect out!''
They get out They get down. That
husband ard ia Their flung his family so
hard they never got up again. There
was the mark on them for life-the
mark OF a split hoof-the death-dealing
hoof of the golden calf
Solomon offered in one sacrifice, on
one occasion, twenty-five thousand
oxen and one hundred and twenty
thousand sheep; but that was a tame
sacrifice compared with the multitude
of men who are sacrificing themselves
on this altar of the golden calf, and
sacrificing their families with them.
The soldiers of Gen. Havelock, in India,
walked literally in the blood of the
''house of massacre" where two hun
dred women and children had been
slain by the Sepoys; but the blood
around about this altar of the golden
calf flows up to the knee, flows to the
girdle, flows to the shoulder, flows to
the lip Great God of Heaven and
earth, have mercyi The golden calf
has none.s
Still the degrading worship goes on,
and the devotees kneel and kiss the
dust, and count their golden beads, and
cross themselves with the blood of their
own sacrifice. The music rolls on I'M
der the arches: it is made of clinking
silver and clinlxing gold, and the rat
Ting specie of the banks and brokers'
shops and the voices of all the ex-
changes The soprano of the worship
is carried by the timid voices of men
who have just begun to speculate;
while the deep bass rolls out from
those who for ten years of iniquity
have been doubly damned. Chorus of
voices wailing over what they have
lost. This temple of which / speak
stands open day and night, and there is
the glittering god with his four feet on
broken hearts, and there is the smok-
ing altar Of sacrifice, new victims every
moment on it, and there are the kneel-
ing devotees; and the doxology of the
worship rolls on, while Death stands
with mouldy and skeleton arm beating
time for the chorus-"More more
more ~
Some people arc very much surprised
at the actions of folk on the stock ex-
change. Indeed, it IS scene some
times that paralyzes description and is
beyond the imagination of anyone who
has never looked in. What swapping
of finger and thumb and wild gesticula-
ton, and raving like hyenas, and
stamping like buffaloes, and swaying
to and fro, and running one upon an
other. and deafening uproar until the
president of the exchange strikes with
his mallet four or five times, crying:
"Order! orderi' and the astonished
spectator goes out into the fresh air
feeling that he has escaped from pande-
monium. What does it all mean? 1
will tell you what it means. The de-
voices of every heather temple cut
themselves to pieces and yell and gy-
rate. This vociferation and gyration
of the stock exchange is all appropri-
ate. This is the worship of the golden
calf.
But my. text suggests that this wor-
ship must be broken up, as the be-
havior of Moses in my text indicated.
There are those who say that this
golden calf spoken of in my text was
hollow, and merely plated with gold:
otherwise, they say Moses could not
have carried it. ! do not know that;
but somehow, perhaps by the assist
ance of his friends, he takes up this
golden calf, which is an open insult to
God and man, and throws it into the
fire, and it is melted, and then it comes
out and is cooled off, and by some
chemical appliance, or by an old-fash-
toned file it is pulverized, and it is
thrown into the brook, and. as a pun
ishment, the people are compelled to
drink the nauseatirg stuff. So, my
hearers, you may depend upon il that
God will burn and He will grind to
pieces the golden calf of modern
idolatry, and He will compel the people
in their agony to drink it. If not be-
fore, it will be SO on the last day. ! do
not know where the fire will begin,
whether at the Battery or at Central
park, whether at Brooklyn bridge or
at Bushwick, whether at Shoreditch,
London, or west end; but it viii be q
very hot blaze. All the government
securities of the United States and
Great Britain will curl up in the first
blast All the money safes and dePos-
iting vaults will melt under the
first touch. The sea will burn like tin
der, and the shipping will be abandoned
forever The melted gold in the bro
ker's window will burst through
the melted window-glass and into
the street; but the flying popula-
ton viii not stop to scoop it mp. The
cry of Fire from the mountain will
be answered by the cry of Fire" in the
plain. The confagration will burn out
from the continent toward the sea, and
then burn in from the sea toward the
land New York and London with one
cut of the red scythe of destruction
will go down. Twenty-Five thousand
miles of confagration! The earth will
wrap itself round aud round in shroud
of fame, and lie down to perish. What
then will become of your golden calf?
Who then so poor as to worship it?
Melted, or between the Upper and the
neither milestone of falling mountains