The Pickens sentinel. [volume] (Pickens, S.C.) 1871-1903, 1893-03-09
AT THE TABERNACLE.
"AS A HEN GATHERETH HER CHICK
EMS UNDER HER WINGS"
Text of DIR. Talmage's Sunday Morning
sermon-He Complains That Certain
Advertisers Have Been Using His Name
without Authority.


Advertisers Have Been Using His Name
without Authority.
BROOKLYN, Feb. 2G.-PreviOus to
the sermon in the Brooklyn tabernacle
this morning Rev. DR.. Talmage. in Civ.
ing out number of notices, dwelt upon
the fact that certain picture makers o
Brooklyn had used his name as a refer
ence in their advertisements and circu
lars without his authority. Thousand:
of letters of complaint have come u
him in this respect, and he wanted i
distinctly understood that he knew
nothing Of these p ,ople or their business
methods. The text selected for th'
"As hen gathereth her chickens unde
her wings, and We would not"
Jerusalem wasln sight rs Chlist came
to the crest of Mount Olivet, heigh
of TOO feet. The splendors of the rel
g'ous capital Of the whole earth irradla'
ted the landscape. There is the tenn.
pie. Ionder is the kings pallce.
Spread out before his eyes are the pomp,
the wealth, the wickedness and the
coming destruction OF Jerusalem, and
he bursts into tears at the thought OF
the Obduracy of a place that he would
gladly have saved. and apostrOphlZes,
saving, 80, Jerusalem, Jerusalem, how
often would l have gathered thy chill
dren together, even as hen gathereth
her chickens under her wings, and yG
would not"
Why did Christ salect hen AMI chick
ems as smile? Next to the apposite-
ness of the comparison think it was to
help all public eachers in the matter Of
illustration to get down OIL their stills
and use comparisons that all can under
stand. The plainrst bird on earth is
the barnyard fowl. Its only adon.
ments are the red comb In its headdress
and the wattles under the throat. 1t
has no grandeur of genealogy. All we
know IS that its ancestors came from
India, some of them from height of
1000 feet on the sides of the Himalay-
as. 1t has no pretension of nest like
the eagles eyre. 1t has no luster Of
plumage like the goldGnch. Possessing
anatomy that allows flight, yet about
the last thing it wants TO do is to fly,
and in retreat uses foot almos. as much
as wing.
Musicians have written out in musical
scale the song Of lark and robin red
breast and nightingale, yet the hen Of
my text hath nothing that could be
taken for song. but only cluck and
cackle. Yet Cmist in the text, uttered
while looking at doomed Jerusalem, de
clares that what he had wished for that
city was like what the hen does for her
chickens. Christ was thus simple in
his teachings. and yet how hard it is for
us, who are Sunday school instructors
and editors and preachers and reformers
and those who would gain the ears oil
audiences, to attain that heavenly and
divine art of simplicity.
We have to run a course of literary
disorders as children a course of physi
cal disorders. We come out of schoo
and college loaded down with Greel
mythologies, and out of the theological
seminary weighed down with what thu
learned fathers said, and we fly will
wings of eagles and f1amingoes and al
batrosses, and it takes good while be-
fore we can come down TO ChrtsL's
slmllitudes, the candle under the bushel
the salt that has lost it's SAVIOR, the net
thrown into the sea, the spittle on the
eyes Of the blind man and the hen and
chickens.
There is not much poetry about this
winged creature OF God mentioned in
my text, but she is more practical and
more motherly and more suggestive of
good things than many that fly higher
and wear brighter coiors. She is not a
prima donna OF the skies nor a strut Of
beauty in the allies Of the forest. She
does not cut circle under the sun
like the Rocky mountain eagle, but
stays at home to look after family af-
lars. She does not swoop like the con-
uor OF the Cordilleras TO transport
rabbit from the valley to the top OF the
crags, but just scratches for a living.
HOW vigorously with her claws she
pulls away the ground to bring up what
ls hidden beneath! When the breakfast
or dining hour arrives, she begins TO
prepare the rcpast and calls all her
young TO partal.e.
l arr IN SYM thy with the unprcten.
tIous, old fashioned hen, because, like
most OF us, she has to scratch for liy.
ing. She knows at the start the lesson
Which most people of good sense are
slow to learn-tbat the gaining of a
livelihood implies work, and tn IT. sue.
ccsses do not lie on the surface, but are
TO be upturned Ivy positive and conunu.
Gus ellort. The reason that society, and
the church, and the world are 80 full OF
failures, so full OF loaters, 30 full of dead
beats. is because people are not wise
enough TO tako the lesson which any
hen would teach thcm-that if they
would find for themselves and for those
dependent upon them anything worth
having they must scratch for il.
Solomon said, "Go 10 the ant. thou
siluggard.' say. Go to tho hen, thou
sluggard. In the Old Testament Cod
compares himself to an eagle stirring IN
her nest, and in the New Tcstame the
HOLY Spirit is compared to DESCENDING
dove, but Christ, in sermon, that he.
gins with cutting sarcasm for hypocritea
and ends with the paroxysm OF pathos
IN the text, compares himself to a hen.
One day in the country We saw and.
den CONSERVATION in the behavior of
olo Dominick. Why the hen should he
30 30 disturbed we could not understand.