The Penn's Grove record., 1893-10-06
REV. DIR.
THE BROOKLYN DIvINE's sun
DAY SERMON.
Subject: "The Gardens of the Sea-,

EuDlttLs III ehS DChs
TEXT: "TAe meeds pere urapped about m,
hedd."-Jonah H., ..
.sTbe Botany Of the Bible or, God Amone
the Flower" " is a fascinating subject. / hold
in my hand q book which L brought from
Palestine. bound in olive wood. and within
II are pressed flowers which have not only
retained their color. but their aroma. Flow,
ers from Bethlehem. flowers from Jerusa.
lem, flowers from Gethsemane. flowers iron
Mount of Olives, flowers from Bethany, flow.
ers from Sloan flowers from the valley of Je-
boshaphat. red emone5 and Wild migno.
nette. buttercups, daisies, cyclamels, camo.
mile. bIuebells, ferns, MOSES, grasses and O
wealth of fora that keep me fascinated by
the hour, and every time | open 1t 1t Is q new
revelation. 1t Is the New Testament of the
fields. But my text leads US into another
realm of the botanical kingdom.
Having spoken to you In a course OF SER
mons about "God Eyerywhere'-on ''The
Astronomy of the Bible or, God Among the
stars y 'The ORTHODOXY of the Bible or,
God Among the Birds . ''The ~Ichthyology
of the Bible or, God Among the Fishes y
..The Mineralogy Of the Bible ;or, God Among
the Amethysts . THE Conchology of the
Bible; or, God Among the Shells "-''The
Chronology Of the Bible or, God Among the
Centuries"-I speak now to you about 1.-THE
Botany OF the Bible or, God In the Gardens
Of the Sea-" Although I purposely take this
morning for consideration the least observed
and least appreciated of all the botanical
products Of the world, we shall find the con.
temptation very absorbing.
In all our theological seminRries where we
make ministers there ought to be professors
TO give lessons in natural history. Physical
science ought to be taught side by side with
revelation. 1t is the same God who inspires
the page OF the natural world as the page oil
the Scrlptural world. What a f%reshening up
it would be to our sermons to press into
them even n fragment of Mediterranean sea-
weed! We should have fewer sermons
awfully dry II we initiated our blessed Lord,
and In our discourse, like Him, we would
let a lily bloom, or a crow fly, or q hen
brood her chickens, or a crystal OF salt daSf
out the preservative qualities OF religion.
The trouble is that in many of our theo-
logical seminaries men who are 80 dry them
selves they never could get people to come
and hear them preach are now trying to
teach young men how to preach, and the
student is put between two great presses Of
dogmatie theology and squeezed until there
is no life left in him. Give the poor victim
At least one lesson on the botany OF the Bible.
That was an awful plunge that the recreani
prophet Jonah male when, dropped over the
cunWales of the Mediterranean ship, he sans
many fathoms down into n tempestuous sea.
Both before and afterth monster of the deep
swallowed him, he was entangled In seaweed.
The jungles OF the deep threw their cordage
of vegetation around him. Some ofthis sea.
weed was anchored to h bottom OF the
watery abysm, and come of 1t was ahoat and
swallowed by the great sea monster, so that,
while the prophet was at h bottom OF the
deep after he was horribly imprisoned he
could exclaim and did exclaim in the words
OF my text, ''The weeds were wrapped abou'
my head"
Joanah was the first TO record that there
are growths upon the bottom of the sea as
we'll as upon land. The first picture / ever
owned was a handful of seaweeds pressed on
a page, and | called them ''the shorn locks
Of Neptune" These products of the deep,
whether brown or green or yellow or pur'
pie or red or intershot of many colors, are
most fascinating. They are distributed al
over the depths and from Arctic to Antarctic.
That God thinks we'll OF them I conclude
from the fact hat he has made 5000 species
Of them. Sometimes these water plant;
are 400 or 700 feet long, and they cable
the sea. One specimen has a growth o
1900 feet.
On the northwest shore of our country is
seaweed with leaves thirty or forty feet long,
amid which the sea otter makes his home
resting himself on the buoyancy OF the lea
and stem. The thlcsest ~lungles of the trop'
les are not NOR full OF vegetation than the
depths OF the saa. There are forests down
there and vast prl'ries all abboom, and Goo
walks there as he walked in the Garden o.
Eden Gin the cool OF the day." Oh. what
enhancement, this ~subaqueous world! Oh
the God given wonders OF the seaweed! Its
birthplace is a palace OF crystal. The cradle
that rocks It is the storm. Its grave is asar'
cophagus of beryl and sapphire. There II
40 night down there.
There are creatures OF God on the bottom
Of the sea SO constructed that. strewn al
along, they make n ornament besprent witt
stars, consultations and galaxies OF impos'
ing luster. The sea feathers a lamplighter
The gymnotus is on electrician, and he Ii
%surcharged with electricity and makes the
deep bright with the Lightning of the sea
The ~gorgonia flashes like Jewels. There arr
sea ablaze with light. There arr
the starfsh and the moon1sh, SO called De,
causethey SO powerfully suggest stellar ano
lunar illumination.
Oh, these midnight lanterns of the ocean
cayerns; these professions of flame over tht
white floor Of the deep these illuminations
three miles down under the sea these
g%orgeously upholstered castles of the al
mighty in the underworld! The author o
the text felt the pull of the hidden vegetation
OF the Mediterranean, whether or not he ap'
preciated its beauty, as he cried out, 'Iht
weeds were wrapped about my head"
Let my subject cheer all those who haf
friends who have been buried at sea or In
our great American lakes. Which OF u:
brought up OF the Atlantic coast has not hac
LipIPaI mr. friaDl Tina aop,,i abara1p Wa HAC
the useless horror Of thinking that they wert
denied proper resting place. Wesaid ION
IL they had lived 10 come ashore and nae
then expired What an alienation OF GU
trouble it would have been to put them II
some beautiful family plot, where We could
have planted flowers and trees over them.
Why, God did better for them than we coulc
have done for them. They were let down
into beautiful gardens. Before they ha
reached the bottom they had g~arlands aoou
their brow.
In more elaborate and adorned place ina
we could have afforded them they were pu
away for the last slumber. Hear 1t, mother
and fathers OF sailor boys whose ship wen
down in our last August hurricane Iner'
are no Greenwoods or Laurel Hills or Noun
Auburns so beautiful on the land as there arr
banked and terraced and scooped and hun
in the depths of the sea. The bodies OF gu
~foundered and sunken friends are girdiet
and canopied and housed with such glotit
as attend no other Metropolis.
They were swamped in hfeboats, or the!
struck on Goodwin sands or Deal beach o
the skerries, and were never heard Of, or DIS
appeared with the City Of Boston, or the VII
de Hayre, or the Cymbria or were run dow
in a fishing smack that put out from New
toundland. But dismiss your previous gloon
sbout the horrors Of ocean e~ntombment,
When Sebastopol was besieged in tn
Anglo-french war, Prince Mentchikof, com
handing the Russian navy, saw that IN
only way to keep the English out Of the mar
Dor was to sink all tie Russian ships OF wa
in the roadstead, and so 100 vessels SANK
When, after the war was over, our American
engineer. Gowan, descended to the depth
in q diving bell, 1t was IN impressive spec
tacle.
One hundred buried ships! But it Is tina
way nearly all across the Atlantic ocean
Ships sunk not by command of admirala
but by the command OF cyclones
But thew all had sublime burial, and the sur
~roundings amid which they sleep the Las
sleep are more imposing thar the Ia Mahai
the mausoleum with walls incrusted Wiz
precious stones and built by the great mogu
OF India over his empress. Your departe'
ones were buried In the gardens OF the sea
fenced on by hedges of coralline.
Inc greatest o~bsequies ever known On tn
land were those Of Moses, wh@e no one bu
dod was present. The sublime report OF tina
announcement is in the book of Deuteronomy
which says that the Lord buried him, and Q
Lhese VINO have gone down to slumber in IN
deep the same may be said, s'The Lord burie'
them. As Christ was buried In a garden, ;