Baxter Springs news. [volume] (Baxter Springs, Kan.) 1882-1919, 1893-02-18
ANCIENT ROME.
DR.. Talmage Disooursos on tho
Colosseum and It's Lessons.
Tho Terrible Slaughter In tho Great Am
phithcatcr Tho IIeroism or Tclcma-
clius-AIodcrn Brutailsm--
The Last Judgment.

IN luIc sermon db DTOOhlyu hGV. L.
Dewitt Talmage discoursed from the
text Romans, i. 10: II am ready tc
preach the Gospel to you that are al
Rome, also" The preacher said:
Rome! What n city it was when
Paul visited it! What city it is now!
Rome! The place where Virgil sang
and Horace satirized, and Terence
laughed and Cataline conspired. and
Ovid dramatized and Nero fiddled, and
Vespasian prosecuted aud Sulla legis-
lated, and Cicero Numbered, and Aure-
Illus and Decius and Cnligula and Julian
and Hadrian and Constantine and Au-
gustus reigned, and Paul, the apostle,
preached the gospel
] am not much of draughtsman, but
! have in my memorandum book Il
sketch which made III the winter of
1889, when ] went out to the gate
through which Paul entered Rome and
walked up the very street he walked
up to see somewhat how the city must
have looked TO him rs he came in on
the gospel errand proposed in the text
Palaces on either side of the street
through which the little missionary adj
vanced Piled up wiclSedness. En-
throned accurseness. Tempted crnel-
ties. Affairs TO sham deities. Glor;iied
delusions. Pillarcd, arched, domed,
turreted denominations. Wiclledress of
all sorts at high premium, and right
eousness 999! per cent. of. And now
he passes by the foundations of build
ing which is to be almost unparalleled
for vastness. You can see By the walls
which have begun to rise that here is
to be something enough stupendous to
astound the centuries. Aye, it is the
Colosseum started.
Perhaps, while in Rome, the law of
contrast wrought upon me. l had Wis
tied the Mamertine dungeon where
Paul was incarcerated.' l had meas
ured the openings ut the top of the
dungeon through which Paul had been
let down, and it was 90 inches by 26.
The ceiling, Mt Its highest point was
feet from the floor, but ut the sides
of the room the ceiling was ) feet
9 inches. The room, Mt the widest,
was Is feet. There was seat OF
rock 2j5 feet high. There was shelf
feet high. The only furniture
was spiders web suspended from
the roof, which saw by the torchlight
carried. There was the subterranc-
GUS passage from the dungeon to the
Roman forum, SO that the prisoner
could be taken directly from prison to
trial
Although now n vast ruin, the Colos-
scum is so well preserved that we can
stand in the center and recall all that
it once was. 1t is in shape ellipsoidal,
oval, oblong. 1t is, at its greatest
length, Gle feet. After it had furnished
seats for $1,000 people it had room for
$4,000 more to stand, SO that 100000
people could sit aad stand transfxed by
its scenes of courage and martyrdUm
and brutality and horror Instead of
our modern tickets of admission they
entered by ivory check, and q check
dug up near Rome within few years
was marked: Section 6, Lowest Tier,
Seat No u.s." You understand that the
building was not constructed for an au-
dience TO be addressed by human voice,
although tested it with some friends
and could not be heard across it, but it
was made only for seeing and was
circular and at any point allowed
full view of the spectacle. The arena
in the center in olden times was
strewn with pounded stone or sand,
so as not to be too slippery with
human blood, for if it were too slippery,
it would spoil the fun. The sand
flashed here and there with sparl1les of
silver and gold, and Nero added CHINA
bar and Caligula added chrysocolla.
The sides of the arena were composed
of smooth marble. eleven feet high, so
that the wild beasts of the arena could
not climb up into the audience. On
the top of these sides of smooth marble
was a metal railing, having wooden
rollers, which easily revolved, SO that
if panther should leap high enough to
scale the wall and with his paw touch
any of those rollers, it would revolve
and drop him back again into the arena.
But where was the sport to como
from? Well, l went into the cellars
opening off from the arena, and saw
the places where they kept the hyenas
and lions and panthers and wild boars
and beastly violence of all sorts, with
out food or water until made fierce
enough for the arena, and saw the un-
derground rooms where the gladiators
were accustomed to wait until the
clapping of the people outside demand
ed that they come forth armed to muir
der or to be murdered. ALI the ar
engagements were complete, as enough
of the cellars and galleries still re-
manned to indicate. What fun they
must have had turning lions without
food or drink for week upon an I'M
armed disciple of Jesus Christi At the
dedication of this Colosseum, 5000 wild
beasts and 10000 immortal men were
II Il