Connecticut western news., 1893-01-26
THE WALL OF OF IHIIE1A HIEa YEN IGNfa
DR. TALMAGE INTERPRETS THE suB- LIME IMAGERY OF THE APOCALYPSE.

The FounumrtoIis and the Twelve Wonder ful stones-Ancient Expectations About the Amethyst-And This Is but the Out side of Heaven.
 BROOKLYN, Jan. 22.-Dr. Talmage re- turned from his southern tour of preach ing and lecturing for ten days in Ken lucky, Tennessee, Alabama, Georgia and South Carolina, and resumed his course of sermons on God everywhere. Having preached on "The Astronomy of the Bible; or, God Among the Stars" "The Chronology of the Bible; or, God Among the Centuries" "The Ornithology of the Bible; or, God Among the Birds," he today speaks of "The Precious Stones of the Bible or, God Among the Anne thysts." Subject, "The Wall of Heaven" ]" Text, Revelation xxi, 19, "The founda- Hons of the wall of the city were gar nished with all manner of precious stones"
 Shall be frank and tell you what are my designs on you today? They are to make you homesick for heaven; to con- sole you concerning your departed Christian friends by giving you some idea of the brilliancy of the scenes in which they now comningle; to give all who love the Lord more elevated idea as to where they are going to pass the most of the years of their existence, and to set all the indifferent and neglected to quick and immediate preparation, that they may have it likewise.
 Yea, it is to induce many of our young people to study volume of God that Few ever open, but without some &C., quaintance with which it is impossible to understand the Bfble-I mean the precious stones, their specialization, their powers of refraction, their cleavage, their fracture, their luster, their phos- phoresence, their transparency, their in hnity of color and shape, and what they had to do with the welfare and doom of families and the destiny of nations-aye, the positive revelation they make of God himself.
 My text stands us in the presence of the most stupendous splendor of the uni verse, and that is the wall of heaven, and says of its foundations that they are garnished with all manner of pre- cious stones. All the ancient cities had walls for safety, and heaven has wall for everlasting safety. You may say that wall made up of all manner of precious stones is fgurative, but you cannot understand the force and signif- canoe of the figure unless you know something about the real structure and color and value of the precious stones mentioned.
 Now, propose this morning, so far as the Lord may help me, to attempt to climb not the wall of heaven, but the foundations of the wall, and ask you to join me in the attempt to scale some of the heights We shall only get part of the way up, but better that than to stay down on the stupid level where the most of us have all our lives been stand ing. We begin clear down at the bot tom and where the wall begins.
 THE JASPER WALL.
 The first layer of the foundation, reaching all around the city and for 1,600 miles, is layer of jasper. Indeed there is more of jasper in the wall of heaven than of any other brilliant, be- cause it not only composes part of the foundation, but makes up the chief part of the superstructure. The jasper is a congregation of many colors. It is brown, it is yellow, it is green, it is ven million, it is red, it Is purple, it is black, and is so striped with colors that much of it is called ribbon jasper.
 It is found in Siberia and Egypt, but 1t Is rare in most lands and of great value, for it is so hard the ordinary proc esses cannot break it off from the places where it has been deposited. The work men bore holes into the rock of jasper, then drive into these holes sticks of dry birch wood, and then saturate the sticks and keep them saturated until they swell enough to split the rock, and the frag- ments are brought out and polished and transported and cut into cameos and put behind the glass doors of museums.
 The portraits of Roman emperors were cut into it. The finest intaglio ever seer Is in the Vatican museum, the head oi Minerva in jasper. By divine arrange ment jasper adorned the breastplate ot the high priest in the ancient temple But it's most significant position Is where 1t glows and burns and darkens ani brightens and breaches from the lowes stratum of the wall of heaven. Glad an I that the very first row of stones in tht wall of heaven is jasper of many colors and If you like purple 1t is purple, ant If you like brown it is brown, and i you like green it Is green, and if yor like ocher yellow it is ocher yellow, ant if you like vermilion it is vermilion, ani If you like black it Is black. It suggest to me that heaven Is place of all color -colors of opinion, colors of creed, col ors of skin, colors of taste.
 THE BLUE SAPPHIRE.
 But we must pass up in this inspection of the foundations of the great vail O heaven. and after leaving the jasper tn next precious stone reached is sapphire and it sweeps around the city ,5O0 miles All lapidaries agree in saying that tn sapphire of the Bible is what we now cal lapis lazuh. Job speaks with emotion of "Ths place of sapphires," and Go' thought SO much of this precious ston that he put it in the breastplate of tn high priest, commanding, 'The secon' row shall be an emerald, sapphire an & diamond"
 The sapphire is blue, but varies fror faintest hrN to deepest ultramarine. is found pebble in the rivers of Cey lon. It is elsewhere in compact masses Persia and Thibet and Burmah and Ney South Wales and North Carolina yiel exquisite specimens. Its blue eye is see in the valley of the Rhine. After
 burial of thousands of years 1t has bee brought to sight in Egyptian monument and Assyrian cylinders.
 At Moscow and St. Petersburg an Constantinople have seen great masse of this sapphire, commonly called lap lazuh The closer you study its veir the moro enchanting, and do not wol der that the sapphire is called into u foundation of the wall of heaven.
 makes a strong stone for the foundation for if ia tho bardest If all minerals a